The actor-observer asymmetry in attribution: A (surprising) meta-analysis
Malle meta-analysed a hundred and seventy-three studies of one of the best-known ideas in social psychology, the actor-observer asymmetry: the claim that people explain their own behaviour by circumstances and other people's by character. The claim had been described for decades as robust and pervasive. Across the studies, the average effect is essentially zero. It survives only under specific conditions: when the person acting is portrayed as unusual, when the events explained are hypothetical rather than real, when the two people are close, or when free-text explanations are coded by researchers. There is also a pattern by valence, with the asymmetry appearing for negative events and reversing for positive ones, which looks like a self-serving bias rather than the proposed mechanism. Averaged across both kinds of event, no asymmetry exists. This vault cites it as a case of a textbook claim that did not survive being measured properly.
Malle meta-analysed a hundred and seventy-three studies of one of the best-known ideas in social psychology, the actor-observer asymmetry: the claim that people explain their own behaviour by circumstances and other people's by character. The claim had been described for decades as robust and pervasive. Across the studies, the average effect is essentially zero. It survives only under specific conditions: when the person acting is portrayed as unusual, when the events explained are hypothetical rather than real, when the two people are close, or when free-text explanations are coded by researchers. There is also a pattern by valence, with the asymmetry appearing for negative events and reversing for positive ones, which looks like a self-serving bias rather than the proposed mechanism. Averaged across both kinds of event, no asymmetry exists. This vault cites it as a case of a textbook claim that did not survive being measured properly.
Written from the abstract, OpenAlex.
What our sources record
Reproduced as it was written when this source was checked, figures and all.
Malle, B. F. (2006). "The Actor-Observer Asymmetry in Attribution: A (Surprising) Meta-Analysis." Psychological Bulletin, 132(6), 895-919. 173 published studies; average effect sizes d = −0.016 to d = 0.095.
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- Why You Are Kinder to Your Friends Than to Yourself, Why We Care
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The link below was matched against the publisher's record on title, first author and year, and all three agree.
The source
https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.132.6.895
DOI: 10.1037/0033-2909.132.6.895