Internal and External Attribution of Success and Failure in a Gambling and Non-gambling Situation

The aim of the current study was to compare the internal and external attributions of success and failure in a sample including recreational gamblers and non-gamblers. Seventy-seven participants (32 males 44 females, 1 unknown sex), ranging in age from 18 to 72 years, who had all gambled at some time in their life, participated in the current study. The Multidimensional-Multiattributional Causality Scale (Lefcourt, Von Baeyer, Ware, & Cox, 1979), a modified version of South Oaks Gambling Screen (Lesieur & Blume, 1993), and Youth Gambling Behaviour Survey (Moore & Ohtsuka, 1997) were administered to measure attribution, problem gambling and illusion of control beliefs. It was hypothesised that internal and external attributions of success or failure in skill and chance situations will be different a) between individuals with no gambling problem and those with a possible gambling problem, and b) between individuals with high or low levels of illusion of control beliefs. The results showed a statistically significant difference in attribution between the gambling and nongambling situations for all participants. In a gambling situation, respondents attributed successes and failures externally, whereas in a work/study situation, they attributed successes and failures internally. However, between gamblers and non-gamblers, no differences were found in the pattern of external/internal attributions. Possible problem gamblers showed high external Locus of Control scores for both gambling and work/study context. Individuals with high illusion of control beliefs had significantly higher ratings for external attributions in both situations than those with low illusion of control beliefs.