Discuss the types of attribution

Through perception, individuals will often impose their own behavioural explanations for the actions of others which Heider discussed, is directly influenced by either the personal traits of that character or his social environment (Heider, The Psychology of Interpersonal Relations 1958). The term given to this social phenomena is the Attribution theory and although later developed by Harold Kelley (1967) and Bernard Weiner (1974), it was initially investigated by Fritz Heider during the 20th century. Heider explored the subcategory of common sense psychology as a means to introduce two categories to the attribution theory; internal and external attribution. During the internal attribution, one will infer a person’s behaviour is due to individualistic factors like attitude, personality traits or character, while the external classification is fixated on the environment’s impact on the behaviour (insert researcher here 1943). In addition to defining external attribution Harold Kelley (1967) provided further insight. Keller (1967) theorized that the environment can have direct causation for the person’s behaviour and was not simply a factor in their actions (Social Cognition: Understanding Self and Others, Gordon B. Moskowitz 1972). However, as attribution occurs various biases are present and can significantly affect a person’s reasoning in appraising another’s behaviour. Differing cultural backgrounds can also be a key factor in whether this appraisal is negative or positive.
Delving deeper into the internal and external attribution types, Kelley (1967) developed the covariation model that provided deeper explanation for self-perception and social-perception. Furthermore, the term covariation principle reasoned that at the same ...

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...ttribution, Maller B.F 2006).
The actor versus observer bias explains how people will attribute behaviour either to internal or external factors depending on whether they are the actor in the situation or observer. Miller and Norman (1975) showed that if a person is in a particular environment, they are more likely to blame their actions on that rather than make generalizations of their own personality. However, when the roles are reversed, they tend to attribute the other person to internal factors. In regards to cultural differences, an instance of this happens often in multicultural societies where the native of the country will blame their unemployment on mass immigration taking away job opportunities. Yet, when the roles are reversed they blame the person’s laziness or unwillingness to integrate into society (Quillian 1996; Kónya 2005; Pehrson and Green 2010).