Psychology I / Attribution Theory and the Fundamental Attribution Error
Practice question · Match the pairs

Each judgement below is biased. Identify which attribution bias it displays.

  • Actor-observer bias
  • Self-serving bias
  • Fundamental attribution error
  • You get top marks and say it shows how hard you worked; you fail the next paper and say the questions were unfair.
  • A driver cuts you off on the motorway and you conclude he is a reckless jerk.
  • You cut someone off yourself, and explain that you were racing to a hospital appointment.
Hints
  1. First ask whose behaviour is being explained: someone else's, or your own?
  2. If it is your own, ask whether the case contrasts a SUCCESS with a FAILURE - that contrast is what marks the self-serving bias off from the plain actor-observer bias.
Show the answer
  • Actor-observer bias → You cut someone off yourself, and explain that you were racing to a hospital appointment.
  • Self-serving bias → You get top marks and say it shows how hard you worked; you fail the next paper and say the questions were unfair.
  • Fundamental attribution error → A driver cuts you off on the motorway and you conclude he is a reckless jerk.
Why

r1 and r4 explain a stranger by character while ignoring visible circumstances - the fundamental attribution error. r2 and r5 explain the speaker's own behaviour situationally - the actor-observer bias. r3 is the self-serving bias specifically, because the same person's success and failure are attributed in opposite directions.

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