When an event occurs, whether it is positive or negative, human nature calls for an explanation. Why did you do poorly on a test? Why were you late for class? In order to explain such experiences, we make attributions. I received a bad grade on the test because I didn't study enough. I was late arriving to class because there was a traffic jam. Attributions seem simple enough; they are an explanation for something that has happened. It is the reasons why we make the attributions we do that is a bit more complex.
What is Attribution Theory:
The Attribution Theory is based on the reasons for our successes and failures. Every attribution is categorized in terms of locus, stability, and controllability. Locus refers to the location of the attribution. If a student believes that the reason they failed or succeeded lies within their own self, the attribution in internal. Conversely, if the student cites something in the environment as the cause of their success or failure, the attribution is external. Stability denotes whether or not the attribute will stay the same or change. A stable attribution indicates that the cause of the success or failure is the same in the past and the future, while an unstable attribution occurs when the situation is expected to change. For example, ability is considered a fairly stable factor, whereas effort is readily increased and deemed unstable. Controllability is the student's ability to affect the outcome by controlling the factors that caused it. Uncontrollable attributions are not within the student's control. An uncontrollable factor might be a time constraint or feeling ill.
Examples
| Controllable Factors | Uncontrollable Factors | |
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| External Factors |
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Why We Make Attributions:
We make attributions to satisfy our need for an explanation. These attributions usually stem from our perception of the event we are attempting to justify. Depending on the circumstances, we may consider only the current situation or we may include past experiences. Stereotypes, in as much as they influence our perceptions, also have an effect on the attributions we make.
There are times when attributions are straightforward. If traffic causes you to arrive late to class, the attribution is part of a clear-cut cause and effect relationship. The result of your efforts on a test is not always so directly correlated. Perhaps you studied very hard, only to receive a low exam score. How would you explain this outcome? Often, the attributes we make arise from the current circumstances. Maybe the test was much more difficult than you anticipated, or you didn't feel well. Attributes can also be based on our prior experiences. If you repeatedly fail tests in a range of subject areas, you may begin to believe that you have a have a problem with tests in general and chalk up your low scores to an inferior test-taking ability.
Stereotypes also play a role in the attributions we make. In essence, attributions stem from our perception of an event; we allocate a cause for what has happened based on our observations, beliefs, and comprehension of the situation. Since stereotypes can influence our perception, they can impact the attributes we assign. For example, females are stereotyped as being less skilled in math than males. Therefore, if a female received a low score on a math assignment or test, she would be more likely to attribute it to low ability than a male would. We can make attributions about others, too, and stereotypes effect these attributions as well. Take the widely held stereotype is that of the African American athlete, for instance. If both an African American and Caucasian student were both equally gifted at basketball, the coach might attribute their skill to different causes. He might credit the Caucasian student's ability to long hours of practice and hard work, and ascribe the African American student's skill to natural ability.
Student Implications:
The attributions students make can be quite powerful. Locus impacts a student's academic self-esteem. A student that attributes failures to an internal locus will have a lower self-esteem than a student that cites external factors. The opposite is true for successes: a student that ascribes a good grade to luck or other external factors will have lower self-esteem than a student who takes credit for their work. Stability affects the student's hope for the future. A stable attribution, such as ability, may lead the student to believe that the future is predetermined. Thus, a student achieving unsatisfactory results may feel discouraged. An unstable attribution, on the other hand, would allow the student some hope for a different outcome in the future. For instance, if a student believes that a low grade was the result of being unprepared, they will feel that they can earn a better grade by studying more for the next exam. Controllability creates a feeling of being in control of our own fate and emotional health. If a student feels that they are in control of the situation they know that the result is directly related to their actions; to change an outcome, they must alter their behavior.
Learned Helplessness
Learned Helplessness occurs when students attribute their successes and failures to factors that are out of their own control. Whether or not the contributing factors are really out of the students’ control, they believe that they cannot succeed due to things that lie in the uncontrollable sections of the chart. When students fail a test, some students will attribute their failure to the lack of studying, or their own poor preparation for the test, and other students will attribute their failure to things like their lack of ability, or that the teacher does not like them (all of which are things that the student cannot control). Because students feel that they are unable to control their own success or failure, a state of learned helplessness occurs.
As this illustration shows learned helplessness occurs when the student believes that their behavior as little or no affect on the outcomes, and other uncontrollable influences have a very direct affect on the outcome.
This illustrates the opposite, when students believe that their behavior is the primary factor of the outcome, and other uncontrollable influences have little or no impact on the outcome.
Some signs of learned helplessness are students who say things like, “Why try?” and “What’s the point?” They say these things because they really believe that they have no control over the outcomes. Students become passive and shy away from the work, and willingly take the bad grades, because they feel there is no use in trying.
How can you use the attribution theory to influence learning?
There have been many studies on the attribution theory and the influence it has on people. Although there are many examples, for the purpose of this website the focus will be on one such study. This study was done to see the effect the attribution theory could have on math scores and self-esteem. The research was done on second grade students. The researchers designed ways to measure math skills as well as self-esteem before and after the testing period. They then created a phrase for each student that the teacher would say and/or write to them. Students would receive either attribution training, persuasion training, or reinforcement training. For the attribution training, the teacher would say or write comments such as "You always work extremely hard in math." In the persuasion training, the students would receive comments similar to, "You should be doing better in math." Lastly, a statement such as, "I am pleased with your work," would be provided for the reinforcement training. After the training period, the results showed that while all of the students had higher self-esteem, the students who went through attribution training had the highest. As for the test results, the students took two tests after the training which lasted 8 days. The students with the attribution training averaged two points higher than the other students on twenty point tests.
Using the attribution theory to influence others is often referred to as attribution training. To use it effectively, there are two key steps. The first thing that must be done is applying it to a situation in which people are questioning why things occur. Next, it must be explained by relating it to an internal attribution. Working with internal attribution is much more effective than external attribution. External attribution provides little to no motivation to change a behavior because the person involved believes that that other things need to be modified, not themselves or their actions. Attribution training is quite simple. While a student is doing their homework in class, the teacher could come up and say "You are a very hard working student, no wonder you do so well on your homework." When students hear these types of comments, they begin to believe it and change their behaviors to match these beliefs. This technique can be applied to the school setting, as well as many other aspects of life. There have been examples in the heath field where this training has been used to influence people to eat healthier and practice self-control.
What can a teacher do?
As a teacher, you have several opportunities in preventing and changing learned helplessness. Prevention is much easier but it is not impossible to instill the proper attributions with students that have learned helplessness.
The first strategy is providing a responsive classroom environment. Showing or telling students what it will take to receive a good grade on the assignments, and what the student will have to do in order to get the grade. Sometimes holding a classroom discussion to clarify those behaviors that will affect the grade is good, and make sure those behaviors are always things that are within the students’ control.
Second, you can help change a student’s pessimistic explanatory style. Most often a student that displays an optimistic explanatory style for the bad events that come their way is protected from the demoralizing effects of failure. A teacher can help this process of changing one’s explanatory style by offer coaching in the identification between behaviors and outcomes. A teacher might present a difficult problem for a student, and allow them to struggle with it for a while, and then reveal the secret to the problem. The reaction from the student is often, “it was solvable, I can do the next one.” Teachers can also expand the range of students’ possible attributions by slightly modifying them when they occur. For instance if a student says, “ I failed because I am just not a good reader.” A teacher can offer an alternative, and equally valid attribution such as ineffective strategy, insufficient effort, or lack of experience. Changing their attribution from something that is beyond their control to things that are within their control.
Teacher's Response:
Teachers can respond and help their students through the three spectrums. Through the locus the teacher determines where students learning stops and where to start back up again. Through stability the teacher using phrases such as, "you can do this if you try," reinforces the student's belief that their ability to be successful is stable. Through controllability a teacher's response to the students' successes and failures can determine if the teacher feels that the student is in control of their own outcome. Sympathy, on the part of the teacher, can communicate that no matter how much an effort a student puts fourth, he or she will never accomplish the task. Where as criticizing a student when he or she could have done better can communicate the message to the student that he or she has the ability to do better.
Analyzing Calvin
What is Calvin's motivational pattern?
Identifying a motivational pattern for Calvin based on his attribution tendencies is a little tricky. He provides plenty of reasons for his troubles in school, but his attributions vary in terms of locus, controllability, and stability. In fact, the most revealing aspect of Calvin's attributions is found in his ability to shift blame away from himself. Examining the actual attribution yields very little insight into the situation as he manipulates the attribution to accommodate his need to place blame elsewhere. Calvin blames his parents, time constraints, low-ability, and even amnesia for his academic failures. All of these factors would be considered uncontrollable, allowing Calvin to appear a victim of the circumstances. In reality, Calvin is usually the one at fault. Many of the predicaments he finds himself in are the result of poor planning or procrastination on his part. For example, one cartoon depicts Calvin the night before a paper is due. He and Hobbs spend the entire evening creating a "thinking cap" to help Calvin come up with a topic for his paper. When Calvin's mother tells him to go to bed, he explains that he has not even started writing his paper yet and needs to stay up later to finish it. After discovering Calvin's poor use of time, his mother only extends his bedtime by half an hour. Calvin grumbles about not being able to write a quality paper in such a short amount of time. Later, he even complains that when he finally got the chance to write about something he really understands, he had to rush through the assignment. Instead of acknowledging that he had control over the situation, Calvin insists on finding an uncontrollable factor to site for his downfall. Below are a few more examples of Calvin making attributions that fall under the uncontrollable category:
Calvin's use of uncontrollable attributions indicates that he has little motivation. Uncontrollable attributions are characteristic of a pessimistic explanatory style; Calvin believes that the obstacles preventing him from succeeding are not in his control and are unlikely to change; he cannot control his bedtime, or his low test-taking ability. Students with this type of attitude feel discouraged and experience decreased effort and progressively worse results.
Examples for Calvin:
| Controllable Factors | Uncontrollable Factors | |
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| Internal Factors |
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Why does Calvin have this particular pattern?
Calvin's motivation for school, in general, seems to be nonexistent. He seems to be unmotivated when it comes to school and school activities. We believe that Calvin has received positive reinforcement for the actions and attitudes that he has shown in class. By positive reinforcement we mean that Calvin is acting up and is receiving the attention he desires from his peers and teachers alike. In one strip he makes the comment that his tests are popular in the teachers' lounge. We believe that this only reinforces his bad behavior by showing him that it is ok to put poor answers on his test. Mrs. Wormwood is not very supportive of Calvin, nor are his parents, which leads us to believe that his behavior problems have been accruing for some time now. We can see the lack of support when Mrs. Wormwood puts "barfing face" stickers on his homework assignments. Calvin switches from controllable to uncontrollable attributions depending on the situation at the time. In one strip, he states that he's just not good at taking tests. While in other strips he makes it clear that he blames his poor performance on teacher because she creates the assignments and tests. Depending on the situation at hand, Calvin switches between the two attributions. We believe that he switches between these to only offer up an excuse to why his work is so bad. Calvin feels, as explained in another strip, that when he keeps everyone's expectation of him lower, then life is easier for him. This also leads us to believe that the behavior problems are stemmed from his lack of motivation.
What can Ms. Wormwood do to foster a more productive motivational pattern?
It is easy to see that Calvin's teacher, Ms. Wormwood, could come up with more effective ways to motivate him. The first and one of the most beneficial things that she could do is alter the comments that she provides to Calvin. Often, her comments are not supportive and do not motivate Calvin. She even goes as far as to make jokes about Calvin's assignments and behavior. As stated earlier in this website, attribution theory can be used to foster motivation and influence behavior by using simple statements. Calvin's teacher could catch him at a time where he is working quietly by himself and say, "Calvin, I am not sure that you know this, but you have been on-task for quite a while now, you are a hard-working student." By using comments similar to this, Calvin will hopefully start to believe them and change his behavior to fit these beliefs. As stated previously in the section on how to use attribution theory to influence others, there are two main steps in using attribution training effectively. First, apply it to a situation in which a person (Calvin) is questioning why things occur. Next, it must be explained by relating it to an internal attribution. Calvin often questions the reasons for his success and/or failure in class. Any time he does this, Ms. Wormwood should use attribution training to motivate him to perform at his peak.
Calvin is a student with an extremely active imagination. Because of this, he becomes distracted easily and does not do well with standard assessments. These aspects are external and controllable; therefore, Ms. Wormwood should take this into account and work to minimize these things as much as possible. Calvin tends to shift internal, controllable things such as his belief in his abilities to external, uncontrollable factors. Ms. Wormwood could work with him to change his self-concept which would help to shift this negative self-view of his abilities back into the internal, controllable category. She could also look into creating alternative assessments that allow more creativity. Calvin was particularly interested in his topic of tyrannosaurus rex for the paper he had to write, but he did not particularly like the writing aspect of it. He had many creative ideas such as drawing pictures to illustrate his report. In this situation, the teacher could have shortened the writing portion of the project and added a visual aspect where Calvin could have used his great ideas.