Sorority Rituals - Reflections On Rites of ... - Mari Ann Callais

that "the essential feature of a group is that members are interdependent, meaning that they
influence one another in some way" (p. 286).
Sororities are groups of women who by their structure require many facets of operation.
They manage their day to day operations, govern themselves, and interact most often on a daily
basis in some way. Because of this structure, it is necessary to understand what causes a member
to join as well as how and why they act as they do. One theory to consider would be Heider's
Naïve Psychology, otherwise known as the attribution theory (Taylor, et. al 1997). Heider was
interested in how "people in everyday life figure out what is concerning what” (Taylor et. al
1997, p. 57). Another definition of attribution theory is a "description of the way in which people
explain the cause of their own and other people's behavior" (Aronson, Wilson, & Akert, 1999, p.
121). Heider's attribution theory includes two perspectives: internal attribution and extreme
attributions. Aronson, et. al, 1997 defines the attributions as follows:
Internal Attribution is the inference that a person is behaving in a certain way because of
something about him or her, such as a person's attitude, character, or personality. External
Attribution is the inference that a person is behaving a certain way because of something
about the situation he or she is in; the assumption is that most people would respond the
same way in that situation (p. 121).
An individual within any group struggles with who they are as an individual and how they
function within the group. Sororities have the same challenges.
Summary
In summary, this chapter presents various aspects of ritual, rites of passage, female
development, sorority women, and sororities in general. History and the need for ritual establish
a foundation for the basis of "why ritual." I presented the sorority experience from several
different perspectives. It is important to understand the various components of a sorority,
including the definition of sorority as well as how a sorority’s culture and structure affects its
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