Psychology 331 Social Psychology

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Psychology 331Social Psychology

• Behavior and Attitudes
• Chapter 4

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Attitudes

• Beliefs that have an evaluative connotation
  attached to them, whether it be positive or
  negative

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Three Components of Attitudes

• Affective (feelings, likes, values)
• Behavioral (intent to act)
• Cognitive (beliefs informational)

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Four Basic Characteristics

• Inferred from behavior
• Directed at a psychological object
• Learned (and thus can be changed)
• Influence behavior

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Attitudes and Affect

• Attitudes can influence Affect
• Zilmann Cantor (1977)
• Affect also can influence Attitudes
• Griffitt Veitch (1971)
• Baron (1987)
• Schwarz Clore (1985)
• Schachter Singer (1962)

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Attitudes and Behavior

• Attitudes influence Behavior
• Borgida Campbell (1982)
• Behavior influences Attitudes
• Lewin (1947)
• Festinger Carlsmith (1959)

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Attitude-Behavior Consistency

• Do attitudes predict behavior?
• LaPiere (hotel study)

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When are attitudes a better predictor of behavior?

• Attitudes are very strong
• Attitudes are specific
• The closer together the attitude and behavior are
  measured
• Other social influences are minimized
• Subjective norms
• Bogus Pipeline (Jones Sigall, 1971)

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Cognitive Consistency Theories

• Heiders Balance Theory (1944)
• Peoples attitudes and behaviors can be balanced
  or unbalanced
• People have a tendency to desire balance
• Examples of balanced and unbalanced states
• Aronsons my enemys enemy should be my friend
  study

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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)
Zeke

Michael Jordan

?
Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States
Zeke

Michael Jordan


Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States
Zeke

Michael Jordan
-
-
Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States
Zeke
-
Michael Jordan

-
Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States
Zeke
-
Michael Jordan
-

Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States
Zeke

Michael Jordan

-
Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States
Zeke

Michael Jordan
-

Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States
Zeke
-
Michael Jordan


Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States
Zeke
-
Michael Jordan
-
-
Katie
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Heiders Balance Theory

• How do we change unbalanced states to balanced?
• Zeke starts to like Katie
• Katie starts to like Michael
• Zeke starts to like Michael

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Festingers Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Cognitive Dissonance
• State of tension when a person holds 2 attitudes
  that are psychologically inconsistent
• Dissonance is unpleasant, so people are motivated
  to reduce it

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Festingers Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Three types of cognitions
• Consonant (I like you, you like me)
• Dissonant (I like you, you dont like me)
• Irrelevant (I like you, you like cheese)

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Festingers Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• How can we reduce dissonance?
• Reduce the importance
• Change one or both of the cognitions
• Increase consonant cognitions

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Festinger Carlsmith (1959)
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DV Task Enjoyment
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Brehm (1956) Post-decisional Dissonance
Fan
Liking
Toaster
Choice Before Choice After
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Dissonance vs Self-Perception

• Dissonance Theory says
• To avoid feeling bad, people think about good
  qualities of the chosen product and bad of the
  unchosen
• Self-Perception Theory says
• What did I do? I chose the fan. Why? I must like
  it.

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Zanna Cooper Dissonance as Arousal
Aroused/ True Info No change
No Info
Relaxed/ False Info
DV Attitude Change
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Dissonance vs Self-Perception

• Dissonance causes Arousal!
• Self-Perception theory explains attitude
  formation
• Dissonance theory explains attitude change

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Dissonance Theory Paradigms

• Induced Compliance
• Zanna and Cooper

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Dissonance Theory Paradigms

• Effort Justification
• Aronson Mills (1959) initiation study
• Cooper (1980) snake phobics

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Dissonance Theory Paradigms

• Insufficient Justification
• Festinger Carlsmith boring task study
• Aronson, Turner, Carlsmith (1963)
• Forbidden Toy Study
• Mills (1958) cheating study
• Nel, Helmreich, Aronson (1969)
• Marijuana study
• Zimbardo et al. (1965)
• Grasshopper study

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Aronson,
Turner, Carlsmith (1963)
Harsh Threat
Mild Threat
DV Liking for Toy
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Self-Discrepancy Theory - Higgins

• People are motivated to maintain a sense of
  consistency among their beliefs and perceptions
  of themselves
• Actual, ought, and ideal selves

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Self-Completion TheoryWicklund Gollwitzer

• Holds that any threat to a valued identity will
  motivate seeking social recognition of the
  identity through self-symbolizing activities
• Gollwitzer (1986) dancer study

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Self-Evaluation Maintenance Theory - Tesser

• Holds that ones self-concept can be threatened
  by another individuals behavior, and the level
  of threat is determined by both the closeness of
  the other individual and the personal relevance
  of the behavior.
• Threatened
• Bask in the reflected glory

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Self-Evaluation Maintenance Theory - Tesser

• What if a friend outperforms you in an important
  domain?
• Distance self from friend
• Change importance of domain
• Improve you own performance to be better than the
  friends

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Self-Affirmation Theory - Steele

• Suggests that people will reduce the impact of a
  dissonance arousing threat to their self-concept
  by focusing on and affirming their competence in
  some dimension unrelated to the threat.
• Fail math test focus on winning football game

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Self-Verification Theory - Swann

• Suggests that people have a need to seek
  confirmation of their self-concept, whether the
  self-concept is positive or negative
• Positive self-concept, seek positive info
• Negative self-concept, seek negative info