Conservatism and Perceptions of Poverty: An Attributional Analysis1

Attribution theory was used to relate causal explanations for poverty to affect and behavioral intentions. In Experiment 1, student subjects rated 13 causes of poverty on importance, the attribution of controllability, blame, affects of pity and anger, and judgments of help-giving (personal help and welfare). Two individual differences, conservatism and the belief in a just world, were also assessed. A principal components analysis categorized the causes into three types: individualistic, societal, and fatalistic. Conservatism correlated positively with a belief in the importance of individualistic causes, controllability, blame, and anger, and it correlated negatively with perceptions of the importance of societal causes, pity, and intentions to help. No systematic effects of the belief in a just world emerged. A structural equation analysis revealed that personal help is emotionally determined, whereas welfare judgments are directly related to attributions of responsibility and political ideology. Experiment 2 revealed a similar pattern of results using a nonstudent sample.     

Attributional Training Versus Contact in Acculturative Learning: A Laboratory Study1

A culture assimilator, a programmed learning technique for teaching about another culture, was combined with behavioral contact to test for the joint effectiveness of the two approaches to acculturative training. A total of 45 White male college students were randomly assigned to five training conditions in a modified Solomon four-group design. Results indicated significant differences between trained and untrained S s on knowledge of Black culture and better behavioral performance (as rated by Black confederates who were blind as to the training conditions) for S s receiving assimilator training followed by contact than the reverse condition. Apparently, the assimilator provides an opportunity to consolidate new attributions prior to their use in a real interaction. The reverse pattern (interaction before the formation of new attributions) is seen as anxiety producing and a test for the role of anxiety in intercultural training was generally positive. Possible implications of the results for cross-cultural training theory and methodology are discussed.     

An Attributional Analysis of Reactions to Magic Johnson1

Principles from attribution theory were used to analyze public reactions to the health status of Magic Johnson. An experimental study containing two distinct samples (college students and African-American adults) together with supplemental reports from local and national media confirm the value of this approach. The findings show that inferences about causal responsibility are related to affective reactions of sympathy and anger toward Magic Johnson. Implications for attribution theory, as well as for future attitudes toward Magic Johnson, are discussed.     

An Attributional Analysis of Social Accounts: Implications of Playing the Blame Game1

These studies proposed that effective social accounts should contain external, unstable, specific, and uncontrollable attributions. In Study I, managers provided accounts for a negative event. The accounts contained highly unstable and specific attributions but, contrary to original predictions, they also contained highly internal and controllable attributions. In Study 2, managers rated the effectiveness of the account. Account effectiveness was positively related to unstable attributions, but was negatively related to external and uncontrollable attributions. These relationships were stronger (more negative) for accounts communicated downward than upward. These results indicate that blaming others or deflecting personal responsibility for negative events may be ineffective, especially when one is in a high‐status role.     

Perceptions of the Onset Controllability of AIDS and Helping Judgments: An Attributional Analysis1

Weiner's attributional model of helping behavior is used to examine the relationship between the perceived controllability of the onset of AIDS, the affective reactions of pity and anger, and helping judgments. In this model, the effect of the perceived controllability of another person's need on helping is mediated by pity and anger. In the present study, respondents read one of five scenarios describing a friend who had just been diagnosed with AIDS. The cause of the disease was manipulated in the scenarios. Knowledge about HIV transmission measures and respondent's gender were added as control variables to the original model, which was tested by using path analysis. The findings partially support Weiner's model. The effect of the perceived onset controllability of AIDS on helping judgments was mediated by pity, but not by anger. Respondents' anger toward a friend with AIDS did not inhibit help-giving.     

How to Argue Against Active Euthanasia

Most arguments against active euthanasia, as do most arguments in applied ethics generally, take place within the framework of what can broadly be referred to as a modern, as opposed to an ancient, approach to moral theory. In this paper, I argue that this fact works to the disadvantage of opponents of active euthanasia, and that if there is a successful argument against active euthanasia, it will be of the latter sort. In Part I, I attempt to clarify thedistinction between modern and ancient approaches with which I am concerned. In Part II, I attempt to show that any argument against active euthanasia that is of the first sort is bound to fail. In Part III, I propose an argument against active euthanasia of the second sort that I believe has a better chance for success. In Part IV, I consider some objections that can be raised against this argument and attempt to show how they can be overcome.     

An Attributional Analysis of Gender and Cancer-Related Stigma

This experiment examined the impact of gender on cancer-related stigma from Weiner’s (An attributional theory of motivation and emotion. Springer, New York, 1986) attributional perspective. Undergraduates (n?=?204; 59% female; 71% White) and community members (n?=?85; 62% female; 64% White) in the northeastern U.S. were assigned randomly to listen to an audiotaped interview of a target person with lung cancer in which gender and smoking status (nonsmoker, smoker, or unspecified) were manipulated. Participant and target gender predicted participants’ perceptions of disease controllability and anger toward the target person. The target person’s smoking status also predicted participants’ perceptions of disease controllability and emotional responses to the target person. Findings partially support Weiner’s (An attributional theory of motivation and emotion. Springer, New York, 1986) theory and suggest that the relationship between gender and cancer-related stigma deserves further investigation.     

An Attributional (Causal Dimensional) Analysis of Perceptions of Sexual Harassment1

Female and male subjects read one of three scenarios depicting a social-sexual interaction between a man and a woman. The scenarios varied in severity of the stimulus male's behavior according to whether sexual harassment had occurred. Subjects then rated the offensiveness of his behavior and whether it constituted sexual harassment. Subjects also rated the stimulus male's behavior on Weiner's (1986) three basic dimensions of causality: locus of causality, or the perceived cause of the behavior as internal or external; stability, or the likelihood of its recurrence; and controllability, or the amount of volitional influence he exercised during the interaction. Additionally, subjects reported their anger at the target male and sympathy for the target female. Findings generally indicated that for both women and men, as the scenarios increased in severity, these ratings were elevated. Gender comparisons also showed elevations in these ratings for female but not for male subjects, and only in the scenarios of lesser severity. Regression analyses revealed attribution variables—control, stability, and anger—as reliable predictors of perceived offensiveness and harassment in the most severe scenario, whereas affects were the most reliable predictors in scenarios of lesser severity. The implications of these findings for perception of sexual harassment are discussed.     

Altering Beliefs About the Importance of Strategy: An Attributional Intervention1

The study reported in this paper describes an attributional intervention designed to change maladaptive beliefs for failure from uncontrollable causes to a lack of strategy attribution. Rather than an academic setting, the context for this research was the heath field and subjects were 52 physical therapists experiencing role strain (failure) in their professional interactions with physicians. Half of these health professionals were randomly assigned to a 3-week intervention where they were trained to attribute their failures to poor choice of strategy, rather than to uncontrollable factors such as low ability or physician bias. Relative to a control group, subjects who participated in the attribution retraining program were more likely to endorse strategy attributions and expected greater success in their interactions with physicians at the conclusion of the intervention. At a 6-month follow-up, trained subjects also received more actual job promotions. These findings have implications for attribution retraining to strategy in a variety of domains.     

An Attributional Analysis of Jurors' Judgments in Civil Cases

Abstract

Jurors' assessment of disputants in civil cases can be conceptualized as an attributional task. An experiment was designed to test the hypothesis that jurors, in the process of performing their attributional analyses of disputants, would exhibit judgmental biases that favor the defendant and disfavor the plaintiff. A total of 166 college students witnessed slide-tape presentations of trials for two civil cases. Each trial represented one condition in a 2 × 2 (Roles × Order) factorial design: Jurors (a) either heard Actors X and Y assume the roles of plaintiff and defendant or heard the same actors assume the opposite roles and (b) expressed their verdicts either before or after engaging in an attributional analysis of each litigant's behavior. The results supported the hypothesis. Juror's attributional analyses in both trials reflected a bias against the plaintiff. Each actor's behavior was attributed more often to hostile intentions and negative stereotypes when he assumed the role of plaintiff than when he was the defendant. Juror's verdicts also reflected a bias against the plaintiff, with votes for each actor in both trials decreasing as he shifted from defendant to plaintiff. No significant order effect was detected in either trial.     

Consistent Liberalism does not Require Active Euthanasia

I argue that ‘classical liberalism’ does not sanction any easy permissiveness about suicide and active euthanasia. I will use liberal arguments to argue that the distinction between active and passive euthanasia is real and that assisted suicide is, at the very least, deeply troubling when viewed from an authentic liberal perspective. The usual argument for active euthanasia is a utilitarian, not a liberal argument, as recent calls to eliminate the conscientious objection rights of doctors who refuse participation in such procedures plainly demonstrate. The paper focuses on arguments in the public sphere (such as those articulated by James Rachels).     

An Attributional Perspective on African American Adults' Exercise Behavior1

The present study examined attributional patterns for successful and unsuccessful exercise behavior change in a sample of African American adults. Subjects typically reported the primary causes of successful exercise change to be of a motivational and personal nature, whereas attributions for unsuccessful change were primarily concerned with time management. Multivariate analyses indicated successes being attributed to internal, stable, and personally controllable causes, and failures to internal, unstable, and personally controllable causes. Stable attributions in the successful group were significantly correlated with expectations for continued maintenance, and unstable attributions were significantly related with expectations for future behavior change in the unsuccessful group. The findings are discussed with respect to attributional approaches to improving exercise and health behavior change.     

An Attributional Analysis of Emotional Reactions to Schizophrenia in Mexican and Anglo American Cultures1

The present study uses attribution theory to identify factors that may lead to unfavorable emotional reactions toward patients with schizophrenia and to highlight factors that may contribute to the observed inverse relationship between industrial status of a country and schizophrenia outcome. University students from Mexico and the U.S., 2 countries differing in industrial status, served as participants. Eighty-eight Mexicans from Guadalajara and 88 Anglo Americans from Los Angeles, California read vignettes of a patient described to meet DSM-IV criteria for schizophrenia. In one vignette, the patient's disorder was characterized by predominantly positive symptoms (e.g., hallucinations, delusions), whereas in the other vignette negative symptoms (e.g., social withdrawal, apathy) predominated. In support of an attributional approach, negative symptoms were associated with greater perceived control than were positive symptoms. Correspondingly, negative symptoms were found to provoke more intense negative affect and less intense positive affect than were positive symptoms. Some national and gender differences were also found.     

Mental Illness,Natural Death,and Non-Voluntary Passive Euthanasia

When it is considered to be in their best interests, withholding and withdrawing life-supporting treatment from non-competent physically ill or injured patients – non-voluntary passive euthanasia, as it has been called – is generally accepted. A central reason in support of the procedures relates to the perceived manner of death they involve: in non-voluntary passive euthanasia death is seen to come about naturally. When a non-competent psychiatric patient attempts to kill herself, the mental health care providers treating her are obligated to try to stop her. Yet it has been suggested that death by suicide can be a part of the natural course of a severe mental illness. Accordingly, if the perceived naturalness of the deaths occurring in connection with non-voluntary passive euthanasia speaks for their moral permissibility, it could be taken that a similar reason can support the moral acceptability of the suicidal deaths of non-competent psychiatric patients. In this article, I consider whether the suicidal death of a non-competent psychiatric patient would necessarily be less natural than those of physically ill or injured patients who die as a result of non-voluntary passive euthanasia. I argue that it would not.     

Understanding Intentions to Exercise Following a Structured Exercise Program: An Attributional Perspective1

The present study examined the relationships among perceived outcome, causal attributions, affect, expected success, and intentions to exercise following a structured exercise program. Participants were 105 volunteers who had just completed a 12-week exercise program. Results indicated that perceived outcome over objective outcome (% attendance) was significantly more important for understanding the attribution process. Interesting interactions indicated that (a) individuals who made personally controllable attributions reported higher positive affect following perceived success, but lower positive affect following perceived failure than those who made personally uncontrollable attributions, and (b) individuals who made external attributions following perceived failure reported higher expected success than those who made internal attributions. Finally, both positive affect and expected success showed positive relationships with intention to exercise following the program. It was suggested that attribution theory may be beneficial to understanding continued exercise following structured exercise programs.