Attribution Process and Biases

Running head: ATTRIBUTION PROCESS OR BIASES 1
Attribution process and biases
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ATTRIBUTION PROCESS OR BIASES 2
Abstract
The two articles chosen for the attribution process addressed counterfactual thinking and
Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE). In counterfactual thinking, people consider life events
with personal meaning. It can be used to produce both positive and negative outcomes. People
tend to make possible alternatives concerning what has already occurred with references to life
events. It is usually contrary to the outcomes of the event that took place. Furthermore,
Fundamental attribution error gives a big emphasis on the personal characters when something
has occurred and forget to give into consideration situational factor. It can cause victimization
and peer regrets on individuals. Education and training people can make them understand the
importance of considering situation factors when making judgments.
Article one (Counterfactual thinking)
Counterfactual thinking involves a description of the events which did not take place. The
consequences tend to affect the results of problem-solving, decision making, behavioral
regulation and management of the circumstances. It is clear that when people have counterfactual
thinking, they usually take life events with personal meaning. In this study, supervised statistical
and rule-based approaches were used to understand the meaning of counterfactual thinking. In
Psychology, counterfactual thinking is defined as mental representations of more different
alternatives to states, events, and actions of the past (Son, Buffone, Raso, Larche, Janocko,
Zembroski & Ungar, 2017). It has been associated with the perception of life events to be more
important or meaningful. Devine and problem- solving tends to influence it because of the
imagination of the alternative outcomes and the steps that might be needed in its improvement.
The article establishes a language-based model that can be used in recognition of different social

ATTRIBUTION PROCESS OR BIASES 3
media texts with emphasis on Facebook and Twitter. The low base rate has been used in
understanding the counterfactual thinking in social media. It was found that two percent of the
people on Facebook are actively making status updates and only one percent in Tweeter. It also
takes various forms or types of natural language. Natural language variability and low base rate
counterfactuals make it hard for recognition when simple statistical features or linguistics are
used in social media texts. It becomes easy to identify disclose relations using different forms
such as classification, subsets or statistical approach. The precision of the counterfactual can be
increased through improved training.
Similarly, counterfactual thinking tends to make people feel guilty or have negative
expectations about the consequences of the event. People can use counterfactual thinking to
avoid the situation or show avoidance behavior. Mostly the situations which are avoided may
make them feel unpleasant, and it can be hard to understand the cause of these events. It is good
to have positive behavior and think in a way that can change the life for the benefits of individual
as well as others. It can be more used when a group of people or one individual has failed to
achieve the set goals. It makes people to creatively and critically think of other alternatives that
are possible in achieving the set objectives or goals. It can act as motivation because people are
already prepared for the results, and they understand that they can be negative. When intentional
behavior is included in the counterfactual thinking, the performance can improve because of
various alternatives. On the other hand, people tend to have negative thoughts about the effects
or the outcomes of the situation (Son et al, 2017). The feeling of disappointments, regrets and
guilty about a certain event. However, functional basis helps in the correction of all those
mistakes and trying to avoid them in the future. The results of the discussion from the
counterfactual thinking showed out that it can be used to understand the behavior of people. This