Social Psych- Chapter 6.3: Persuasion by Our Own Actions

Four steps are required to arouse or reduce cognitive dissonance (Causes attitude change)

1: An attitude-discrepant behavior must produce unwanted negative consequences 2: There must be a feeling of personal responsibility for the unpleasant outcomes of behavior 3: There must be physiological arousal that produces a state of discomfort and tension that the person seeks to reduce 4: The person must attribute the arousal to the attitude-discrepant behavior

Ways to reduce dissonance he Classic Version

1: Change your attitude "I don't really need to be on diet" 2: Change your perception of the situation " I hardly eat any" 3: Add consonant cognitions " Chocolate ice cream is nutritious." 4: Minimize the importance of the conflict 5: Reduce perceived chocie

Alternative Routes to Self-Persuasion

1: Self-perception theory 2: Impression-management theory 3: Self-esteem theories

Festinger & Carlsmith (1959) Classic experiment on dissonance shows

1: Self-persuasion: when people behave in ways that contradict their attitudes, they sometimes go on to change them without any exposure to persuasive communication 2:

Two types of problems have been addressed for Behavioral ethics

1: Unintentional lapses in ethics 2: Acts of intentional wrongdoing committed to serve personal interests

Impression-management theory

1: What matters is not a motive to be consistent but a motive to appear consistent 2: Calibrate our attitudes and behaviors publicly in order to show ourself in better light. 3: Self presentation

Self-perception theory Textbook

1: When people behave in ways that are not terribly discrepant from how they feel, they experience little tension and form their attutudes as a matter of inference.

Insufficient justification

A condition in which people freely preform an attitude-discrepant behavior without receiving a large reward.

Self-esteem theories textbook

A dissonance producing situation set in motion a provess of self-affirmation that serves to revalidate the integrity of the self concept.

Cognitive Dissonance theory

A powerful motive to maintain cognitive consistency can give rise to irrational, sometime maladaptive behavior.

Self-esteem theories

Acts that arouse dissonance do so because they threaten the self-concept

Justifying Difficult Decisions: When Good Choices Get Even Better

After making a difficult decision, people rationalize the decision by exaggerating the positive features of the chosen alternative and the negative features of the unchosen alternative

Impression management theory argues that

Attitude change is spurred by concern about self presentation

Motivated to reduce the tension, people often change their attitudes to justify

Attitude discrepant behavior, wasted time, and difficult decisions

Why does role-playing lead to enduring attitude change?

Because it really helps someone learn a message and helps them remember

Cognitive Dissonance as Both Universal and Culturally Dependent

Canada vs Japan ranking of 10 foods

Dissonance theory states that people

Change their attitudes to justify their attitude-discrepant behaviors, efforts and decisions

Why can changes in behavior lead to changes in attitude?

Cognitive Dissonance Theory

Cognitive dissonance is both universal and

Dependent on culture. At times everyone feels and tries to reduce dissonance, but cultures influence the conditions under which these processes occur.

Highly discrepant behavior produces attitude change through.... Where as low discrepant behavior produces attitude change through

Dissonance, self-perception

vicarious dissonance

Experiencing dissonance over an issue that someone you know and like is experiencing dissonance over.

The more money you pay people to tell a lie, the more they will come to believe it.

False: Cognitive dissonance studies show that people believe the lies they are underpaid to tell as a way to justify their own actions.

Self affirmation theory makes a unique prediction

If the active ingredients in dissonance situations is a threat to the self, then people who have an opportunity to affirm the self in other ways will not suffer from the effects of dissonance

Just as a small reward provinces insufficient justification for attitude-discrepant behavior, mild punishment is

Insufficient deterrence for attitude discrepant non-behavior

New Look cognitive Dissonance Theory

People do change their attitudes to justify attitude-discrepant behavior, effort and difficult decisions. But for dissonance to be around, certain conditions must be present.

Self-perception theory

Since we don't always have firsthand knowledge of our own attitudes, We infer how we feel by observing ourselves and the circumstances of our own behavior

cognitive dissonance theory

States that feelings of inconsistency force a change in attitude

Self perception theory argues

That the change occurs because people infer how they feel by observing their own behavior

The more money participants in Festinger experiment got

The more justified they felt and less likely they were to change their attitudes

Justifying Effort:

The more money or time we invest in something, the more anxious you will feel if the outcome proves disappointed.

The more you pay for something, whether it be in money or pain

The more you will come to like it or justify it

Behavioral ethics

The study of how individuals behave when facing temptations to cheat, steal, plagiarize, commit fraud, or otherwise behave unethically

Cognitive Dissonance Theory: The Classic Version

The theory that inconsistent cognitions arouses psychological tension that people become motivated to reduce

When people are gently coaxed into performing an attitude discrepant behavior

They often go on to change their attitudes

Festinger & Carlsmith (1959) Classic experiment on dissonance

Told people they were in the control group and did an hour of boring tasks for different amounts of money. Those who were paid 1$ had said it was fun because it would reduce dissonance by changing their attitude due to insufficient justification of their attitude discrepancy. Those who paid 20 had more dissonance and said the experiment was boring so lied.

Justifying Effort: Coming to Like What we Suffer For

We alter our attitude to justify our suffering. Example: Sex conversation with women was rated more favorable by women who had to take the harder embarrassment test.

What happens when we engage in attitude-discrepant behavior?

We are at odds with ourself like acting

Whenever we make difficult decision

We feel dissonance

How does Cognitive dissonance arise The Classic Version

When you committed a behavior freely while knowing the consequences, dissonance is aroused and behaviors are taken to reduce it.

insufficient deterrence

a condition in which people refrain from engaging in a desirable activity, even when only mild punishment is threatened

The less sever the threatened punishment,the greater (insufficient deterrence)

the attitude change produced.

Conditions for cognitive dissonance:

the attitude-discrepant behavior was chosen freely and with some knowledge of the consequences

People often come to like what they suffer for.

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