Mark: Strongly disagree/ disagree/ neutral/ agree/ strongly agree

1. Mark: Strongly disagree/ disagree/ neutral/ agree/ strongly agree • World hunger is a serious problem that needs attention • Our country needs to address the growing number of homeless people • The right to vote is one of the most valuable rights of US citizens • Our government should spend less money on nuclear weapons and more on helping citizens better their lives.

2. Indicate whether or not you regularly perform the stated behaviors • I personally donate money or write my representative to do something about world hunger • I volunteer in a homeless shelter or donate money to organizations that help the homeless. • I voted in the last election (if eligible) • I write to my representative or participate in protests to convey my feelings about nuclear weapons

3. Attitudes • What is an attitude? • Belief, opinion with evaluative component • Functions? • Cognitive dissonance theory • Festinger • we we need our attitudes to be consistent with our behavior • it is uncomfortable for us when they aren’t • we seek ways to decrease discomfort caused by inconsistency

4. Dissonance-reducing Mechanisms • Avoiding dissonant information • we attend to information in support of our existing views, rather than information that doesn’t support them • Sweeney & Gruber (1973) Watergate study • Firming up an attitude to be consistent with an action • set aside doubts/ uncertainty, become more confident after decision • effect of investing great effort, cost

5. Dissonance-reducing Mechanisms • Changing an attitude to justify an action • when a person does something counter to their stated beliefs, then justify the deed by modifying their attitude • Insufficient-justification effect • change in attitude that occurs because person cannot justify an already completed action without modifying attitude • optimizing conditions include external justification, free choice, when action would cause harm

6. Insufficient-justification effect • Festinger & Carlsmith (1959) • gave subjects a boring task, then asked subjects to lie to the next subject and say the experiment was exciting • paid ½ the subjects $1, other ½ $20 • then asked subjects to rate boringness of task • $1 group rated the task as far more fun than the $20 group • each group needed a justification for lying • $20 group had an external justification of money • since $1 isn’t very much money, $1 group said task was fun

7. Using Attitudes as Ways to “Justify” Injustice • Just-world bias • a tendency to believe that life is fair • it would seem horrible to think that you can be a really good person and bad things could happen to you anyway • Just-world bias leads to “blaming the victim” • we explain others’ misfortunes as being their fault • e.g., she deserved to be raped, what was she doing in that neighborhood anyway?

8. Summary • Perceiving & evaluating others • when we’re accurate, when we’re not • Attributions • person vs. situation attributions • the person bias • actor-observer discrepancy • effects of prior information • effects of physical appearance

9. Summary • Stereotypes • what are they? • how do we study them? • Implicit stereotypes • Self-fulfilling prophecy effects • Attitudes • cognitive dissonance theory • dissonance-reducing mechanisms • the insufficient-justification effect • the just-world bias & blaming the victim