Attribution Analysis

CORE DEFINITION

The attribution tool family groups methods used to trace why an event occurred, including repeated why-questioning, cause-and-effect diagrams, root cause analysis and laddered questioning. It also draws on attribution theory, which distinguishes internal attributions to persons from external attributions to circumstances and documents systematic biases in how people make that distinction. The core proposition is that explanations people offer by default are shaped by bias rather than evidence, so structured tools are needed to make the reasoning visible and checkable. The key qualification is that each tool suits a different causal structure, so a single method applied to every problem produces shallow or one-sided attributions.