Correspondent Inference Theory

Correspondent inference theory is a psychological theory proposed by Edward E. Jones and Keith E. Davis in 1965 that systematically accounts for how a perceiver infers what an actor was trying to achieve by a particular action. The theory sets out to explain why people make internal, dispositional attributions rather than external, situational ones, holding that people compare a chosen action against the alternatives available to evaluate whether the behavior reflects an internal disposition. Central to the theory is the covariation model, which weighs several factors in deciding how much to attribute a behavior to the person rather than the situation: whether the person had a real choice in taking the action, whether the behavior was expected by the person's social role, and whether the behavior was consistent with that person's normal conduct.