cool story.

So once upon a time, I was sitting in my three hour social psychology class. We were talking about fundamental attribution error.  If you don’t know what that is, please enjoy this definition via wikipedia. “Fundamental attribution error describes the tendency to over-value dispositional or personality-based explanations for the observed behaviors of others while under-valuing situational explanations for those behaviors. The fundamental attribution error is most visible when people explain the behavior of others. It does not explain interpretations of one's own behavior—where situational factors are often taken into consideration.”

Our professor was asking for examples in our own lives of this. This kid in my class, who comes off on the arrogant side,and he’s well aware of how he comes off opened his mouth.

He says he experiences the fundamental attribution error “everyday on my way to the Salt Lake Center” you see, he’s “not from Utah, and doesn’t appreciate the drivers here. He drives a four wheel drive LIFTED jeep, so he has no problem getting to school. It makes him really angry when a little two wheel drive car is in front of him” 

Our professor asked him what he thought that the car in front of him was thinking. He responded with “Oh anything but driving!” 

Before  I knew it my mouth was open, and I said, “Or maybe they are thinking “WHO IS THIS A-HOLE flying 100 miles an hour down the freeway in the snow?” (No, I didn’t swear, I just said a-hole.)

Everyone around me just started to laugh, and I lost it too. I went sooo red. I couldn’t believe I said that out loud.  Do I regret it? Absolutely NOT.