External relational attributions: Attributing cause to others' relationships

• Date: 01 June 2019
• Published date: 01 June 2019
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/job.2360

SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE

External relational attributions: Attributing cause to others'

relationships

Jack Carson

Raymond J. Harbert College of Business,

Auburn University, Auburn, Alabama, U.S.A.

Correspondence

Jack Carson, Raymond J. Harbert College of

Business, Auburn University, Lowder Business

Building, 405 W. Magnolia Ave, Auburn, AL

36849, U.S.A.

Email: jec0065@auburn.edu

Summary

I present an attributional approach to understanding how people perceive and

respond to the effects of others' relationships in the workplace by suggesting that

people perceive others' relationships to be causal sources of workplace outcomes.

Specifically, I suggest that individuals' responses to negative outcomes at work can

be better understood by differentiating between two types of external attributional

explanations: external relational attributions and external nonrelational attributions.

This research focuses on the conceptual development of external relational attribu-

tions, which are defined as those attributional explanations made for outcomes or

behaviors experienced or observed by a focal individual that locate the cause of an

outcome within the relationship between two others (people, groups, organizations,

or any combination), not including the focal individual. Further, I propose situational

antecedents and behavioral outcomes of external relational attributions, with an

emphasis on individuals' behaviors toward others' relationships. Lastly, I highlight

the advantages of considering the role of others' relationships when applying

attribution theory to a variety of organizational phenomena and present directions

for future research.

KEYWORDS

attribution theory, external relational attributions, work relationships

1|INTRODUCTION

At ages as young as 9 months, people are keenly aware of others' rela-

tionships (Liberman, Kinzler, & Woodward, 2014). Many common

workplace behaviors involve actions directed toward others' relation-

ships: leaders conduct team‐building exercises to forge strong rela-

tionships between group members (Wang & Howell, 2010),

workplace romance is increasingly subject to formal and informal

human resources policies (Pierce & Aguinis, 2009), and employee gos-

sip can severely undermine others' relationships (Ellwardt, Labianca, &

Wittek, 2012). However, extant research has yet to examine the

extent to which individuals actually attribute their experienced

workplace outcomes to others' relationships. Acknowledging others'

relationships as perceived sources of significant work outcomes is a

key step in more clearly identifying the attributional antecedents to

behaviors directed toward others' relationships. This research

facilitates an understanding of when and why such attributions may

occur and identifies a set of behavioral responses that can be

explained by these attributions.

Attribution theory posits that individuals act as “naive psycholo-

gists”in determining causal explanations for outcomes and behaviors

experienced and performed by themselves and those around them

(Heider, 1958; Kelley, 1967; Weiner, 1985). A wide number of causal

explanations are possible for any given outcome (Kent & Martinko,

1995). For example, an employee who fails to meet a deadline might

consider causal explanations for the failure such as his or her own

effort or the difficulty of the project requirements. Organizational

research invoking attribution theory suggests that individuals'

explanations for the occurrence of workplace outcomes influence

their affect and performance, two individual outcomes critically

Received: 28 December 2017 Revised: 30 January 2019 Accepted: 5 February 2019

DOI: 10.1002/job.2360

J Organ Behav. 2019;40:541–553. © 2019 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/job 541