Psychology 331 Social Psychology

1. Psychology 331Social Psychology Behavior and Attitudes Chapter 4

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

3. Three Components of Attitudes • Affective (feelings, likes, & values) • Behavioral (intent to act) • Cognitive (beliefs; informational)

4. Four Basic Characteristics • Inferred from behavior • Directed at a psychological object • Learned (and thus can be changed) • Influence behavior

5. 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)

6. Attitudes and Behavior • Attitudes influence Behavior • Borgida & Campbell (1982) • Behavior influences Attitudes • Lewin (1947) • Festinger & Carlsmith (1959)

7. Attitude-Behavior Consistency • Do attitudes predict behavior? • LaPiere (hotel study)

8. 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)

9. Cognitive Consistency Theories • Heider’s Balance Theory (1944) • People’s attitudes and behaviors can be balanced or unbalanced • People have a tendency to desire balance • Examples of balanced and unbalanced states • Aronson’s “my enemy’s enemy should be my friend” study

10. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944) Zeke + + Michael Jordan ? Katie

11. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States Zeke + + Michael Jordan + Katie

12. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States Zeke + - Michael Jordan - Katie

13. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States Zeke - + Michael Jordan - Katie

14. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Balanced States Zeke - - Michael Jordan + Katie

15. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States Zeke + + Michael Jordan - Katie

16. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States Zeke + - Michael Jordan + Katie

17. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States Zeke - + Michael Jordan + Katie

18. Heider’s Balance Theory (1944)Unbalanced States Zeke - - Michael Jordan - Katie

19. Heider’s 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

20. Festinger’s 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

21. Festinger’s Cognitive Dissonance Theory • Three types of cognitions • Consonant (I like you, you like me) • Dissonant (I like you, you don’t like me) • Irrelevant (I like you, you like cheese)

22. Festinger’s Cognitive Dissonance Theory • How can we reduce dissonance? • Reduce the importance • Change one or both of the cognitions • Increase consonant cognitions

23. Festinger & Carlsmith (1959) DV: Task Enjoyment

24. Brehm (1956) – Post-decisional Dissonance Fan Liking Toaster Choice Before Choice After

25. 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.

26. Zanna & Cooper –Dissonance as Arousal DV: Attitude Change

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

28. Dissonance Theory Paradigms • Induced Compliance • Zanna and Cooper

29. Dissonance Theory Paradigms • Effort Justification • Aronson & Mills (1959) – initiation study • Cooper (1980) – snake phobics

30. 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

31. Aronson, Turner, & Carlsmith (1963) DV: Liking for Toy

32. 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

33. 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

34. Self-Evaluation Maintenance Theory - Tesser • Holds that one’s self-concept can be threatened by another individual’s 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

35. 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 friend’s

36. 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

37. 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