Concepts
Health psychology/Cognitive biases · Social cognition
Self-serving bias
What it means
Attributing one’s successes to internal factors (ability, effort) but one’s failures to external factors (bad luck, others), to protect self-esteem.
Worked example
"I passed because I’m able; I failed only because the questions were unfair."
In the exam
A student credits her good results entirely to her own ability, yet blames a poor result solely on an unfair examiner.
What settles it
Self-serving bias asymmetrically claims success and disowns failure (esteem-protective). The actor–observer bias is about self vs OTHERS — situational for oneself, dispositional for others — regardless of success or failure.
Classically confused with
Actor–observer bias
Source: Miller & Ross; social psychology