**4. The overview of attribution theory**

The basic premise of attribution theory is that people have an innate desire to control the events around them and to understand the causality of their behaviour and that their attribution influences their responses to them and future behaviour [43]. Attribution theory has been applied, inter alia, to understand the HRM process [9] and the leadership process [44]. There are three foremost contributors to the theoretical development of attribution theory. First, Heider [11] argued that people's attributions are dependent on whether the locus of causality for their behaviour is dependent on the person, the environment, or both. The internal locus of causality consists of both motivations and ability while the external locus of causality includes situational factors such as opportunity etc. For example, when an employee misses his/her performance targets, the manager will use the information about his/her motivation, ability, and situational factors (lack of requisite physical resources) to infer the causality of the

employee performance failure. In addition, Heider [11] extended the attribution theory by examining errors that may occur during the attribution process. The first is the *fundamental attribution error*, which occurs when individuals ascribe the causality of an individual's behaviour to internal factors, rather than external factors. The second attribution error is the *actor-observer effect*. This error describes the inclination for an actor to ascribe the causality of their behaviour to external factors while an observer makes causal inferences of the same behaviour to internal factors [45]. Lastly, self-serving bias is the tendency for an actor to attribute the causality of their behaviour for positive events to internal factors while negative events are ascribed to external factors [46]. This attribution perspective has been applied to explain interpersonal dynamics and attribution of behaviour/event within several specific HR functions, such as performance management, grievances, disciplinary actions, recruitment and selection, training, and occupational health and safety (see [10]).

Kelley [12] expanded on Heider's attribution theory by evaluating the information pattern that people use to make causal attribution, known as the covariation principle (e.g. consensus, consistency, and distinctiveness information). Distinctiveness refers to the extent to which a person behaves in a similar way across identical situations. Consensus refers to the extent to which there is a collective agreement in the observation of different people about a person's behaviour. Consistency refers to the extent to which an individual behaves in the same way over time. Kelley [12] noted that when people have access to multiple cases of similar behaviour and events, they would use a different combination of information patterns to infer whether the individual behaviour is caused by internal (disposition) and external (situation) factors [43]. An observer is likely to infer the causes of a person's behaviour to internal factors when there is low distinctiveness, high consistency, and high consensus [47]. Bowen and Ostroff [48] adopted this Kelley's [12] covariation principle (and Michel's [49] situational strength) perspective to conceptualise how consistent, distinctive, and consensus HRM messages affect the strength of the relationship between HRM and organisational performance, conceptually framed as *HR system strength*.

Finally, Weiner [13] extended Heider and Kelley's works by examining the consequences of causal attributions as well as how dimensions (e.g. locus of causality, stability, and controllability) of attributional explanation (e.g. effort, ability, luck, and task difficulty) could affect emotion and behaviour. He argued that different combinations of locus of causality, stability, and controllability in an achievement context is associated with attributions of ability, effort, task the difficulty, and luck [13]. Nishii et al. [50] partly adopted Weiner's [13] attributional theory explains how employees' subjective interpretation of HR practices influences their attitudinal and behavioural reactions towards it. Nishii et al. [50] noted that employees could make either internal or external attributions about the purpose of HR policies and practices, which could result in the attachment of different meanings and behaviours.

Accordingly, when employees make positive internal HR attribution that their management's intent for designing HR practices is to enhance service quality and well-being, they are likely to develop positive perceptions, attitudes, and behaviour towards their management's goals. Conversely, when employees make negative internal HR attribution that their management's intent for designing HR practices are to reduce cost and for exploitation, they will develop negative perceptions, attitudes, and behaviour towards their management goals. Similarly, when an individual makes an external HR attribution that the management intents for designing HR practices to comply with union requirements, they will also develop a negative perception, attitude, and behaviour towards the management goals [50].
