(1) Hyde's Attribution Theory
Hyde attaches great importance to the study of human perception, and believes that the essence of human perception research is to examine the way ordinary people deal with information about others and themselves. An observer is so interested in the behavior of the observed person that he seeks the causal explanation of the behavior like a "naive psychologist". In Hyde's view, the cause of behavior is either the environment or the individual. If it is in the environment, the actor is not responsible for his own actions; If it is an individual, the actor is responsible for the results of his actions. Others, rewards and punishments, luck, difficulty of work and other environmental reasons. ; Personality, motivation, mood, attitude, ability, effort and other personal reasons. If a student fails the exam, it may be due to personal reasons: not smart, not working hard and so on. It may also be environmental reasons: the course is too difficult and the exam is unreasonable. Hyde's attribution theory about environment and individual, external cause and internal cause became the basis of later attribution research. He believes that the role of human perception in interpersonal communication is to enable observers to predict and control the behavior of others.
(2) The corresponding inference theory of Jones and Davis.
The attribution theory put forward by Jones and K.E. Davis in 1965 is called correspondence reasoning. The theory holds that people should deduce the intention and motivation of behavior from behavior and its results when making personal attribution. The derived behavior intention and motivation correspond to the observed behavior and its results, that is, the corresponding inference. The more a person knows about behavior and its causes, the more consistent his inference about behavior will be. The more unusual a behavior is, the more consistent the observer's reasoning about its reasons is.
There are three main factors that affect the corresponding inference: ① Heterogeneity result: The selected action plan has different characteristics from other action plans. For example, when a person stands up, closes the window and puts on a sweater, we can infer that he feels cold. The action of closing the window alone may also mean preventing noise outside the window. The gay result of wearing a sweater can make people infer that this action is due to cold. ② Social expectations: When a person shows behaviors that meet social expectations, it is difficult for us to infer his true attitude. For example, when a party participant leaves, he tells the host that he is interested in the party, which is in line with social expectations. It is difficult to infer his true attitude from this action. However, when a person's behavior does not meet social expectations or is not recognized by the society, the behavior is likely to correspond to his true attitude. As mentioned above, everyone who attended the party told the host that the party was terrible when they left, which did not meet social expectations and probably reflected the real attitude of the actors. Freedom of choice: If we know that someone is free to choose a behavior, we tend to think that this behavior corresponds to someone's attitude. If it is not a free choice, it is difficult to make corresponding inferences.