OFFenSe TIPS
What’s Your “Reason Why?”
long time to improve and that as a cutter
there’s not much that he can do to help.
Brian’s perceived lack of power to influence
By John K. Gotwals, PhD
this factor frees him from any personally
responsibility or accountability over the
Let’s start off with a mental exercise. players’ control. “Effort” is another common loss. Of course he feels a bit upset over
Think back to one of your games from last attribution used to explain a loss in the team’s loss, but he doesn’t lose any
season in which the outcome really had an Ultimate. That is, the loss occurred because personal pride or self-esteem because
impact on you. This could be anything from players just didn’t try hard enough. This there’s nothing he could have done to
a big win at Nationals or a tough loss in attribution would generally be classified as prevent it.
league finals. What were the main reasons internal, unstable, and controllable because Compare the impact of Brian’s attribution
why your team won or lost that game? Did it originates from within, can change from to that of Sarah’s. Sarah thinks that her
the wind suddenly pick up in the second game-to-game, and is directly under a team lost in the semis of No Borders
half? Were you too old to keep up with the player’s control. because she didn’t layout for the d on
youngsters on the other team? Were your An attribution’s classification is important the final scoring pass. In Sarah’s mind this
teammates just more skilled than your because different attributions differently is an internal, unstable, and controllable
opponents? Take a moment to write down impact a player’s sense of personal attribution because she knows that she
your top “reasons why” because we’ll come responsibility and accountability over a can layout and at times has laid out in the
back to them later. game’s outcome. This, in turn, influences past, but for some reason she didn’t do it
This exercise is the starting point in the player’s emotions after the game. For for that specific pass. This perception leads
“attribution analysis.” Sport psychologists example, Brian feels his team lost their Sarah to feel that she could have influenced
use attribution analysis to understand the quarterfinal game at Nationals because the factor that caused her team to lose.
relationship between athletes’ explanations the handlers on his team weren’t skilled Because Sarah feels a greater sense of
for the outcome of a game (i.e., their enough to put up good hucks for him personal responsibility and accountability
attributions) and how the athletes felt after to bring down. In his mind this qualifies over the loss, the sadness and guilt that she
the game, how motivated and committed as an external, stable, and uncontrollable feels over the game’s outcome will probably
they are to improvement, and how they attribution because he feels that his hit closer to home than it did for Brian.
perform in future games. Interestingly, what teammates’ throwing skills will take a Now you may think that Brian’s
is most important may not be the actual
attributions, but the characteristics that
underlie them.
According to Attribution Theory there
are three dimensions to any “reason why”
(see Figure 1). The first dimension, locus of
causality, focuses on attributions’ origins.
Do your reasons represent things internal
or external to you? The second dimension
concerns attributions’ stability. Can your
reasons change on a day-to-day basis or do
they stay relatively the same across time?
The third factor focuses on your perception
of control over the attribution. Are your
attributions under your control or will they
happen whether or not you want them to?
Let’s look at some examples to bring
this to life. How many times have you
heard players’ say that their team lost
because it was too windy? This attribution
would typically be classified as external,
unstable, and uncontrollable because
the wind emanates from outside of you,
changes from day-to-day, and is out of
Ultimate Canada Magazine — www.canadianultimate.com 5
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