Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 10, 2026
05:33
Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effect of Induced Emotion on Grammar Learning
Published on: January 29, 2020
The influence of mood on attribution
Yana R Avramova1, Diederik A Stapel, Davy Lerouge
1Tilburg Institute for Behavioral Economics Research (TIBER), Social Psychology Department, Tilburg University, P.O. Box 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, Netherlandsy. r.avramova@uvt.nl
Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin
|August 19, 2010
Summary
Your mood influences how you explain behavior. Sad individuals focus on personality, while happy individuals consider the situation, especially when the context is emphasized.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Social Psychology
Background:
- Mood states are known to influence cognitive processes.
- Attribution theory explains how individuals interpret the causes of behavior.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the interactive effect of mood and salience on behavioral attributions.
- To determine whether mood influences dispositional versus situational explanations.
Main Methods:
- Four studies were conducted to examine mood and salience effects.
- Participants' moods (sad vs. happy) and the salience of actor vs. context were manipulated.
- Attributions for observed behavior were subsequently assessed.
Main Results:
- When the actor was salient, sad individuals favored dispositional attributions, while happy individuals favored situational ones.
- When the context was salient, this pattern reversed, with negative moods leading to more situational attributions.
- Mood significantly altered attention to actor versus context, influencing attributional biases.
Conclusions:
- Mood and salience interact to systematically affect how people attribute behavior.
- These findings support the hypothesis that mood influences attributions by modulating attention.
- Understanding mood-congruent attention is key to explaining attributional differences.
Related Concept Videos
01:29The Influence of Affect on Cognition
Positive affect significantly influences cognitive processes, including evaluation, memory, creativity, and social judgments. Compared to negative affect, positive emotional states promote more favorable interpretations of stimuli, cognitive flexibility, and heuristic processing. These effects highlight emotions' powerful role in shaping how individuals perceive, remember, and interact with the world.Influence on Evaluation and AttributionWhen individuals experience positive affect, they are...
01:15Theory of Attribution I: Correspondent Inference Theory
Correspondent inference theory, proposed by Jones and Davis in 1965, seeks to explain how individuals infer stable personality traits from observed behaviors. It suggests that people attribute actions to underlying dispositions rather than external circumstances, particularly when the behavior appears intentional and socially significant.Voluntary Behavior and Dispositional AttributionAccording to this theory, individuals are more likely to attribute behavior to personal traits when it appears...
01:14Fundamental Attribution Error
According to some social psychologists, people tend to overemphasize internal factors as explanations—or attributions—for the behavior of other people. They tend to assume that the behavior of another person is a trait of that person, and to underestimate the power of the situation on the behavior of others. They tend to fail to recognize when the behavior of another is due to situational variables, and thus to the person’s state. This erroneous assumption is called the fundamental attribution...
01:26Attribution
In social interactions, individuals frequently seek to understand the motivations and causes behind others' behaviors. This fundamental aspect of social perception, known as attribution, plays a crucial role in shaping interpersonal relationships and guiding future actions. Attribution refers to the cognitive process through which people infer the reasons behind others' behaviors, allowing them to assess character traits, intentions, and situational influences.Attribution Theory and Its...
00:56Attribution Theory
Behavior is a product of both the situation (e.g., cultural influences, social roles, and the presence of bystanders) and of the person (e.g., personality characteristics). Subfields of psychology tend to focus on one influence or behavior over others. Situationism is the view that our behavior and actions are determined by our immediate environment and surroundings. In contrast, dispositionism holds that our behavior is determined by internal factors (Heider, 1958). An internal factor is an...
01:29Theory of Attribution II: Kelley's Covariation Theory
Attribution theory plays a crucial role in social psychology, helping to explain how individuals interpret the causes of behavior. One prominent model within this field is Harold Kelley's covariation theory, which provides a systematic approach to determining whether internal traits or external circumstances drive a person's actions. The model posits that individuals rely on three key types of information—consensus, consistency, and distinctiveness—to make these judgments.Consensus: Comparing...