locus of causality

attribution of the causes of an event to sources internal or external to the self, which may influence subsequent behavior in relation to that event. For example, a student who fails an exam may attribute his or her poor performance to an inherent lack of ability—an internal cause—and decide not to study at all for the next exam because “it won’t do any good,” whereas another student may attribute the same poor performance to distractions from a neighbor’s loud party during a review session the night before—an external cause—and hence study twice as long in a quiet setting for the next exam. Research suggests that consistent performance tends to be attributed to internal factors whereas highly variable performance tends to be attributed to external factors. [described in 1979 by U.S. social psychologist Bernard Weiner (1935– )]

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Psychology term of the day

May 8th 2024

distractibility

n. difficulty in maintaining attention or a tendency to be easily diverted from the matter at hand. Excessive distractibility is frequently found in children with learning disorders or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and in people experiencing manic or hypomanic episodes.