Reversing Viewpoints

Videotape and the Attribution Process:

Reversing Actors’ and Observers’ Points of View

Katie Harnish

Outline• Background

• Methods

• Results

• Discussion

• Questions

• Reference

Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE)

• “The tendency to assume other people’s actions are caused by their personal, individual qualities rather than external, situational forces” (Ross, 1977).

Background

• Individuals (Actors) seem to articulate potential causes and reasoning behind their own behavior through increased emphasis on external cues (Situational Factors).

• Outsiders (Observers) often consider more internal cues dispositional factors versus situational when explaining others’ behavior.

Contributing Factors

• Differences in actors’ and observers’ points of view:

• Availability of information about external surroundings, behavior, and contexts

• Processing of information

Purpose of Study

• Can actor’s and observers’ points of view be reversed through changing visual orientation?

Methods• Overview of Experimental Procedure:

• Interpersonal Conversations-”Getting Acquainted”

• Videotape Replays

• Actor-Same Orientation

• Observer-Same Orientation

• Actor-New Orientation

• Observer-New Orientation

• Control Group (No videotape replay)

• Post Questionnaire

Methods cont’d.

• 120 Participants-30 groups of 4 people

• Measures: Personality Characteristics

Situational Characteristics

Results

• Visual orientation is key when actors and/or observers are interpreting behaviors.

• No significant differences between perceived level of behavior and differences in attributions (situational, dispositional)

• Significant differences in the correlation between role (actor/observer) and videotape orientation.

Results cont’d.

• Actors attributed relatively more to situational causes than did observers (control and same orientation group)

• Actors attributed relatively more to dispositional than observers (new orientation group).

• For the questionnaire: dominance was difficult to assess for subjects (observers, self)

Discussion Question

• What are some possible implications from the results of this study?

Reference

• Storms, M. D. (1973). Videotape and the Attribution process: Reversing actors' and Observers' points of view.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 27, 165-175.