This theory looks at the different reasons people give for our success or failure. This is broken down in 3 causal dimensions, locus, whether its internal or external. Controlability, whether success or failure is due to something within ones control, controlable, or whether the sucess of failure is due to something beyond ones control, uncontrolable. Lastly, stability, which looks at whether the cause of success or failure could easily change, stable, or if its not likely to change anytime soon, unstable (Graham, S., & Taylor, A. Z. (2022). The power of asking why?: Attribution retraining programs for the classroom teacher. Theory Into Practice, 61(1), 5-22. https://doi.org/10.1080/00405841.2021.1932160 ).
Attribution Theory in Action:
A student fails their spelling test.
Response 1 (Internal, uncontrolable, stable)
I fail becuase I am just bad at spelling.
Response 2 (External, uncontrolable, unstable)
The teacher put words on the test that were way harder than our vocab list.
Response 3 (Internal, controlable, unstable)
I did not set up enough time to study this week.
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The personal belief one has in their ability to succeed. This describes one's confidence and influnces everything froms goals to learning. Based on one's mindset and the attributions they makes determines their self-efficacy.
High self-efficacy means students will be more willing to push themselves and have more meaning and accusition when it comes to learning.
Low self-efficacy within students looks like lower level goals set/achievement, avoidance when it comes to learning tasks, and overall not finding joy in learning.