Attribution Making

When events occur, individuals often try to understand their causes. In doing so, they attribute causes and responsibility for the action. Researchers have studied the degree to which attribution making might mediate the relationship between antecedent variables and conflict actions and consequences.

Pearce and Halford (2008) investigated the degree to which attributions mediate the association between attachment styles and negative communication. Having an insecure attachment style was positively related to self­reported negative communication and postdis­cussion stress, but this relationship was most evident among females. Attributions partly mediated the associations between insecure attachment and negative communication and fully mediated the relationship between inse­cure attachment and postdiscussion distress. However, attribution making did not mediate the relationship between attachment and com­munication.

Kennedy and Pronin (2008) examined a dif­ferent type of attribution. They reasoned that individuals are prone to see others who dis­agree with them as biased, and consequently, they allow conflict to escalate. They found that disagreement increases the tendency for individuals to attribute biases toward oth­ers, which increases the tendency to compete rather than cooperate. Moreover, the prefer­ence for competition further increases percep­tions that an opposing party is biased. Hence, attributed bias seems to set off an escalation process that is self-reinforcing.