Power and gender influences on responsibility attributions: the case of disagreements in relationships

In a sample of 156 college students (74 men and 82 women), the authors examined the influences of power status and gender on responsibility attributions and resolution choices during disagreements in personal relationships. The participants read vignettes in which relationship partners disagreed; then the participants placed themselves in the situations depicted and reported their perceived responsibility and resolution choices. The participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 power-status conditions (you have/your partner has greater power in the situation). Power status was based on resource power (i.e., a monetary inheritance) or on perceived power (i.e., financial knowledge). The authors tested 2 alternative power-status hypotheses (justified benefits/rights and ability/accountability) and 1 gender hypothesis. The results supported both power-status hypotheses. In addition, the men's and the women's responsibility attributions and resolution choices (i.e., adhering to their own wishes or deferring to their partner's wishes) revealed differential dependence on the type of power held by the person with greater situational power. The authors suggest issues further research concerning how situational differences in socially based expectations (e.g., power status and gender) may affect conflicts within relationships.     

Attributions of Responsibility in Cases of Sexual Harassment: The Person and the Situation1

When observers learn about a case of sexual harassment, it is common for them to assign responsibility to the victim and perpetrator. However, attributions of responsibility are complex judgments often based on variables beyond the case's details (e.g., attitudes). The present study examined how victim response, victim and perpetrator gender, and participant gender and gender‐role attitudes influenced participants' attributions. Victim and perpetrator responsibility were measured before and after participants knew the victim's reaction in order to examine whether new information would alter participants' attributions. Consistent with previous research, gender differences were found for attributions and attitudes. Victim and perpetrator gender did not affect attributions. However, biases appeared in open‐ended responses. Finally, only females made distinctions of responsibility across victim reaction condition.     

Priming Prejudice How Stereotypes and Counter-Stereotypes Influence Attribution of Responsibility and Credibility among Ingroups and Outgroups

The research examines the effect of priming negative stereotypic and positive counter-stereotypic portrayals of African Americans (Study 1) and women (Study 2) on interpretations of actual media events. A counter-stereotypic portrayal of an African American male led participants to subsequently make more external or situational attributions of responsibility to other African American males involved in unrelated media events (i.e., Rodney King and Magic Johnson), whereas stereotypic portrayals led to more internal or personal attributions. Similarly, a counter-stereotypic portrayal of a female tended to increase the perceived credibility of females involved in unrelated media events (i.e., the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas hearings and the William Kennedy Smith/Patricia Bowman rape trial) whereas stereotypic portrayals decreased their perceived credibility. Study 2 also revealed an ingroup-outgroup bias in the interpretation of media events, with females tending to be more sympathetic toward other females. Implications of these findings are discussed and suggestions made for future research.     

The role of positive thinking in social perceptions of cancer outcomes

Pressure for ‘positive thinking’ (PT; i.e. focusing on positive thoughts/suppressing negative thoughts to ‘fight’ cancer) burdens cancer patients facing health deterioration. It was determined whether PT exposure enhanced effort, control and responsibility attributions assigned to an individual for his/her cancer trajectory. Within an online blog a hypothetical same-gender person describes a personal cancer experience. 482 participants were assigned to one of six experimental conditions in which we manipulated PT exposure (blogger learns about ‘power of PT’ but does not try it, blogger tries PT, control/no PT) and cancer outcome (successful/unsuccessful treatment). A 3?×?2?×?2 multivariate analysis of covariance (with personal cancer experience covariates) tested PT exposure?×?cancer outcome?×?gender effects on attributions for the blogger's cancer outcome. Results indicate that PT exposure enhanced effort and responsibility attributions assigned to individuals for their cancer outcomes and that responsibility attributions differed as a function of gender. Findings suggest that exposure to the idea of PT may lead to cancer patients being perceived as culpable if they do not recover from the disease.     

Power at work: Linking objective power to psychological power

Experimental research conducted with student participants has documented that feeling powerful or powerless (psychological power) affects outcomes with high practical relevance for organizations. However, it is unclear how results from these studies can be generalized to organizational settings in which individuals have various roles that imply more or less objective power. To address this gap, we present a theoretical framework to aid in the understanding of how objective power in organizations affects psychological power. We assume that stable differences in organizational rank (i.e., structural power) determine the likelihood of interactions with superiors, subordinates, or peers. These interactions give rise to within-person variation in situational power which should lead to dynamic fluctuations of psychological power and eventually its outcomes. Results of a preregistered experiment (n = 190 participants) and a preregistered experience sampling study (n = 129 participants) conducted with working adults support our key predictions: Structural power was associated with the likelihood of being in a high power versus low power situation. Within-person differences in situational power were related to feelings of power such as judgments about (1) one's own ability to influence others in a given social situation (i.e., interpersonal power) and (2) one's own competence, agency, autonomy, and independence (i.e., personal power).     

The role of positive thinking in social perceptions of cancer outcomes

Pressure for 'positive thinking' (PT; i.e., focusing on positive thoughts/suppressing negative thoughts to 'fight' cancer) burdens cancer patients facing health deterioration. It was determined whether PT exposure enhanced effort, control and responsibility attributions assigned to an individual for his/her cancer trajectory. Within an online blog a hypothetical same-gender person describes a personal cancer experience. 482 participants were assigned to one of six experimental conditions in which we manipulated PT exposure (blogger learns about 'power of PT' but does not try it, blogger tries PT, control/no PT) and cancer outcome (successful/unsuccessful treatment). A 3?×?2?×?2 multivariate analysis of covariance (with personal cancer experience covariates) tested PT exposure?×?cancer outcome?×?gender effects on attributions for the blogger's cancer outcome. Results indicate that PT exposure enhanced effort and responsibility attributions assigned to individuals for their cancer outcomes and that responsibility attributions differed as a function of gender. Findings suggest that exposure to the idea of PT may lead to cancer patients being perceived as culpable if they do not recover from the disease.     

Adaptive thinking: Can adaptive dispositional attributions protect against the harmful effects of maladaptive situational attributions?

ObjectivesThe study was designed to examine if dispositional team-referent attributions moderate relationships between situational team-referent attributions and collective efficacy.DesignIn this cross-sectional design investigation, team athletes completed measures of dispositional team-referent attributions, situational team-referent attributions, and collective efficacy. Team outcome (i.e., win-loss status) was recorded.MethodAthletes (N = 163) on sport teams (K = 17) completed a measure of dispositional team-referent attributions (i.e., attributional style). They also completed a measure of situational team-referent attributions in reference to their most recent team competition and a measure of collective efficacy in reference to their next upcoming team competition.ResultsFollowing team victory, simple slopes analysis revealed a moderating effect such that adaptive dispositional team-referent attributions appeared to protect against the effects of maladaptive situational team-referent attributions on collective efficacy. This trend was demonstrated across stability and globality attribution dimensions. Following team defeat, no significant interaction effects were observed.ConclusionsThe results suggest that developing adaptive dispositional attributions after success may protect athletes from experiencing deleterious effects of maladaptive situational attributions. Future research is needed to confirm these results and understand how these results can be applied to attributional retraining interventions in sport.     

The benefits of collective responsibility: How ingroup reputation concern motivates prosociality in intergroup contexts

Collective responsibility processes have been investigated from the perspectives of the outgroup (e.g., collective blame) and the ingroup (e.g., collective guilt). This article extends theory and research on collective responsibility with a third perspective, namely that of the individual actor whose behavior triggers the attribution of collective blame. Four experiments (n = 78, 118, 208 and 77, respectively) tested the hypotheses that collective responsibility processes influence the individual actors' appraisals, emotions and behavior. The possibility of collective blame for their individual action prompted more prosocial behavior among participants (Experiment 1). Participants also experienced more ingroup reputation concern and in turn more negative emotions (Experiment 2–4) for a past wrongdoing if it could reflect negatively on the ingroup in the eyes of outgroups. The increased negative emotions then motivated participants to improve the ingroup's image (Experiment 4). The effects were moderated by perceived ingroup entitativity, in that activating collective blame increased ingroup reputation concern and negative emotions only for ingroups perceived as highly entitative (Experiment 3).     

Social competence in Zimbabwean multicultural schools: Effects of ethnic and gender differences

S tudents' social competence was investigated in relation to race/ethnicity and gender for a sample of 371 Zimbabwean students attending racially/ethnically integrated schools. About 42% of the students were black, and 58% white (mean age 12 years; SD=9 months). Peer and teacher sociometric ratings of children's social behaviour, social responsibility, and friendliness comprised the social competence measures. Tests of empirical independence among these social competence measures supported their uniqueness in reliably assessing components of the general construct of social competence among Zimbabwean students. Multiple analysis of variance procedures were used to examine the relationship between social competence statuses and group membership (i.e., race/ethnicity, gender) while controlling for aggregate scores and classroom racial proportions. Superior academic achievement and racial/ehnic propinquity are social status levelling factors in multiracial school settings. Teachers rated white students higher on social responsibility and social behaviour. Students rated white students higher on social responsibility only. Comparisons of social competence by ethnicity and gender revealed that white and female students were rated significantly higher on social behaviour and social responsibility than their black and male classmates. Female students were perceived as more socially competent or better adjusted to school than males. Reliable differences in social competence in race/ethnicity and gender groups were concentrated in peer ratings of social responsibility and in teacher ratings of social behaviour and social responsibility. In postcolonial settings or settings with a history of race/ethnicity and gender‐based privilege, minorities from a dominant culture may have higher social status than peers from a majority culture. Superior social competence in females is a resource for school adaptation and social climate. Students have perceptions of social competence in peers that only partially overlap with those of teachers and contribute uniquely to their experience of school. Social competence in students is multifaceted, gendered, and differently perceived by teachers and peers.     

How green defaults promote environmentally friendly decisions: Attitude‐conditional default acceptance but attitude‐unconditional effects on actual choices

Defaults (i.e., options that become effective without an active choice) have been found to be powerful tools to influence decision‐making in a range of behavioral domains. However, seemingly conflicting assumptions have been expressed regarding the interplay of defaults with individual attitudes. Whereas some expect attitude‐conditional effects (i.e., a statistical default‐by‐attitude interaction), others assume an attitude‐unconditional effectiveness of defaults (i.e., statistically additive effects). Integrating both assumptions, we argue that the interplay of defaults and attitudes depends on what is considered a default effect. Specifically, whereas default acceptance is likely to be attitude‐conditional, we predicted that defaults and attitudes would add up in explaining people's actual choices. We tested these hypotheses in an online shopping scenario presenting environmentally friendly or conventional default products to 231 participants. Participants’ environmental attitude was assessed with the General Ecological Behavior scale and actual product choices were identified if participants rejected a given default product. In line with our hypotheses, default acceptance was predicted by a default‐by‐attitude interaction. In contrast, actual environmentally friendly product choices were found to be an additive function of defaults and participants’ environmental attitude. From an applied perspective, our findings suggest that defaults can readily be applied even in attitude‐heterogeneous target populations. Concurrently, however, our findings also speak of the importance of people's attitudes for understanding individual decision‐making.     

Internal,external, genetic,or cultural? Lay theories about racial health disparities predict perceived threat,adherence, and policy support

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported that Black and Latinx communities experienced a disproportionate burden of illness. The goal of this study is to investigate laypeople's attribution of these disparities. We hypothesized the following four potential attributions: external causes (e.g. systemic racism), internal causes (e.g. personal choices), cultural causes (e.g., being close knit), or genetic causes (e.g., being more vulnerable for genetic reasons). Data from 447 participants revealed that lay theories involving external factors were the most endorsed, whereas theories relating to genetic causes were the least endorsed. Our analyses further revealed that external attributions predicted broader COVID-19 relevant outcomes (i.e., perceived threat of COVID-19, adherence to CDC guidelines, and support for government policies in response to COVID-19), even after controlling for political orientation, participant race, and other attributions. This research provides insight into how lay people's explanations for disparities can predict their reactions to the pandemic.     

Seeing the forest and not the trees: When impact uncertainty heightens causal complexity

This study attempts to isolate the effects of experiencing uncertainty on people's cognitive processes. I argue that people can believe that their actions affect the outcome (i.e. outcome control), but still face uncertainty regarding the extent to which actions will make a difference (i.e. impact uncertainty). To this end, I introduce a novel experimental paradigm which isolates the effects of impact uncertainty from outcome control. The findings revealed that after experiencing impact uncertainty, participants demonstrated greater causal complexity (i.e. more likely to make situational attributions and judge outcomes as having a “ripple effect”), but did not make fewer effort attributions for the outcomes. These findings demonstrate how the experience of impact uncertainty can affect cognitive processing, without compromising outcome control. Implications of these findings for developing more nuanced theories on control and uncertainty are discussed.     

The Effects of Accumulated Underaccommodation on Perceptions of Underaccommodative Communication and Speakers

This study examined the effects of repeated instances of underaccommodation (i.e., insufficiently adjusted communication) on people's perceptions and evaluations of communication and speakers. Participants (N = 179) completed a series of three map‐based tasks that required them to follow directions that contained insufficient information. Consistent with hypotheses, as underaccommodation accumulated across tasks, participants inferred less positive motives for the speaker's communication, and inferences about motive for each task contributed directly and indirectly to overall evaluations of both the speaker and their communication. These results indicate that accumulated underaccommodation is consequential, and underscore the theoretical importance of motive attributions to predicting reactions to underaccommodation.     

Durability and generalization of attribution-based feedback following failure: Effects on expectations and behavioral persistence

ObjectiveThis experiment investigated, following perceived failure, the immediate, long-term (i.e., durability), and cross-situational (i.e., generalization) effects of attribution-based feedback on expectations and behavioral persistence.DesignWe used a 3 × 2 (Group × Time) experimental design over seven weeks with attributions, expectations of success, and persistence as dependent measures.Method49 novice participants were randomly assigned to one of three treatment (attributional feedback) groups: (a) functional (i.e., controllable and unstable); (b) dysfunctional (i.e., uncontrollable and stable); or (c) no feedback. Testing involved three sessions, in which participants completed a total of five trials across two performance tasks (golf-putting and dart-throwing). In order to track whether the attributional manipulation conducted within the context of the golf-putting task in Session 2 would generalize to a new situation, participants performed a dart-throwing task in Session 3, and their scores were compared with those recorded at baseline (in Session 1).ResultsAnalysis of pre- and post-intervention measures of attributions, expectations, and persistence revealed that the functional attributional feedback led to more personally controllable attributions following failure in a golf-putting task, together with increases in success expectations and persistence. In contrast, dysfunctional attributional feedback led to more personally uncontrollable and stable attributions following failure, together with lower success expectations and reduced persistence. These effects extended beyond the intervention period, were present up to four weeks post intervention, and were maintained even when participants performed a different (i.e., dart-throwing) task.ConclusionsThe findings demonstrate that attributional feedback effects are durable over time and generalize across situations.     

Bystanders' reactions towards co‐punishment events in the Taiwanese military: Examining the moderating effects of organizational norms

The present study examined bystanders' justice perceptions about co‐punishment events. In a sample of 169 logistic officers in the Taiwanese military, responsibility attributions (i.e. liability attributed to co‐punished persons) had a negative relationship with perceived harshness, and a positive relationship with perceived procedural justice. In addition, the effects of responsibility attributions on procedural justice were weaker if the person perceived stronger rather than weaker organizational norms of co‐punishment.     

Use of the Self-Concept in Forming Preferences by French Students of Different Levels of Academic Achievement

Abstract

According to the results of recent research in France (D. Martinot & J. M. Monteil, 1995), only high-achieving students possessed well-structured academic self-concepts, which, in academic settings, should facilitate the use of a prototype-matching strategy (i.e., a decision-making strategy in which the self-concept guides one's choices). In 2 studies, the authors examined the tendency among French students of different academic levels to use the prototype-matching strategy. In Study 1, the participants of high and average academic achievement, but not those of lower academic achievement, used prototype matching in forming preferences. In Study 2, all participants in the condition (experimental) that facilitated the accessibility of academic self-concepts used prototype matching; the participants in the control condition did not.     

An Attributional Perspective on Sexual Aggression in India

ABSTRACT

This article reports the findings of programmatic research on attributions made by Indian participants with respect to hypothetical incidents of sexual aggression. The Indian research findings in the context of related research in Western countries, especially the judgmental variations obtained as a function of rapist-victim acquaintance and participant's gender, reflect the relatively low status of women and the patriarchal dominance of men in Indian society. Among other issues examined in the reviewed experiments were the rape victim's causal versus moral responsibility, the rapist-victim relationship, the gender-adversary perspective, and the ambiguity about victim's consent.     

The Effects of Apology and Perspective Taking on Interpersonal Forgiveness: A Dissonance-Attribution Model of Interpersonal Forgiveness

Abstract

The author investigated (a) the effects of a victim's perspective taking and a transgressor's apology on interpersonal forgiveness and (b) forgiveness as a mode of dissonance reduction. Before the participants read a scenario describing a situation in which they imagined being mistreated by a classmate, the author randomly assigned them to 1 of 4 perspective-taking conditions: (a) recalling times when they had mistreated or hurt others (i.e., the recall-self-as-transgressor condition); (b) imagining how they would think, feel, and behave if they were the classmate (i.e., the imagine-self condition); (c) imagining how the classmate would think, feel, and behave (i.e., the imagine-other condition); or (d) imagining the situation from their own (i.e., the victim's/control) perspective. After reading the scenario, the participants read an apology from the classmate. The participants in the recall-self-as-transgressor condition were significantly more likely than those in the control condition to (a) make benevolent attributions, (b) experience benevolent emotional reactions, and (c) forgive the transgressor. The relationship between the perspective-taking manipulation and forgiveness was mediated by the benevolent attributions and positive emotional reactions experienced by the victims.     

Arrogant or self-confident? The use of contextual knowledge to differentiate hubristic and authentic pride from a single nonverbal expression

Two studies tested whether observers could differentiate between two facets of pride—authentic and hubristic—on the basis of a single prototypical pride nonverbal expression combined with relevant contextual information. In Study 1, participants viewed targets displaying posed pride expressions in response to success, while causal attributions for the success (target's effort vs. ability) and the source of this information (target vs. omniscient narrator conveying objective fact) were varied. Study 2 used a similar method, but attribution information came from both the target and an omniscient narrator; the congruence of these attributions was varied. Across studies, participants tended to label expressions as authentic pride, but were relatively more likely to label them as hubristic pride when (a) contextual information indicated that targets were arrogant and (b) no mitigating information about the target's potential value as a hard-working group member (i.e., that success was actually due to effort) was presented.