ABSTRACT
This chapter illustrates the ramifications of the question and suggest some alternate assumptions that might be more useful. It looks at historical material dealing with the issues, research findings are offered to demonstrate the apparent mindlessness of ostensibly thoughtful action. Though much attention has been given in social psychology to the attribution process and its attendant behavior, there has been little concern with just how pervasive the attribution phenomenon actually is. Much psychological research relies on a theoretical model that depicts the individual as one who is cognitively aware most of the time, and who consciously, constantly, and systematically applies “rules” to incoming information about the environment in order to formulate interpretations and courses of action. Much of the interaction that people mundanely enact in the everyday world would seem to rely on the scripted structure of typical activities rather than on the active processing of incoming information that attribution making relies on.
