Attributing Traits to Oneself and to Others

Abstract

Attributional explanations of trait ascription processes predict that actors are more likely to use a situational attribution when describing themselves than when describing others. It has been further hypothesized that as level of acquaintance with the other increases, so does the tendency to form situational attributions for the other. The hypothesis concerning level of acquaintance has received mixed results, perhaps because previous studies in which the hypothesis was tested have confounded situational attributions with neutral, uncertain, and ambiguous ones. Subjects in the current study rated themselves and four acquaintances (differing in level of acquaintance) on 16 traits, using a response format that allowed unconfounding of the aforementioned attributions. This more precise measure of attributional tendencies revealed a clear-cut positive relation between level of acquaintance and the tendency to use a situational attribution. The implications of these findings for current views of personality ascription are discussed.