3 - Attitude

Question 1

What are attitudes?

Answer 1

• Study of how people influence others’ behaviour, belief and attitudes
• Focus on the situation, and it’s power
• Are people in a library introverted? Are people in a concert extroverted?
• Social psychology and personality psychology linked

Question 2

How were attitudes formed?

Answer 2

Mere Exposure (frequent exposure) 
- Zajonc, 1968. Presented chinese characters to participants. Presented either twice or 10 times. Couldn’t explicitly tell if had been seen before. Participants rated the characters seen 10 times as more good.
Classing conditioning
Operant conditioning
Imitation

Question 3

What is Bem’s self-perception theory?

Answer 3

We infer our attitudes from our behaviours
E.g. Do you like ice cream? - Have I had ice cream recently?
Attributing behaviour to external (situation) or internal (attitudes) sources
Attitude inferences if behavior is freely chosen

Question 4

What are unobtrusive influences on attitudes?

Answer 4

Facial expression
Testing the quality of headphones
Pushing up vs pushing down

Question 5

What is congitive consistency?

Answer 5

People try to maintain internal consistency, order and agreement between their beliefs.
Don’t want to be seen as hypocrites

Question 6

What is balance theory?

Answer 6

P: Person
O: Other
X: Attitude object

Question 7

What are the elements of balance theory?

Answer 7

Seeking balance through an odd number of positive relationships
Situation 1: All positive
S2: Both person and others don’t like the attitude object.
S3: Don’t like each other, but both like the same thing. Tension, how can this other like what I like as well?
S4: Like person, don’t like attitude object. Other likes object. Tension, how can they like that?

Question 8

What is the balance theory?

Answer 8

Unbalanced triads create tension, and there is motivation to restore balance, through least effort
Support: Newcomb, 1961. Male students in student housing. Assessing for attitudes and values. Predicting who would become friends
Changing attitude towards attitude object e.g. teacher or subject
Prediction of who you hang around and who became friends with whom.

Question 9

What are implicit attitudes?

Answer 9

Implicit attitudes: Well learned, similar to habits, tend to instilled at a young age
Automatic, non-conscious, difficult to change, may be unknown
Can reside within you

Question 10

What are explicit attitudes?

Answer 10

What you think of immediately

Easy to fake, consciously controlled, easier to change (social desirability)

Question 11

What is the attitude behaviour link?

Answer 11

Assumption of attitudes predicting behaviour
Election polls getting it wrong?: Brexit 2016; US presidential election

LaPiere, 1934.
Chinese couple visiting 250 restaurants and hotels in US
Only one refused Chinese people at the scene
6 months later, asking would Chinese people be accepted? ~120 restaurants said no

Question 12

Do our private attitudes determine our public behaviour?

Answer 12

No link between attitude and behaviour, then what’s the point of trying to change attitudes? Teaching, counselling, etc.
Link between attitudes and behaviour?
0.3 correlation between attitudes and behaviour
9% variability in behaviour accounted for by attitudes
Wicker 1969 and Mischel 1968. Weak link for personality measures and behaviour

Question 13

How do we improve the attitude-behaviour relationship?

Answer 13

(Minimise) Social influences on expressed attitudes
E.g. Job interview
Measuring attitudes specific to the observed behaviour
E.g. Recycling? Ask about recycling specifically, not environment.
Attitude strength: Personal involvement and knowledge
Strong attitudes have a greater link

Question 14

What is the theory of planned behaviour?

Answer 14

Ajzen and Fishbein 1980
Attitude behaviour link is stronger once the influences are taken into account
Forming attitudes and performing a particular behaviour is a fairly rational process
Sometimes, still irrational

Question 15

What is the cognitive dissonance theory?

Answer 15

Leon Festinger 1957.
Well known approach.
Based on cognitive consistency
Cognitive dissonance is a feeling of discomfort caused by performing an action inconsistent with attitudes
Strive to reduce dissonance and the easiest way is to change the attitude
Rationalisation shapes attitudes

Question 16

What is the Ben Franklin effect?

Answer 16

Describing a strong political opponent. Opponent has a rare book that he wants to read. Letter back of thanks. Became friends.
Not reciprocity, where there is an obligation to return.
Behaviour was a book. Changed attitude.
Experimenter asked participants to donate money back to the experimenter.
Rated experimenter better

Question 17

What is the justification of effort and dissonacne?

Answer 17

Aronson and MIlls, 1989.
Psychology of sex discussion group to women. Was attractive group
Needed to pass embarrassment test before joining.
Severe initiation. Reading obscene words and a sexual scene.
Mild initiation. Reading mild words.
No initiation.

Question 18

What is the link of amnesics to dissonance?

Answer 18

Are dissonance effects due to conscious decisions?

Question 19

What is cognitive dissonance?

Answer 19

Restinger et al, 1956.
A cult belief that, on a date, that the world will end. Believed that aliens would come and save them. Realised this wouldn’t occur on the day.
Belief: Given more time to recruit more members.

Question 20

What is post-decision dissonance?

Answer 20

We like the thing more that we picked.

Tend to be happier with purchases without a returns policy

Question 21

Components of attitudes

Answer 21

hree components
Affective (emotional)
Behavioural tendency
Cognitive
E.g. A: Don’t like snakes; B: Stay away from snakes; C: Might feel smooth, kill rodents