PSYCHOLOGY MASTER'S THESIS ABSTRACT

Julianne Millar

MA-Research
December 1995

Constructive Thinking and Attributional Complexity in Emotional Judgments

    It was hypothesized that constructive thinking and attributional complexity would be positively related.  Further, it was hypothesized that good constructive thinkers would make more internal and stable causal attributions in emotionally favorable situations, while poor constructive thinkers would make more internal and stable attributions in unfavorable situations.  Undergraduate psychology students (N = 123) completed the Constructive Thinking Inventory, Attributional Complexity Scale and the Emotional Situations Inventory.  As predicted, attributional complexity was positively related to constructive thinking.  The other hypotheses received partial support: good constructive thinkers did not make more stable attributions in favorable situations, but they did make fewer unstable attributions.  Similarly mixed results were found in unfavorable situations, with good constructive thinkers making fewer internal and stable attributions, but also fewer external and unstable attributions.  In unfavorable situations, good constructive thinkers might have been unsatisfied with response alternatives that precluded more complex explanations to protect self-esteem and situational perspectives.

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