Attribution Theory

Objective

            In attribution theory, “students attribute success or failure to a variety of factors such as ability, effort, luck fatigue, ease or difficulty of the exam and so forth, and their belief is shaped by their perceptions of why they have succeeded or failed in the past.” (Barkley, 2009)

Reflective

Motivation is an internal drive that directs behavior towards some end ( (Barkley, 2009). Motivation enhances learning by directing behaviors towards particular goals, increasing effort, energies, increasing the initiation of and persistence in activities. In cognitive process, motivated learners are more actively relating the knowledge and skill to real-life application of what they learn. (Eccles & Wigfield, 1985) Why do some learners get motivated by challenges while some lose their confidence? What is the psychological hidden psychological process that convince the students that they are competent and will succeed given making more efforts? Attribution theory shines some lights on these questions.

When the students experience desirable outcomes, attributions help them understand what caused these events so they can achieve the outcomes again. When they experience unpleasant outcomes, attributions help them identify and avoid the behaviors.

Interpretive

Attribution theory explains learner’s causal attribution for their success and failures. These attributions are categorized into three dimension (Weiner, 1986)

 -  Locus – the location of the cause, internal (individual’s aptitude and effort) or external (teacher, difficulty of test, difficulty of task)

- Stability – whether the cause is permanent or changeable

- Controllability – whether the cause is within individual’s control

The stability dimension affects expectancy for future success. With outcomes attributed to a stable cause, learner would expect it to occur again; the controllability dimension is related to emotions. “Pity and sympathy are experienced toward others whose failures are caused by uncontrollable factors. In contrast, anger is elicited when others' failures are due to causes within their control.” (Barkley, 2009) Teacher’s pity and sympathy hints the students for an external attribution.

The attribution process has three stages (Attribution Theory -B. Weiner, 2014). First of all, students must perceive or observe their success or failure. Secondly, they should believe that this behavior was intentionally performed due to a cause. Lastly, students must determine the three dimensions (the locus, stability and controllability) of the causes.

According to attribution theory, high-performing students will approach tasks because they understand that success comes from their ability and effort. Failure is, instead, caused by temporary external causes, such as bad luck or difficult exam. Hence, their self-esteem and self-confidence are not hurt by failure, and success in return improves their confidence and pride. However, low-performing students avoid tasks because they attribute the failure to internal causes but assume success can only be achieved due to external causes, e.g. an easy exam. They start to doubt their ability and don’t believe they can succeed again upon a failure.

Teachers’ response and feedback can affect individual’s attributions. There is a rich social context that individual’s attribution is affected by the social environment including peers, teachers, and parents, who express their emotions, who reward, punish or help(Pintrich & Schunk, 2002).

Decisional

As instructors, how can we use attribution theory to motivate students more effectively? Referring back to three stages of attribution, teachers should first determine whether success or failure has occurred. Although the academic standards should be consistent, I believe success is defined differently on different students. We should recognize and praise a low-performing student’s progress and also encourage a high-performing student’s exploration on novel alternate paths. Following this, the teacher should guide students make accurate attributions. In the event of a failure, it is beneficial if the students can attribute it to temporary, unstable and external causes – so they believe that success is still possible. When doing so, we can give examples, such as, similar questions were answered correctly in a homework, so that they are capable of the skills, but might just happen to make a mistake in the test. Attributing failure to a lack of appropriate effort or strategy could convince the student that they still can succeed if they try harder or use the right strategy. What if a student repeatedly fails after making serious effort? Arranging the difficulties of tasks so that students who work hard are able to perceive themselves as successful sometimes. If the difficulty level is indeed too high for a particular student due to lack of existing knowledge, we may have to advise student to take lower-level preparing course first instead of encouraging them to try their best. For success, it is also adaptive to attribute success to strategies, efforts, or when appropriate, to talent or skills, instead of “being lucky”.

In concluding, attribution theory explains how success and failure is interpreted and how this relates to individual’s motivation and future motivation. It is beneficial for instructors to guide the learners to attribute the outcomes appropriately to keep them motivated in future studies.

References

Attribution Theory -B. Weiner. (2014). Retrieved from Instructional Design: http://www.instructionaldesign.org/theories/attribution-theory.html

Barkley, E. F. (2009). Student Engagement Techniques: A Handbook for College Faculty. Jossey-Bass.

Eccles, J. S., & Wigfield, A. (1985). Teacher expectations and student motivation. In In J. B. Dusek (Ed.), Teacher expectations (pp. 185-217). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Pintrich, P., & Schunk, D. (2002). Motivation in Education: Theory, Research, and Application (2nd ed.). Upper Saddle, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Weiner, B. (1986). An attributional theory of motivation and emotion. New York: Springer-Verlag.