A schematic model of dispositional attribution in interpersonal perception.

Previous research on dispositional attribution has failed to take into account how the inference process may be affected by variations in schematic representation of dispositional attributes. A schema is denned here as a set of implicational links between dispositional levels and categories of relevant behaviors. Three general schemata are discussed—the partially restrictive schema, the hierarchically restrictive schema, and the fully restrictive schema—each having different implications for the rules of inference employed in making attributions based on observed behaviors. Relevant research on utilization of information regarding consensus, situational context, and actor's past behavior is reviewed in this framework.