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The 'fact or fiction1 controversy about self-serving attributional biases is discussed under two aspects: a) The lack of a clear conceptual definition of "bias" referring to cognitive models of causal attribution which specify unbiased, rational modes of causal inference; b) The empirical evidence with regard to the decision whether attributional distortions are due to self-protective and self-enhancing motives rather than errors and biases in information processing. It is concluded that progress in self-serving bias research is conditional upon a theoretical clarification and operational definition of self-serving biases explicitly derived from a rational standard of causal inference and based on a motivational analysis of the functions of causal attributions.