1. an inference regarding the cause of a person’s behavior or an interpersonal event. Three dimensions are often used to evaluate people’s attributional styles, or characteristic tendencies when inferring such causes: the internal–external dimension (whether they tend to attribute events to the self or to other factors), the stable–unstable dimension (whether they tend to attribute events to enduring or transient causes), and the global–specific dimension (whether they tend to attribute events to causes that affect many events or just a single event).

2. in the two-word stage of language development, a noun qualified by an attribute, for example, blue car.