Male subjects, classified high or low on chronic self-esteem and high or low on internality-externality, received bogus feedback of pass or fail on a person perception task. They then attributed their performances to ability, effort, task difficulty and luck. As predicted, externals were more likely than internals to attribute their failures, but not their successes, to external factors. Shortcomings in Rotter's scale and a narrowness in his definitions of internality and externality were discussed. Differences resulting from chronic self-esteem emerged only in attributions to effort.
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