Two college students both received exceptional grades on a difficult project. One of them responded by saying, “I worked so hard on that project! I know if I had to do it again and I studied just as hard, I would do just as well the next time.” The other said, “My professor must have been in a good mood when he saw my project. If I did it again, who knows how high my grade would be.”
Each of the their responses hold clues into how they generally perceive their world and their risk for developing depression and other mental health issues. When we try to conceptualize results, whether they are professional like projects or personal like why a relationship failed, we tend to do so on three levels: locus, stability and controllability.
When people try to understand life events they either attribute the event to internal or external circumstances (locus), to temporary or permanent causes (stability) and whether the events were in the person’s control (controllability). Research has shown that children, teens and adults who tend to view their success as internal, stable and controllable have higher self-esteem, are more success academically, professionally and in personal relationships.
When they fail at something, people who think this way might respond by saying, “I didn’t spend enough time on the project but next time I do something like this, I know exactly how I can change my work habits to get a different result.” During times of failure, they believe that the result is temporary and that succeeding next time is in their control.
This is exemplified by the first quote above. This way of thinking also acts as a protective factor against developing depression and anxiety problems. People who think this way expect success and when success occurs they attribute it to their effort or intelligence, barring any other probable external circumstances that would have affected the result.
The second student in the above example has an external, unstable and uncontrollable view of her project. Had this student failed at the project, this student would have responded by saying something like, “I’m not very good at this class so even if I had to do the project over I would still fail. There’s no way I can learn this material.” This type of thinking is associated with higher rates of depression, negative self evaluation and lowered self-esteem.
People who think this way tend to have a negative view of the world and even when successes happen, attributing them to external, uncontrollable circumstances that may not happen again further perpetuates this negativistic view.
How we learn to think this way depends a lot on how our parents think. Children watch how their parents conceptualize the world and take on their views of why things happen the way they should. In addition, people who are at higher risk for depression and have low self-esteem are more likely to attribute success to external, unstable and uncontrollable circumstances.
If you find yourself sounding more like the second student than the first student in the above example, rest assured that it is possible to retrain your brain to think differently. Challenging your thoughts and forcing yourself to find evidence contrary to what you naturally believe can help your brain re-learn healthier ways of conceptualizing success and coping with failures.
What do you think about attributions? Please leave your comments below.