Relationship Attribution Measure (RAM)

Author of Tool: 

Fincham, F.D., & Bradbury, T.N.

Key references: 

Fincham, F.D., & Bradbury, T.N. (1992). Assessing attributions in marriage: The Relationship Attribution Measure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 62, 457-468. 

Primary use / Purpose: 

A brief, simple measure of different types of attributions for partner behaviour.

Background: 

Distressed spouses are hypothesised to make attributions for negative events that accentuate their impact whereas non-distressed spouses are thought to make attributions that minimise the impact of negative events. The Relationship Attribution Measure (RAM) is a simple measure of difference types of attribution behaviour in spousal relationships. 

Psychometrics: 

Reliability was established by high internal consistency and test–retest correlations. Causal and responsibility attribution scores correlated with marital satisfaction, attributions for marital difficulties, and attributions for actual partner behaviors generated by spouses. Responsibility attributions were related to (1) reported anger in response to stimulus behaviors used in the measure and (2) the amount of anger displayed by wives during a problem-solving interaction with their partner. The extent to which husbands and wives whined during their discussion also correlated with their responsibility attributions.

Keywords: 

• Relationships

Files: 

Scale

Digital Object Identifier (DOI): 

https://dx.doi.org/10.13072/midss.1513