Attributed To The Development Of A Tendency In The Cultural Context And Cultural Implicit Theories Of Affect

Previous works suggest that the development of attribution tendency is cultural speciality, that is in different culture the developmental style of attribution tendency is defferent. Additionally, the cultural implicit theories have direct impact on attribution tendency.Three studies investigated the development of attribution tendency in Chinese cultural background and the effect of cultural implicit throries on attritution tendency.In study 1, we examined age differences in attribution tendency among 3,6,9,13 and 18 years old participants. The causal attribution tasks involves three kinds of contexts:physical context, individual context and group context. It is found that in physical context, with increasing age attribution tendency are more situational. in individual context; in the first stage with increasing age attribution tendency attribution tendency are more dispositional;in the second stage with increasing age attribution tendency attribution tendency are more situational.in group context, with increasing age attribution tendency are more dispositional.In study 2, we tested the relationship between attribution tendency and three factors that could influence it. Three factors were implicit personality theory, implicit agent theory and fundamental cognitive capacities. A significant correlation was found to exist between attribution tendency scores and implicit agent belief scores; there was no significant correlation between attribution tendency scores and implicit personality belief scores and there was no significant correlation between attribution tendency scores and fundamental cognitive capacities.In study 3, using prime paradigm , we assessed the causal influence of cultural implicit theories on attribution tendency. It is found that attribution tendency scores is different in different primed conditions. this suggested that cultural implicit throry have causal effect on attribution tendency.