I know why he said that...

Fundamental attribution error number 1

We travel a lot for the work that we do. Regional New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria have become very familiar haunts in recent years. I personally love getting out and visiting places like Broken Hill and Longreach and Cobden and I always post photos of where ever I am on Facebook.

A couple of weeks ago I was in Leeton in NSW which is 500kms south-west of Sydney and 450kms north of Melbourne – kind of a midpoint. I travel with two hats – the working hat and the tourist hat. To be completely honest with you, sometimes the tourist hat comes out a little too often when I’m driving in a town like Leeton. My first evening in Leeton I drove into town with a couple of goals in mind - first goal was to find a Pharmacy and the second goal was to get to the Pharmacy before it closed at 5pm. I had been given rough directions and when I'm being given directions verbally I tend to focus only on what I consider to be the salient points like the large round-a-bout and the left turn. I tune out a little on the finer details in between. This gets me into trouble sometimes. So I'm driving along the main street of Leeton and trying to find the Pharmacy. 

Thinking I have plenty of time, I firmly placed my tourist hat on. Driving slowly, trying to find the corner the Pharmacy was on and also trying to figure out the most effective way to park, in reverse, on a 45 degree angle in a country town was all going on in my mind. Then I stopped, middle of the main street, where I found a parking spot in readiness to park. To my shock I started to hear horns beeping from a trail of 8-10 cars down the road and the driver behind me started yelling out the window. 

I didn't hear exactly what he was saying so I wasn't certain where it was directed – oblivious me. I started reversing and then realised I had turned the wheel too sharply, so stopped and moved forward to try again. As I moved forward the driver in the car behind me had already proceeded to move around me and he stopped abruptly. I’d almost hit his car. He started yelling abuse out the car window and I quickly put my hand up to apologise and diffused the situation and he sped off. My immediate thought was that he was an impatient, rude and a bunch of colourful superlatives that I won’t repeat, fellow. Did he think he was only one on the road.

In fact I was only guessing at why he was so angry with what was happening. 

The person behind him seemed completely relaxed about it. I really didn't know if it was me making him angry or a combination of things of which I was only partly to blame. 

Maybe he was in a hurry to get to daycare to pick up his kids before they closed, maybe it was a family emergency, or maybe he’d had a crappy day at work and fought with his boss and was just in a really bad mood, or maybe it just me and my bad driving. All of these things went through my head but I, realistically, had no real idea what his real motivation was. And then I realised that what had just happened was that I’d been guilty of making what psychologists refer to as a Fundamental Attribution Error. 

It happens all the time. 

And we fall into this trap on a regular basis. 

When a car cuts us off in traffic, when a family member makes a comment we don’t appreciate, when a co-worker looks at us in a certain way across the conference room in a meeting we ascribe motivations to all of those behaviours when we actually have no idea what the real motivation was or what they are actually thinking. And it happens to us as well. How often have you heard a family member or friend or co-worker say something like “he’s only doing that because he likes you” or "she said that because she's trying to let you know who’s boss." It is spoken with complete authority! How do you know that? Is that what "she" told you? This leads to frustration in ourselves and we start talking about it to others and it potentially leads to conflict. My take is that we get a little short sighted by the behaviour and in the process we don't ask the right questions to understand it and clear it up for us. Next time someone you're interacting with says or does something that you want to attribute a motivation to stop and think about asking them why exactly they said or did that. You might be surprised. At ProActive ReSolutions we've developed  a product that helps minimise fall-out from frequent use of the Fundamental Attribution Error. We call it Straight Talk and we’ll talk more about that in an upcoming blog.

Darren Robertson

On the way to the airport..

Start a conversation with a cabbie and see where it leads. Depending on how I'm feeling I’ll start the banter or sit there in silence. This morning I said nothing.  The cabbie drove way too slow for my money, hugged the side of the road and wasn't sure where my destination was (and this in a country town).  Despite the slow start, the day went well.  I was in town running a Violence Prevention Workshop. The staff were a great mob and the day went well. This afternoon the pressure was off. The cabbie arrived and I was up for a chat.

We started with the weather and finished with the ‘boat people’.  I was enjoying his company, even while he was bagging everything from our Prime Minister to the new iPhone 5.  He seemed to roll with the punches as I set about bemoaning the destructiveness of the Opposition Leader and agreeing with him on the iPhone  We covered a lot of ground in 15 minutes. But then he started on about ‘boat people’ coming to Oz and I asked him to explain his views more deeply.  What he had to say was informed by commercial radio talk back, so by definition was neither generous nor factual. We continued chatting for a few minutes when we arrived at the airport and I asked him to think again about what he’d said, because it struck me as a being a long way from the reality. He said he might.  I paid him the fare, said I’d tip him next time if we agreed and checked into the flight home.

Often in these situations I’ll just listen to these views and while not agreeing, I won’t disagree.  It’s easier to let others say insulting, inappropriate and racist comments rather than challenge them. 

What do you normally in situations such as this? Do you challenge or question views that you strongly disagree with, or do you let them ride?  Most of us I suspect let them ride. Why?

My sense is that we do so to minimise the possibility of conflict. How often during a day do we do the quick conflict calculation and decide to let it go.  

The calculation goes:

If I challenge what was just said, I run the risk of creating conflict between me and the person who said it (what you might call increasing external conflict). 

If I let it go, I run the risk of feeling I let myself and others down (what you might call increasing internal conflict).  

 Most of us most of the time settle for the latter.

Challenge disrespectful behaviour = increased risk of external conflict

Don’t challenge disrespectful behaviour = increased risk of internal conflict

Next time you’re in a cab and the cabbie starts to say things that you strongly disagree with, have a go at challenging what’s said. You get added value for your fare by practicing how well you can challenge someone without alienating them.  And you don’t become a silent bystander where the assumption is you agree with what’s being said.

See you at the airport.  J