A Description of Perceived Causality

Abstract

Causal perceptions are instrumental to goal attainment and aid in the pursuit of cognitive mastery. Thus, they serve the two most basic motivators of behavior: hedonism and understanding. In addition, the search for causality does not appear to be constrained within any particular time and place in history. For these reasons, it was contended in chapter 1 that attributions of causality may provide the foundation for a general theory of motivation and emotion. As already intimated, the argument of this cellist is that a correct note has been found.

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In which causes are defined and spontaneous attributional search is documented. The perceived causes of success and failure, based on many empirical investigations, are determined, as are lay explanations of wealth, poverty, and illness. The small number of dominant causal explanations is noted.