Age-Related Attribution Biases in Errors Involving Instrumental Activities of Daily Living

Abstract

Previous research has demonstrated biases, such as the correspondence bias and an age-based double standard, related to causal attributions throughout adulthood. Much of this research has focused on memory errors, and little attention has been paid to instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) errors. Due to the social context of IADL tasks combined with the importance of these tasks in maintaining independence, the current study attempts to establish the extent that causal attribution biases occur in this domain. The current study used vignettes describing both memory and IADL errors to assess the types of attributions participants (young, middle-aged, and older adults) made when explaining the cause of these errors. This between-subjects design manipulated the age (young, middle-aged, and old) and gender of the targets committing the errors. Similar to the memory domain, participants exhibited an age-based double standard when describing the cause of IADL errors. Specifically, older targets were thought to commit errors due to ‘mental difficulty.’ This study revealed initial evidence that age-related biases in causal attributions may extend to IADL domains. The findings do suggest, however, that these biases may be less pronounced compared to memory domains, as support for age-related increases in the correspondence bias was found in the memory but not the IADL domain.