Back in 1965 Hal David wrote the lyrics and Burt Bacharach composed the music for a popular song entitled “What the World Needs Now Is Love”.
The lyrics to the catchy tune, proclaiming that “sweet love” is “the only thing that there’s just too little of” ring as true today as they did then. People in the next century probably will be saying the same thing.
A few years after the song about too little love came out, Social Psychologist Lee David Ross, a Stanford University professor, coined the term “fundamental attribution error” to describe the finding of previous studies that people are predisposed towards attributing another person’s behavior to individual characteristics and attitudes, even when it is relatively clear that the person's behavior was a result of situational demands.
For example:
Imagine that you are driving in the right lane of Interstate 55 at a reasonable speed when, as you approach an exit, another motorist in the left lane suddenly whips in front of you to get to the exit ramp. You have to slam on brakes to avoid a collision. You conclude that the other motorist is careless, thoughtless, rude, inconsiderate and stupid. Maybe you even use a noun impugning his parentage.
Now imagine you are the driver in the left lane, tooling along listening to the radio or your car phone and you suddenly realize you are rapidly approaching the place where you should exit the interstate. You step on the gas, pass the car on the right and quickly decelerate to get off the highway. The guy in the right lane is probably thinking or saying things about your character that, in your opinion, aren’t true.
Most of us, at times, are guilty of fundamental attribution error whether we admit it or not. And it goes beyond interstate highways and shopping center parking lots where drivers jockey for position.
Certainly it is pervasive in our politics these days, including the incendiary remarks by our president toward his critics, and, to be fair, among some of the president’s critics toward him. Some of the same people who claimed President Obama's executive orders were dictatorial are fine with President Trump's executive orders and vice versa.
Yes, what the world needs is more love, but if that is an unreasonable expectation, we could certainly do with a lot less fundamental attribution error.
But the sad truth is there seems to be more of it now than when the phrase was coined, back before there was an internet and 24-hour cable television. If it isn’t more prevalent, at least we are exposed to it more now than ever before.
