Assumptions, Interpretations, and Attributions
I heard a story many years ago. Two men working for a show company were sent to a tribe in the middle of nowhere to scout the territory and inform the company of any possibility of success selling shoes there. The first man makes his observations and informs the company of his conclusions:
– Business here is going to be a complete waste of time and effort. No one is wearing shoes.
The second man also reports back to the company:
– Business here is going to be great and worth the efforts. No one is wearing shoes.
Similarly this happens in every situation in life. One situation, two individuals, different views. It happens in the art world too. Two individuals can look at the same piece of art and have two completely different views of it. Interestingly, every view is subjective.
We have the capacity to decode the symbolic information we receive and develop our own views to explain what we see, feel, and understand. We give meaning to the world around us through the filter of our experiences and knowledge. Socially, in the meaning making process we examine multiple views, balance them with our own and form our conclusions. These conclusions are explained and could be categorized in assumptions, interpretations, and attributions.
Assumptions are taking for granted a conclusion without proof or facts based on personal biases. It is very natural to us to fall prey of assumptions. That is not a problem. The problem is when no proof or facts allow us to consider other options. We form our view and that becomes the only truth. Interpretations, on the other hand, consider facts balancing these with experience and knowledge, assigns meaning, but remains open to consider other views that eventually help grow and develop a broader picture. Attributions go a step further.
According to Bernard Weiner’s Attribution Theory, broadly used in cognitive psychology, we assign meaning to meaning. In other words, we explain why we reached our assumption or interpretation of an event, behavior, a piece of art, and other forms of symbolic information. We assign internal or internal causes to our conclusions. Interestingly, we switch between internal and external attributions when it come to us and others. If we are successful or received favorable feedback we apply internal attributes and tell ourselves: “I worked very hard on this”. When we fail or we don’t like the feedback we receive we tell ourselves we apply external attributes to justify the results: “I don’t care what you have to say. You don’t know what I had to go through to achieve this”.
The scene quickly switches when it comes to judging the behaviors or events involving others. When people act in a specific way we attribute that behavior to internal factors concerning personality or character traits like coping skills (or lack thereof), or attitude issues. Rarely we consider external attributes to be the cause for other’s behaviors like a difficult situation they might be going through.
Once again, these views are subjective. All opinions are subjective. Every perspective is as individual as the person who has it. However, we must be very careful how we share these views with others not only for their sake but for our own. Our words can hurt people. We don’t know what they are going through. We should lift people up instead of trying to tear them apart. We must remember that when we apply assumptions, interpretations, and attributions to others we do so based on our own views, biases, experience, and knowledge. When we talk to others or about others, we might be revealing more about ourselves than what we are trying to reveal about them.
For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
Matthew 7:2
You Will Get Offended
“You will get offended at some point. Someone is going to say something that will go against what you think or believe, and you will get offended. However, getting offended is a choice. There is another choice. You can look back at this selfie and understand that you only have one view and a very small part of the complete story.”
Inquiry is a fancy label to seek understanding of multiple points of view. In the process, we discover that we don’t know everything, or have all the answers. Interestingly, with all the advances in technology, specially in astronomy, some people still believe that the universe revolves around them. Some people assume that their current knowledge and understanding, and self-gained experience is the one and only irrevocable truth. As I often tell my students, and share with other people in conversations, the earth was flat. Through a process of investigation we realize that it is not.
In life, what we think we know today can be challenged, and it can change for our own benefit. We increase knowledge when we allow ourselves to understand different positions and points of view. Our world expands when we can see it from multiple perspectives, but not so much when we only look through the scope of our self-righteous, self-absorbed understanding of the world around us like there is nothing else. It is very easy to talk about tolerance and acceptance, when the only thing we tolerate and accept is what we believe. Then we get offended by opposition. Nevertheless, there is a big difference between tolerance and acceptance, and to surrender your believes and principles for what someone else understands is the truth. Understanding you is not going to change what I believe, but I get to see your point. That is a subject for another conversation.
We all have a selfie, a small view of the world around us. You choose to be offended or to allow yourself to understand other points of view. Some people will choose to hold on to their wisdom and allow their world to shrink with their self-righteousness. Others will grow their wisdom and understanding by investigating and learning about different perspectives on the subject matter.