The folk-conceptual theory of behavior explanation has three layers. The first layer concerns the conceptual framework that underlies behavior explanations (essentially, the adult theory of mind and behavior) and the resulting explanatory tools that are available to people. These tools include different modes of explanation (reason explanations, causal history of reason explanations, enabling factor explanations, and cause explanations) and different types within each mode (e.g., belief reasons vs. desire reasons).

The second layer concerns the psychological processes that govern the construction of explanations. There are two different problems to solve: The first is that people must choose among the various explanatory tools (e.g., what determines that actors use more belief reasons, and fewer desire reasons, than observers do). The factors that influence those choices include features of the behavior to be explained (e.g., intentionality, difficulty), pragmatic goals (e.g., impression management, audience design), and information resources (e.g., stored information, perceived action context). The second problem in constructing explanations is that people must select specific reasons, causes, etc., and they do so by recruiting a number of cognitive processes (e.g., retrieving information from knowledge structures, but also simulation, projection, rationalization).

The third layer of the theory is a linguistic one, concerning the specific linguistic forms people have available in their language to express behavior explanations. Some of these linguistic forms can be usefully exploited to use explanations as a tool of social influence, such as to distance oneself from an agent’s reason (e.g., "She refused dessert because she’s been gaining weight" vs. "She refused dessert because she thinks she’s been gaining weight").