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Running head: MOOD, PERSPECTIVE, AND FAE

The Influence of Mood and Perspective on the Fundamental Attribution Error

Cem Demir, Tuong-Vy Nguyen, and William Kettler

University of California, Los Angeles

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MOOD, PERSPECTIVE, AND FAE

The Influence of Mood and Perspective on the Fundamental Attribution Error

The fundamental attribution error (FAE), also known as the correspondence bias, is oneof the most famous principles throughout the history of social psychology. It refers to the

tendency of individuals to underestimate the influence of situational causes and overestimate the

influence of dispositional factors when explaining social events. Although there is an abundanceof experimental literature regarding the FAE, there is little experimental evidence detailing howthe tendency towards the FAE is influenced by the actual psychological state of the observer.

There is irony in that research on the FAE has focused more on situational factors, than

psychological influences towards committing the FAE. It is the intent of this experiment toreverse that general trend, by examining the extent to which mood and perspective influence the

incidence of the FAE.

The FAE is believed to be endemic to social judgments based on the mutual influence of

cultural and cognitive influences. Historically, Western culture has placed more emphasis on theindividual than society, directing observers to attend to the dispositional influences of actors over

the situational forces of the environment. But innate cognitive strategies are relevant as well.

Observers tend to attend to the most apparent, accessible, and easily processed information,which in this case is the actor, while situational factors which require more intensive and

systematic analysis are only accounted for secondarily (Taylor & Fiske, 1975). Observers

correct for situational influences subsequently if motivation to do so is sufficient. But if this

motivation is impaired, then the attention to situational factors may be absent resulting in theFAE.

Early researcher on the FAE, conducted by Jones and Harris, involved subjects being

presented with an essay which either advocated a popular (anti-Castro) or unpopular (pro-Castro)opinion. Essays were either written freely or were written under coercion. As predicted,

subjects made stronger dispositional attributions to the writer of the essay when the essay was

unpopular and did so freely (Jones & Harris, 1967). But subjects also made dispositional

attributions to the writer even when the essay was written under coercion and especially whenthe essay expressed an unpopular opinion (Jones & Harris 1967). In effect, subjects ignored the

situational factor of coercion when the essay was of unpopular opinion and thus of particular

salience.Expanding on the role of informational salience in committing the FAE, Taylor and Fiske

conducted an experiment which manipulated the perspective of observers. Taylor and Fiske

reasoned that actors focused on situational factors more because they were acting upon theenvironment where as observers focused more on the actor because it was central against the

environmental background (Taylor & Fiske, 1975). Based upon this, they hypothesized that

what an observer attended to, would appear more salient, and thus more causally influential. To

test this they had subjects view a conversation between two individuals. In one condition,subjects could see only one participant, while in the other condition subjects could see both

individuals. It was expected that subjects would make more dispositional attributions towards

the subject that was most visible to them. The results confirmed this hypothesis with subjects

making stronger dispositional attributions for the individual that was more visible to theirobservations.

It wasnt until later that mood was integrated into the analysis of the FAE. Experimental

evidence suggested that individuals in positive moods attributed success to stable internal causeswhile attributed their failure in performance to unstable, external causes (Forgas, Bower, &

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Moylan, 1990). In contrast, individuals in negative moods made stable internal causes for failure

and unstable external attributions for their successes (Forgas et al., 1990). These differences

highlight the informational effects mood has on attributions, influencing individuals to accessand indentify different evidence as causes. But mood also has processing effects on how

individuals process information itself. Individuals in a positive mood tend towards generic and

creative inferences when making causal attributions while negative moods result in critical andsystematic analysis.These differences in information and processing effects for positive and negative mood

can be explained by both functional and motivational reasons. The functional explanation holds

that temporary mood states signal to the individual the state of the environment they are in.Positive moods inform individuals that they are in a favorable situation and thus can think

creatively while negative moods signal a hostile context which requires the individual to respond

with critical and vigilant processing of information. The motivational explanation argues that

people are motivated to maintain or avoid certain states for reasons intrinsic to the experienceitself. Positive mood states lead individuals to try to maintain their emotions by avoiding the

distraction of cognitive effort known as mood maintenance while individuals in a negative mood

try to improve their mood by increasing analysis of the environment through mood repair.Integrating this information with the prior work of Jones and Harris, Forgas conducted an

experiment to examine the interaction between mood and informational salience and committing

the FAE. Similar to the prior experiment by Jones and Harris, Forgas assigned subjects to read

essays expressing popular or unpopular opinions of current social issues (Forgas, 1998). Thesepapers were also described as being either freely written or coerced into being written. But

uniquely, subjects were also primed to be in a temporary mood state prior to reading the essays.

This was accomplished by having subjects take a verbal ability test, and then randomly assigningsubjects either above average results or below average results which corresponded to positive or

negative moods respectively. The success of this induction technique was checked by a post-

experimental questionnaire which asked subjects for an emotional response resulting in a

positive correlation between performance results and mood (Forgas, 1998).Based on the evidence previous experiments, Forgas predicted that dispositional

attributions would be highest when the essay was unpopular, whether or not it was in fact written

freely because unpopular essays would defy expectations and thus be more salient to subjects(Forgas, 1998). Additionally, it was predicted that dispositional attributions would be higher for

subjects in a positive mood because positive moods induce more automatic and generalized

processing in contrast to the careful analysis of subjects in a negative mood (Forgas, 1998).Combining these two expectations resulted in the third hypothesis that mood and informational

salience would interact so that when mood was positive, the dispositional attributions of the FAE

would be higher in subjects in the unpopular as opposed to popular condition (Forgas, 1998).

The results confirmed these hypotheses suggesting that both mood and informational salience areinfluential towards committing the FAE and exert and interactive effect.

Our experiment develops these experimental findings, refining the analysis and

redirecting it. Like the work by Forgas and those prior to him, our experiment manipulates

temporary mood states of positive or negative emotion to examine their influence on the FAE.We expect similar results such that positive mood has a higher incidence of the FAE than the

condition of negative mood. This hypothesis is justified on the grounds that positive mood

induces automatic and generalized processing of information and motivates subjects to avoidcognitive effort to maintain the mood state. In contrast negative mood results in systematic and

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critical analysis of information and motivates the subject the engage in cognitive effort to alter

their mood state.

But our experiment is not a replication of the work by Forgas and does not pair themanipulation of mood with the manipulation of informational salience in terms of popularity or

unpopularity. Instead, the perspective is manipulated in a manner similar to that in the

experiment conducted by Taylor and Fiske. But rather than a visual manipulation, ourexperiment involves a conceptual manipulation where subjects read a passage from differentperspectives of someone involved in a situation or merely observing it. Similar to Taylor and

Fiske, we expect a variation of what is attended to in the passage based upon the perspective of

the subject. Subjects in the involved condition will be immediately affected by the eventdescribed and will attend to the disposition of the actor while subjects in the observed condition

will be able to attend to the overall context and take situational factors into consideration.

Additionally, we expect and interaction between mood states and the salience of perspective so

that when subjects are in a positive mood, the FAE will be higher for those in the involvedcondition rather than the observed condition. The intent of this new experimental direction is to

provide additional information on the FAE on psychological influences. Previous experiments

manipulated the tendency of the FAE by altering the information or environment of the subject,while in our experiment we intend to keep this information relatively constant while simply

manipulating the perspective the subject is able to interpret the information from. This would aid

in explaining how individuals can examine the same situation and reach different conclusions of

attribution.

Method

Participants

Sixteen participants were recruited from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Thirteen of the participants were female and the remaining four participants were male. Theages of participants ranged from 19 to 29 years of age approximately. All participants were

undergraduate Psychology students and were acquired through a research methods pre-requisite

course in the Psychology major program. Each student participated as a part of a finalexperimental design project that was part of the course. Participants were compensated in the

form of points towards the project and their overall course grade.

Design

The experiment was of two-by-two design and was conducted according to a within-

subject design. Thus each student participated in each of the four combinational conditions of theexperiment. The first independent variable was mood induction. Mood induction represented

the mood subjects were inducted into after reading a mood-biased passage. Mood induction

possessed two conditional levels: positive mood and negative mood. When in the positive mood

condition, subjects read a passage intended to arouse a consoling emotional reaction in thesubject where as subjects in the negative mood condition read a passage expected to elicit a

disturbing emotional response.

The second independent variable is situational perspective. This variable represented theperspective that subjects read the causally-ambiguous situation in the passage from. Situational

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perspective also had two conditional levels: situational involvement and situational observation.

The situational involvement condition required subjects to read the passage from the perspective

of an individual directly affected by the events described. In contrast, subjects who were in thesituational observation condition read the same scenario from the perspective of someone

indirectly observing the situation without having personal involvement in it.

The dependent variable of the experiment was the degree to which subjects committedthe FAE. The tendency to commit the FAE was measured according to the responses of subjectsalong a seven-point bi-polar Likert scale. Subjects responded along the Likert scale,

emphasizing what they believed was the more causally significant factor in explaining the event

described in the passage. A value of one, the lowest possible response, represents a situationalattribution while a value of seven, the highest possible response, represents a dispositional

attribution.

The experiment was counter-balanced according to a Latin-square design so that equal

numbers of subjects were randomly assigned to different orders of the conditions. Thus thenumber of conditional orders was equal to the number of total conditions. Because the

experiment was a two-by-two factorial design and thus contained four conditions, the Latin-

square design dictated that these four conditions be arranged in four different orders. In addition,an extraneous variable was integrated into the experiment to mislead subjects away from

identifying the actual independent variables across conditions. This variable was ethnicity and

possessed four different conditional levels: Caucasian, Asian, Latino, and African American.

These variables were counter-balanced as well so as to eliminate any confounding variables theymay introduce.

Materials and Apparatus

Experimental materials consisted of passages followed by brief questionnaires. Because

the experiment was of two-by-two design with a confounding variable of four levels and was

counter-balanced using the Latin-square technique, there were sixteen possible passages in all.Four passages based upon combinations of the two independent variables of mood induction and

situational involvement that each varied along with the four levels of the confounding variable of

ethnicity for a total of sixteen possible passage combinations. However, given the nature ofcounter-balancing procedure, subjects would receive only four of these possible passages. Each

subject received a passage for each level of the confounding variable of ethnicity, each with a

different combination of the independent variables.Each passage was assigned a different color, letter and number to distinguish it from

other possible combinations of passages. Color denoted which of the four groups the passage

belonged to. Letter denoted which subject within each group the passage belonged to. Number

denoted which combination of variables the passage contained in the series of conditions eachsubject within each group was to receive.

All passages followed a universal format that contained variation only when relevant to

the manipulation of the independent variables of mood induction and situational perspective and

the extraneous variable of ethnicity. All passages described a causally-ambiguous scenario. Thescenario describes a train carrying passengers down a track as its break system malfunctions

preventing it from losing momentum. In its path is an engineering crew repairing the track

system and who cannot be signaled in time. A worker in the control station can flip a switch thatwill send the train down an alternative route. The track system has not yet been repaired and it

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will cause the train to crash but will save the lives of the engineering crew. The worker reacts

and flips the switch, causing the train to adjust tracks, sending it down the damaged route.

The independent variable of mood induction varied according to the consequence of thetrain crashing. In the positive mood condition, the train derailed but everyone survived the

incident. In the negative mood condition, the train derailed from the tracks and there were no

survivors from the accident, save for the engineers in the original path of the train. Theindependent variable of perspective varied according to the perspective the reader read thepassage from. In the involved condition, subjects read the passage from the perspective of one of

the rail-road workers in the path of the train. In the observed condition, subjects read the same

events but from the perspective of a bystander watching from the train station. The third falsevariable, ethnicity, altered the ethnicity of the control room worker who changed the course of

the train. In some passages the worker was Caucasian, in others Asian or Latino, and in still

others the worker was African American.

All passages were followed by a brief questionnaire which asked the subject twoquestions. The first question was a check on the effectiveness of the mood induction. Subjects

were asked whether they would describe the passage as eliciting a positive or negative emotional

reaction. If subjects provided a reaction consistent with the mood induction condition they wereassigned, then this consistency would justify the effectiveness of the mood induction technique.

The second question on the questionnaire was a measure of the dependent variable on the Likert

scale. Subjects were asked whether the event described in the passage was due to situational or

dispositional factors which they were supposed to a value along the continuum of the Likertscale provided.

Procedure

The experiment began once all students had entered the room and sat down. They were

then debriefed as a group that they would be involved in an experimental study on possible effect

of ethnicity and mood on attributions of responsibility for events. This was a false description ofthe intent of the study. Were participants to know that the actual intent of the study was to study

the effects of mood and perspective on the FAE, they may have made compensational

adjustments to their innate bias towards dispositional attributions, thus introducing confoundingvariables.

Once the debriefing had finished, experimenters randomly distributed the combination of

passages and questionnaires to each student around the room. Subjects were given time to readeach passage and answer the questionnaire. When it was apparent that all subjects had

completed the first questionnaire, experimenters collected the prior questionnaire and distributed

the subsequent passage and questionnaire for each subject. Subsequent passages and

questionnaires were distributed on the basis of their color, letter and number combinations suchthat subjects received a subsequent passage and questionnaire of the same color and letter as

their previous individual passage and questionnaire combination. All subjects received passages

of the same number following the previous number to ensure the proper order of conditions.

This process repeated until all subjects had completed all four conditions and answered thecorresponding questionnaires.

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Reference List

Epley, N., Gilovich T., & Savitsky K. (2002). Empathy neglect: reconciling the spotlighteffect and the correspondence bias. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol.

83 (No. 2), 300-312

Forgas, J. P. (1998). On being happy and mistaken: mood effects on the fundamentalattribution error. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 75 (No. 2), 318-331

Forgas, J. P., Bower, G. H., Moyan, S. T. (1990). Praise or blame? Mood effects on attributionsfor success or failure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 59, 809-819.

Harvey, J. H., Harris, B., & Barnes R. D. (1975). Actor-observer differences in the perceptions

of responsibility and freedom. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 32,(No. 1), 22-28

Jones, E. E. & Harris, V. A. (1967). The attribution of attitudes. Journal of Experimental SocialPsychology, Vol. 3, 1-24.

Taylor, S. & Fiske, S. T. (1975). Point of view and perception of causality. Journal of

Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 32, 439-445.

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