The Attribution Problem: Judgment gets us into trouble.
October 16, 2023
In conflict situations, judgment gets us into trouble. Yet there is an unspoken default of "understanding for me and judgment for thee" that often overrides reason.
Consider this scenario:
It’s late. Your phone buzzes and flashes awake out of the corner of your eye, but your hands are full with post-dinner clean-up and lunch preparations for the next day so you can’t reach for it immediately. "I’ll get to it in a moment," you promise to no one but yourself as you slide another dish into the mounting pile in the kitchen sink.
The next week at coffee, a long-time friend angrily blows up at you: "How come you didn’t text me back the other night?! What the heck?!? If you don’t want to be my friend, just say so!!" she punctuates her outburst with a clatter of her fork on the plate.
"Whoops!" you manage to spittle out – taken aback by your friend’s reaction to the accident. You explain yourself and they seem to believe you. You nod sagely at her and give her arm a squeeze, content in the knowing that the friendship’s capacity for understanding is a deep gift to humanity (cue doves flying, rose petals gently falling, rainbows, etc).
Misunderstanding settled.
Jump to next week and the very same friend goes non-responsive to your text message outreach. In the space of a tightened breath, you forget about recognizing circumstance. As your phone screen stays black for another moment, you let out a silent scream. She is a cruel, vengeful, and hateful person! How can she make me wait like this?! UGHHHHH!!!
And scene!
What in the world is happening in this imagined (but probably not hard to imagine) story that causes such a sudden shift in your outlook on an unsent text? The circumstances are uncannily similar, the same people are involved, and even the history of the previous misunderstanding is just a short scroll up on the conversation thread. So why does a flipped role yield such a vastly different perspective?
We’ve all had things slip through the cracks when we’re busy. We’re human, and that means that we don’t get it right all the time.
Towards ourselves, we tend to view these oversights through a lens of understanding (it was perfectly reasonable for me to miss replying to you). Yet when others wrong us, our tendency is to understand what happened through a lens of judgment (you are a malevolent monster for not replying to me).
This is something known as the attribution problem, where we ascribe our frustrations to someone’s personality rather than considering the external factors that led them to act the way they did. It’s a fascinating psychological concept that plays a crucial role in our understanding of conflicts and how we perceive others’ actions and intentions.
As with any double standard, the prevalence of the attribution problem can hinder effective conflict resolution and perpetuate misunderstandings.
Our personal perspectives, biases, and emotions significantly influence how we perceive and interpret others’ actions in conflict situations. We tend to attribute our own actions to external circumstances, such as stress or time constraints, while attributing others’ actions to internal qualities or flaws.
With this example of an unsent text, we tend to understand the reasonable circumstances behind the communication breakdown when we’re the ones who didn’t respond. What if we could extend this grace to others as well?
Conflict 101
At this point, you can probably think of an example (or thirty) in your own life where the attribution problem has reared its frustrating head. But remember that perspectives go both ways. When we’re in conflict, it’s entirely likely that the person we are in conflict with is experiencing the attribution problem as well – justifying their own actions and slipping into a negative judgment of our role in the interaction.
Because of the ubiquity of the attribution problem, we’ve devoted an entire module in our FREE Conflict 101 on-demand webinar to it. We dive into its complexities through case studies and practical understanding.
Recognizing the impact of perspectives and biases is crucial in developing a more balanced and fair understanding of conflicts. When we know what to look for, we can spot the attribution problem playing out in real-time. And, with practice, work with it to find better outcomes.
Please join us in doing this (and more!) with our free online course Conflict 101: Demystifying Conflict Through a Psychological Approach. Get started today.