Unique and Nonunique Aspects of Attribution

Abstract

In a review chapter published several years ago, Kelley and Michela (1980) noted that the available attributional notions are piecemeal and greatly in need of synthesis. The present chapter attempts such a synthesis, based on the present epistemic theory. In many ways this work continues my earlier attempts to integrate the field of attribution (Kruglanski, 1980; Kruglanski, Hamel, Maides, and Schwartz, 1978) yet it differs from those initial endeavors in two principal respects: (1) by taking into account relevant research findings published since and (2) by explicitly incorporating the motivational dimension of epistemic behavior barely mentioned in those earlier analyses.