Actor-observer asymmetries in explanations of behavior: new answers to an old question.

By Bertram F. Malle, Joshua Knobe, Sarah E Nelson. 2007

235 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Traditional attribution theory conceptualizes explanations of behavior as referring to either dispositional or situational causes. An alternative approach, the folk-conceptual theory of behavior explanation, distinguishes multiple discrete modes of explanation and specific features within each mode. Because attribution theory and the folk-conceptual theory carve up behavior explanations in distinct ways, they offer very different predictions about actor-observer asymmetries. Six studies, varying in contexts and methodologies, pit the 2 sets of predictions against each other. There was no evidence for the traditional actor-observer hypothesis, but systematic support was found for the actor-observer asymmetries hypothesized by the folk-conceptual theory. The studies also provide initial evidence for the processes that drive each of the asymmetries: impression management goals, general knowledge, and copresence.

Subfields: Applied Psychology, Social Psychology, Sociology and Political Science

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Applied Psychology

1. Tim Miller
2. Ruth M. J. Byrne
3. Bertram F. Malle
4. Dustin Tingley
5. G. Reeder

In Social Psychology

1. Tim Miller
2. Ruth M. J. Byrne
3. G. Reeder
4. Bertram F. Malle
5. Dustin Tingley
6. Joshua D. Kertzer
7. Joshua Knobe
8. Tania Lombrozo

In Sociology and Political Science

1. Tim Miller
2. Ruth M. J. Byrne
3. G. Reeder
4. Bertram F. Malle
5. Joshua D. Kertzer
6. Dustin Tingley
7. Joshua Knobe
8. Tania Lombrozo

Citations in the corpus

• Explanation in Artificial Intelligence: Insights from the Social Sciences (2017, background): “[117] argue that this theory accounts for apparent paradoxes observed in attribution theory, most specifically the actor-observer asymmetries, in which actors and observers offer different explanations for the same action taken by an actor.”
• Time to Give Up the Dogmas of Attribution (2011, methodology): “Three actor–observer asymmetries follow from the impact of these processes (Malle et al., 2007).”
• Mindreading: Judgments About Intentionality and Motives in Dispositional Inference (2009, background): “The low frequency of traitlike explanations has also been observed when people explain real-life events ( Malle, Knobe, & Nelson, 2007 ).”
• Attribution theories: How people make sense of behavior. (2011, background): “…(both in terms of reasons CHRs and belief reasons vs. desire reasons) when trying to make the other person favorable (DeAndrea & Walther, 2011; Malle et al., 2007); and they explicitly add a state marker to their belief reasons when they want to distance themselves from the (e.g., "Why is he…”
• Political Psychology in International Relations: Beyond the Paradigms (2018, background): “Similarly, many propositions or paradigms that were once well entrenched in social psychology—and continue to be viewed that way by many political scientists—are now less so, including groupthink and the fundamental attribution error (Malle et al. 2007, Turner & Pratkanis 1998).”
• Counterfactual thoughts about experienced, observed, and narrated events (2011, background): “Another explanation can be derived from the traditional account of causal attribution, according to which actors attribute a given behaviour to the situation in which it occurs, whereas observers attribute it to the traits and disposition of the person who acted (Jones & Nisbett, 1972; but see M”