Humans are inquisitive and try to explain things in order to have a rationale (explanation) for their occurrence or existence. It allows us to understand and function in our environment. This approach influences our relationships and daily interactions, in many ways. This phenomenon was first studied and discussed by Fritz Heider in the late 1950s to explain human acts and dispositions with The Psychology of Interpersonal Relations, which expanded on his creations of balance theory and attribution theory.

Although there are some cultural and personal differences in the making of attributions, there seems to be a universality to the underlying process. Because we perceive the world through our senses, and make judgments based on our past experience, we create a personal reality. This colors our understanding of the world around us. So, different people inevitably interpret the world differently and, in turn, reach different conclusions about information, situations, or people.

In psychology, attribution refers to the cognitive process that people use to find reason for either their own behavior or that of others. Researchers found that people tend to make distinctions among behaviors that are caused by personal disposition as opposed to environmental or situational conditions. Attribution is made in four areas, our success or failure, and other people's success and failure.

Attribution and behavior

In a typical situation on a construction site different people observing the same situation may arrive at different conclusions.

Observer A might think the worker will get injured due to the heavy loads he is expected to work with. This may lead him to think the project supervision did not make a proper task demand assessment and as a result assigned the wrong worker to do that particular task. This may lead to the conclusion that the project's planning process has some structural weaknesses or that the supervisor's capabilities to manage the crews effectively is deficient.

Observer B might think that this is a classic example of complacency at work, which more than likely will result in an injury, and that supervisors ought to try to make the work interesting to counter this eventuality. This attribution may lead to the suggestion that the task design or demand on this project ought to be reassessed, as well as a reevaluation of task assignment practices by the project's supervision.

Observer C might feel that the project supervision is lacking and the workers are allowed to engage in unsafe behaviors. The suggested intervention may be to focus on the worker who is engaging in unsafe behavior and try to come up with an intervention that eliminates such infractions or that supervisors are not managing the project in a competent and safe manner. ‘

Observer D might think that the worker was doing something he should not have been doing and, as a result, became uncomfortable that he was being observed. This may lead to a determination that the worker is willingly or unwillingly engaged in some form of unacceptable activity that may cause harm to the project or other workers. This worker might be thought of as being incompetent, dishonest, or possibly subversive. 

Observer E might state that she just witnessed an accident where the worker just got hurt in the act of lifting the material. The immediate action may be to stop the work and have the worker examined by someone to ascertain the type and extent of the injury. This may also lead to a reexamination of the risks involved with that particular task.

Five people saw the same behavior and made a different attribution. More importantly, the different attribution led to different conclusions about the worker, the work, the capability or competence of the supervisor assigned to the project or even the organization as a whole. Attributions may also be made to dispositional or situational factors. It is important to note that people may also differ when making attributions about themselves or of others.

Attribution bias

When it comes to making personal attributions, people are more likely to explain their own successes in terms of dispositional factors (i.e., caused by their personality or innate ability). Conversely, they tend to explain their failures as caused by environmental or situational factors, which they may think of as beyond their control. People are more likely to explain other people's failures in terms of dispositional factors and conversely explain other people's successes as caused by environmental or situational factors.

This tendency of people to interpret their behavior differently than that of others is known as attribution bias. People routinely and constantly make attributions to explain or give meaning to behavior. But due to attribution bias, this assignment does not always accurately reflect reality (see Figure 2). Since people invariably are prone to making mistakes, this leads to a biased or sometime false representation of reality.

This may lead one person to make an assumption about the other person as to not having any “common sense.” This tendency to make such an assessment is somewhat common in safety-related situations. I have heard many safety practitioners say this about one of their workers who got injured on their company's construction site. This attribution tends to become a significant barrier to understanding that the cause of the negative event was not the stupidity of the worker but possibly caused by some other salient factors.

One of the things that contributes to disagreements and possible hostility on worksites can emanate from what is known as “hostile attribution bias,” which is an interpretive bias. This is where a worker may observe a couple of other workers talking while looking in his general direction. That worker may assume the conversation is about him/her and makes an attribution of hostile intent, even though the other workers' behavior was totally unrelated.

A hostile attribution bias does not need to result in aggression or aggressive action in all cases. In safety situations, hostile attribution bias may create a situation that may result in resistance to complying with suggested corrective behavioral actions or work process procedure changes. This understanding may open subtle means for the safety practitioner to more effectively deal with workers on site so as to achieve a more cooperative work environment, safer work practices, and a more productive worksite.

There are other attribution biases as well. Researchers have found that sometimes people tend to make self-serving attributions. More often than not, such bias manifests themselves in conflict situations. One person may view their behavior as more appropriate, or relevant, than the actions of the other person. We may view ourselves as more competent than the other person or not responsible for the negative result or improper outcome. This then leads to the conclusion that the other person was the cause of the event. In conflicts, this generally leads to unpleasant escalations.

Attributions play a role in the evaluations or assessment of accidents as well. Researchers have found that there is a tendency to attribute more responsibility for a severe accident rather than for a mild one. Researchers have also found that when the investigator is somewhat "similar" to the person involved in the accident, they attribute less responsibility to the perpetrator when the accident severity increased. The opposite was found to be true when the perceiver and the perpetrator were somewhat “dissimilar.”

Research has also found that attributions of causation is subject to numerous biases or errors. Some proposed sources of attributional "error" is the perception of causation to satisfy the perceiver's personal motivation. This plays a role in the attribution of responsibility or events with negative outcomes. This could involve natural disasters, crises, crime, or accidents. Several researchers have found attributional biases by persons attempting to make sense of or understand seemingly random catastrophic events. Rather than admit that the accident was a random event that happened by chance, victims of such tragedies may attribute some blame to themselves. This enables them to perceive that they had some level of control that they failed to exercise. This in turn gives them the ability to think that they will be able to successfully avoid such a situation in the future. This use of self-blame attribution serves as a coping mechanism in the present situation for workers involved in accidents.

An informed and knowledgeable supervisor or safety manager may function more effectively when dealing with workers, crews, peers, or others by understanding their tendencies for attribution and the resulting response on their part. This may lead to better managing group interactions and relationships. They will also be able to steer conversations or interaction to neutral ground as a result, avoiding potential barriers to cooperation and more effective teamwork. This ability may prove very effective in coaching and counselling workers to become better in their performance at work.

Conclusion

Researchers have identified many different types of attribution biases, all of which impact the way people react and/or respond to one another. Every comment a person makes, every action in which a person engages, and every piece of information a person processes can be subject to attributional analysis or bias by themselves as well as by others. This analysis has the potential for significant implications in the relationship between the two. It will potentially affect the way they respond or view each other. The attributional processes are vital as well as consequential to interpersonal communication and relationships. From a larger perspective, this may have an indirect impact on internal processes, external relationships, and ultimately the outcome of organizations for whom these people work.