What are the three factors of Seligman’s attributional model (i.e., explanatory style)? Define the two poles of each factor.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Seligman’s concept of explanatory style consists of three dimensions: internal/external, which refers to whether or not a person believes that s/he has control over, or can influence, events; stable/unstable, which represents whether a person believes a repeated event will be the same or subject to change; and global/specific which refers to whether or not a person’s explanation for an event generalizes to other events.

As noted, those who are pessimists attribute failure or negative experiences to internal, stable and global causes and are more likely to experience learned helplessness. Optimistic people attribute negative events to external, unstable and specific causes and are less likely to learn to be helpless.

Kiara seems to be an optimist because although she has experienced a negative event (cancer) she is positive about the outcome of the event. She uses an external attribution for the event, i.e., she does not blame herself for her cancer, instead she sees it as a random event, over which she has no control. Her explanation for her cancer is unstable; she sees her cancer as something that she will recover from, as temporary. And she views the negative event as specific, i.e., she does not generalize from the cancer to other aspects of her life or health. More specifically, although she has cancer, Kiara does not believe she will develop obesity, diabetes or cardiovascular disease.