A self-serving bias is any cognitive or perceptual process that is distorted by the need to maintain and enhance self-esteem, or the tendency to perceive oneself in an overly favorable manner.
[2] When individuals reject the validity of negative feedback, focus on their strengths and achievements but overlook their faults and failures, or take more credit for their group's work than they give to other members, they are protecting their self-esteem from threat and injury.
Studies have shown that similar attributions are made in various situations, such as the workplace,[4] interpersonal relationships,[5] sports,[6] and consumer decisions.
[8] There are both cross-cultural (i.e. individualistic and collectivistic culture differences) and special clinical population (i.e. depression) considerations within the bias.
[9][10] Much of the research on the self-serving bias has used participant self-reports of attribution based on experimental manipulation of task outcomes or in naturalistic situations.
[2] Some more modern research, however, has shifted focus to physiological manipulations, such as emotional inducement and neural activation, in an attempt to better understand the biological mechanisms that contribute to the self-serving bias.
Fritz Heider found that in ambiguous situations people made attributions based on their own needs, in order to maintain a higher self-esteem and viewpoint.
Miller and Ross conducted a study in 1975 that was one of the earliest to assess not only self-serving bias but also the attributions for successes and failures within this theory.
[2] Some more modern testing employs neural imaging techniques to supplement the fundamental self-serving bias laboratory procedures.
Neural correlates of the self-serving bias have been investigated by electroencephalography (EEG),[12] as well as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
Self-presentation refers to the drive to convey a desired image to others and make self-serving attributions to manage impressions.
Airplane pilots with an internal locus of control were likely to exhibit a self-serving bias in regard to their skill and levels of safety.
There is evidence of cross-cultural differences in the tendency to exhibit the self-serving bias, particularly when considering individualistic (Western) versus collectivistic (non-Western) societies.
In contrast, the individual goals and identity focused on in individualistic societies increases the need for people within those cultures to guard and boost their personal self-esteem.
While differences have been shown, conflicting literature has cited similarity in causal attributions across both individual and collective cultures, specifically between Belgium, West Germany, South Korea, and England.
[9] No consensus has been reached on cross-culture influences on the self-serving bias, though some systematic differences do seem to be present, especially between Western and non-Western cultures.
[5] A study on self-serving bias in relational context suggests this is due to the idea that close relationships place limits on an individual's self enhancement tendencies.
Understanding why partners refrain from the self-serving bias is still in question but can partially be explained by favorable impression those in close relationships have for one another.
[5] In another study conducted in 2016, the implicit and explicit evaluation of 108 partners and exes as parents who were either married, separated or divorced was researched to investigate if the self-serving bias influenced them.
This study also revealed that narcissism was related to more favorable self-ratings of workplace deviance and contextual performance compared to other (supervisor) ratings.
[32] Because narcissism broadly reflects strong self-admiration and behavioral tendencies which may not be viewed positively by others it is possible that narcissism influences self- and other perceptions differently, and insight into this possibility may be important given that differences in perceptions are the foundation for certain types of performance management and development practices.
[32] Studies in both lab and field settings have shown both teachers and students hold self-serving biases in regard to outcomes in the classroom.
[7] Another reason is that people are so used to bad functionality, counterintuitive features, bugs, and sudden crashes of most contemporary software applications that they tend not to complain about computer problems.
In one study, collegiate wrestlers at the Division I level made self-reported attributions of the outcomes in their preseason matches.
[16] In a study employing the EEG method of examining brain activation, participants were given bogus outcome feedback that indicated either success or failure and told to make attributions.
Such lack of brain activity implies that self-control, which is controlled by the dorsomedial frontal cortex, is not as prominent in self-serving attributions as non-self-serving ones.