Causal attributions, sanctions, and normal mood variations.

Three experiments with a total of 288 undergraduates tested the causal-locus hypothesis (CLH), which asserts that persons making internal attributions for failure and external attributions for success experience more negative postoutcome moods than persons making the opposite attributions. Although outcomes consistently affected moods and attributions, attributions did not affect moods. Significant correlations consistent with the CLH were infrequently obtained. Another theory, the sanctioned-object hypothesis (SOH), was proposed for understanding how causal attributions lead to mood changes. The SOH asserts that the application of positive or negative sanctions to objects in the perceptual field is a central determinant of mood and that attributions affect mood when their content and salience activate sanctioning processes. Exp IV, with 96 undergraduates, evaluated the competing theories. Results support the SOH but not the CLH. Implications for understanding mood variations and the effects of moods on attributions and methodological alternatives are discussed. (33 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)