attribution theory

• attribution is a reason given by the performer about the outcome or result
• Weiner (1974) stated there were different reasons for winning and losing
• locus of causality.

  • internal - within performers control
  • external - outside performers control
• locus of stability.

  • stable - unlikely to change
  • unstable - can change
• attribution is used to promote task persistence
• self serving bias.

  • when players win, they believe result is down to them so use internal and stable attributes
  • losing results in players attributing outcome to external and unstable factors
• what does self-serving bias promote?

  • helps promote self-esteem keeping players motivated
  • coaches can convince performer that the loss can be 'changed'
• self-serving bias is using external and/or unstable reasons for losing
• what is learned helplessness?

  feeling that failure is root to further failure

  • when players use internal and stable reasons for defeat
• what are reasons for learned helplessness?

  self-doubt and perceived lack of ability
• what can learned helplessness lead to?

  • affecting participation levels
  • negative experiences
  • negative feedback
  • lack of success
• attribution retraining involves changing performers perception of causes of failure
• learned helplessness can be overome by attribution retraining
• how do we use attribution retraining?

  • changing the belief that ability is cause of failure to belief that it was due to lack of effort
  • the attribution is changed to a controllable factor so we can do something about it to improve for next attempt
• what can attribution retraining help with?

  1. raise confidence and self-esteem
  2. change avoidance behaviour to approach behaviour
  3. encourage mastery orientation
  4. avoiding learned helplessness
• mastery orientation.

  when performer high in confidence and believe in own ability therefore think success is repeatable which failure is changeable