IL SELF-SERVING BIAS NELLA RELAZIONE DI COPPIA: UNO STUDIO SPERIMENTALE

[Autom. eng. transl.] Introduction Self-serving bias is a cognitive bias that leads individuals to make internal responsibilities for success and external attributions for failure. It is particularly evident in laboratory tasks: when two individuals perform an interdependent task, they tend to attribute merit to themselves in case of success and to assign responsibility to the other in case of failure. Some recent studies have focused on the mechanism of self-serving bias in the context of some close relationships such as friendship and family relationships, showing that individuals performing a significant person task do not implement self-serving bias. Objectives and Methods The objective of this study is to examine the attributions of responsibility in the context of the couple relationship. It is hypothesized that, unlike outsiders, members of an intimate couple do not manifest self-serving bias, dividing merit and blame equally, or manifesting the other-serving bias, attributing success to the partner and failure to themselves. 128 participants (32 couples engaged and 32 pseudocopies, created by the experimenter combining two strangers of the opposite sex), after having performed an interdependent task in the laboratory, received randomly assigned feedback regarding the performance and attributed responsibility for the outcome of the task. Results and Conclusions Strangers and engaged couples make responsibilities in different ways. Contrary to expectations, outsiders do not manifest self-serving bias, but divide merit and guilt. The fiancés give credit to the partner in case of success and blame themselves in case of failure, showing the other-serving bias. The other-serving bias is a relationship-oriented strategy, involved in the process of maintaining one's identity as a couple.