Attribution

Technically speaking, attribution is the process by which people use information to make inferences about the causes of behavior or events. Simply put, this is how we go about inferring behavior (our own and those of others). For example, if you take an exam and you do well but a friend of yours fails, you might say that you did well because you are smart but your friend failed because he partied all night and didn't study. In this case, you "attributed" your success to an internal attribution (you're smart) but "attributed" your friend's behavior to an external attribution (partied all night).