Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Week 11; Post 2




2). After reading Chapter 12 in its entirety, answer the following question:  When have false attributions you have made about another exacerbated a conflict situation?  Have there been times when making accurate attributions about the other has helped you?

Chapter 12 is all about false attributions. According to the text, an attribution is “an inference made about the causes of another’s behavior.” That means a false attribution is a false assumption made about the reasons for someone else’s behavior and an accurate attribution is an assumption about the cause for someone’s behavior that ends up being true.

At one point, my manager at one of my jobs was being rude and was just difficult to work with. I kept thinking that it had to be because of something that I did or that she just had decided that she didn’t like me. I didn’t really know why either of those things would be true but it seemed like the only reasonable answer. It turned out that there was a new position opening up and the company was going to ask me to fill it. She was acting like that because she wanted the position and was upset that I got it over her even though I was technically below her on a hierarchy. This was a false attribution that I made.

An accurate attribution that I make often has to do with my boyfriend. He is generally a wonderful person to be around and does not like any type of confrontation, but every once in a while he gets upset and yells at me for little or no reason. When this happens, it means he is hungry. There has never been a time that I’ve been wrong about this, it is definitely an accurate attribution!!


2 comments:

  1. Bianca,
    I really enjoyed reading your post. I liked how you organized it into three different paragraphs. The first paragraph was helpful as it defined the term attribution. This made the rest of the post easier to follow. It's unfortunate to hear about the situation with the other woman at your work. This type of environment can be hard to work in because you are always wondering why the other person is treating you that way. I've gone through something similar and it was no fun. In my situation, the woman didn't like me because she thought I was fake. This was disturbing to hear. It is funny to hear about the attribution you made about your boyfriend. My girlfriend would probably say the same thing about me.

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  2. Hey Bianca! I like the examples that you provided for this topic. I have to say that there were many times when I would make the wrong attributions about why someone is acting rude towards me. But I am sorry to hear that your manager was acting rude because you took on a new position. That is pretty funny how your boyfriend gets angry and yells when he gets hungry. I mean I get upset sometimes, but I won’t get too angry. I think by being around the person long enough we are able to make the right attributions around them since we are able to see their habits. Once again nice post this week!

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