Perceptions of a changing environment: Extension of dispositional rules for negative behaviors to negative events and their impacts on causal and dispositional attributions

摘要

Negativity and Hedonic Relevance are examined as factors potentially influencing attributions associated with changes in the built environment. Ninety-nine male and female university students participated on a "survey" testing the extension of previous research identifying these variables as biasing perceivers toward asserting "person" as opposed to "situational" causation. As predicted, increased negativity resulted in significantly more inferences of negative dispositions to only implicitly involved actors. A significant interaction effect was also identified between negativity and gender, with males making more attributions of causality (blame) in response to a more negative event, as predicted for all subjects, and females making less. No new evidence for the role of Hedonic Relevance was identified due to failure of the associated manipulation. A greater focus on gender differences in future attribution research is recommended, as is a greater awareness among architects and planners of the psychological processes underlying the experience of environmental change.