Attributions for serious illness: Are controllability, responsibility and blame different constructs?

We examined whether judgments of controllability, responsibility, and blame are distinct and sequential psychological constructs. Undergraduates read a brief description of a male with AIDS or lung cancer and rated his controllability, responsibility, and blame in relation to the illness. Participants considered him to be more responsible than blameworthy for his illness, but more in control than responsible for becoming ill. Although measures of participants’ behavioural intentions, emotions, and social attitudes were correlated with controllability ratings, such associations were stronger for responsibility ratings and even stronger for blame ratings. Structural equation models provided additional evidence for an attributional hierarchy in which blame is the final step. Nonetheless, emotional and behavioural responses were more completely explained when attributions were considered jointly with personal and social attitudes.