Page 82 - Journal of Library Science in China 2020 Vol.46

CHEN Geng & HU Yachun / The attribution analysis of low participation in public reading 081
among rural residents: A survey from 77 administrative villages and rural libraries in Hubei Province

Another 70-year-old man said, “I like to pay attention to some poverty alleviation policies. I used
to read newspapers, but the news in the newspapers lags behind. Now I just watch TV news, which
tells the news in a more comprehensive and timely manner.” Diversified cultural and entertaining
activities have crowded out reading time for rural residents, making less and less people read for
pleasure.

4 Conclusions and suggestions

This paper empirically analyzes the low participation of rural residents in public reading by
referring to Kelly’s cube theory, attributing it to three main dimensions and seven sub-dimensions,
and tries to establish a relatively complete attribution framework. The results of these dimensions
show that the reasons for the low participation of rural residents are complex and diverse, and
their influence are different among different individuals or groups. In the further action plan and
technical strategy planning, we should not only pay attention to all kinds of reasons as a whole, but
adopt the corresponding strategies according to the different categories of these reasons as well.

4.1 Conclusions

4.1.1 The reasons for rural residents’ low participation in public reading are complex and diverse,
including single factor and composite factors
According to the above study, person, stimulus and circumstance all influence the participation
behavior of rural residents to different degrees. How do these factors work singly or in
combination? Which is more important? We need to combine the consensus, consistency and
distinctiveness of Kelly’s cube theory to make the judgment. Distinctiveness targets at stimulus,
whether a person reacts the same way when faced with different stimulus. Consistency aims
at circumstance, whether a person has always acted in similar ways in the face of similar
stimulus at different times or circumstance. Consensus aims at the person, whether the person
and others exhibit the same behavior. According to the covariant principle, if a condition exists,
the corresponding result also exists, and if this condition disappears, the result also disappears.
Consequently, there are eight theoretical attributions for the low participation of rural residents in
public reading (shown in table 4).
〇a ①

①It should be noted that Kelly’s cube attribution theory has also been criticized for being too idealistic, because it is difficult for
researchers to obtain all the information required by this model and ensure its authenticity. Therefore, Kelly himself, Mac Arthur,
Luber, Feldman, Zuckerman, Orvis and others have only verified the partial attribution hypothesis, and some other hypotheses
have not been effectively verified due to other reasons such as information collection. Nevertheless, the most important thing is
that Kelly’s cube theory provides us with a methodological approach to attribution, that is, “it reveals the ways and processes that
ordinary people should use to make correct attribution, which can not only provide methodological guidance for people to make
correct attribution in their daily life, but it also opens up a way for us to study attribution phenomena in natural situations from the
perspective of attribution research”. Refer to: Wang, Y.Z. (1987). Comment on Kelley’s ANOVA attribution model（试评凯莱的方
差分析归因模式）. Psychological Science Communication（心理科学通讯）, (4): 22-27.