Attitudes Flashcards
What are attitudes?
Functional psychological constructs that give us:
- positive or negative evaluations on objects/subjects
- fast answers to complex questions
- overall impressions
How do attitudes differ from values?
> Attitudes:
- concrete and specific
> Values:
- abstracts and generalised
Why do people have attitudes?
> The helps us
- make fast decisions
- approach positive outcomes
- avoid negative outcomes
> Tell us if something is good or bad for us
-> utilitarian
What are the two functions of attitudes?
- Utilitarian function
2. Symbolic function
What is the utilitarian function of attitudes?
They help us
- approach positive outcomes
- avoid negative outcomes
What is the three symbolic functions of attitudes?
- Affirm values
- act in accordance and commit to them - Express social identity
- Affirm general beliefs
What is a social identity?
It reflects the extent to which we feel that specific social groups are an important part of who we are
Where do attitudes come from?
- Mere exposure
- Learning
- Culture
- Stereotypes
How are attitudes influenced by ‘mere exposure’?
The more often people are exposed to an object/subject, the more likely they like it
-> the more familiar, the more we like it
What explains the effect of mere exposure on people’S attitudes?
When you perceive something repeatedly, it is easier for us to process the information
-> the more familiar (more exposure), the more we like it
What are the limitations of mere exposure?
It can lead to negative attitudes the same way as positive ones:
- repeated exposure to an aversive objet/subject
- > we dislike it
How are attitudes influenced by learning?
Operant learning
- situation/stimulus -> response -> effect - consequences
How are attitudes influenced by culture?
Cultural beliefs in terms of the way people view the self
> Independent self:
- relatively independent of others
- > may hold more positive attitudes towards autonomy
> Interdependent self:
- more as part of larger social group
- > may hold more positive attitudes towards family and community
What are stereotypes?
Beliefs about groups
- positive
- negative
- accurate
- inaccurate
How are attitudes influenced by stereotypes?
Direct influence:
- your attitude towards a group of people may be shaped by the stereotype(s) you have towards them
- under cognitive load, people are more likely to use stereotypes
What is prejudice?
A negative prejudgment of a group and its individuals
- often relying on the knowledge on a group
How can attitudes form prejudiced judgements?
Stereotypes -> Attitudes -> helps us make efficient decisions -> reduced processing
-> prejudiced judgement (harmful or harmless)
How is mental health related to prejudice?
Stigma by association:
- people treated according to stereotypes, that devalue someone because of association
- like or dislike someone because they are related to a stigmatised individual
- > negative consequences for the person being judged
What is the traditional view of psychosis?
Psychosis is a distinct category
What does the psychosis continuum model propose?
Psychotic experiences are common and present in different degrees throughout the population
- they are on a continuum with normal experience
- > continuum between health, normality, and psychosis
- only extreme being the disorder = psychotic threshold
- various unusual experiences happen in between
What does the latest meta analysis show regarding psychotic experiences in the general population?
> 7% of general population have psychotic experiences (e.g. hallucinations)
> 20% of them have psychotic experiences that persist
> 7% develop psychotic disorder
What does the basic cognitive model propose on the occurence of psychotic symptoms?
It’s the interpretation (appraisal) of events/experiences that cause problematic outcomes, clinical symptoms
What did Peters and colleagues (2015, 2016) show regarding the similarity and difference of persistent anomalous experiences in general population to psychosis?
> Non-clinical group:
- people who had psychotic experiences, and remained healthy
- never diagnosed with mental health problems relating to their experiences:
- somatic/tactile hallucinations
- precognition/insight/elation
> Clinical group:
- people who had psychotic experiences, and had been diagnosed with various psychotic disorders
- in reception of mental health services
- commenting/conversing voices
- thought withdrawal/broadcast
- delusions (esp persecutory)
- cognitive difficulties (cognitive ‘grip’)
- more severe
> Both group had:
- voices, visions, thought insertion, mind reading/control/refence
- dissociation
=> It’s not what you experience, it’s how much you experience it
- severity in particular
What did Peters and colleagues (2015, 2016) show regarding the differences in appraisal between clinical subjects and non clinical subjects?
> Non clinical group group frequently finds the anomalous experiences “clearly helpful”
> Significant differences between non-clinical vs. clinical is based on the evaluated valence, danger, abnormality and controllability of the experiences
> Non-clinical group often found anomalous experiences as spiritual, supernatural and normalising
vs. clinical group who found biological or drug related explanations for their anomalous experiences
What is a recurrent and robust finding on the difference of appraisal of anomalous experiences between clinical and non-clinical groups?
Clinical groups are more likely to blame other people, think others are involved in some way in causing their experiences
vs. not at all for non-clinical groups
How can a symptom analogue be used to investigate appraisals?
Create mild anomalous experience
- computer or phone ‘reading your mind’
- hearing voices experience
- controlled and the same for everyone
- > you can see the range of appraisals people make
What is the card task and how does it work in the investigation of appraisals?
> First show of cards: “The card you have chosen will be selected and removed from the pile”
> All of the cards are different at the second viewing
> Trick relies on the fact that people will scan for their own card and not notice that the cards are all different
What is the consistent finding on the card task for the clinical and the non-clinical group?
> Clinical group consistently make more maladaptive appraisals than non-clinical group
> Clinical group find the experience more striking, distressing, threatening, and relate it to their own experiences
-> Threatening, paranoid world-view in appraisals that mean psychotic experiences are leading to a disorder
What are the maladaptive appraisals found in clinical group in the card task?
> Intentionalising
- malicious intent to make them look stupid
> Personalising
- there’s a person involved behind it all
> Internalising
- there’s something wrong with me
> Conspiracy theories
- part of a wider conspiracy
What are the implications for therapy of how clinical groups perceive anomalous experiences, compared to non-clinical groups?
Implications for therapy:
- we may not be able to get rid of people’s experiences
- BUT we can help people to think about them differently, so that they become less distressing
- coping to reduce the distress
-> It’s not necessarily the experience that is the problem, it’s the way people view the experience and what they do about it
What did Kumar and colleagues (2011) show on the effect of CBT for psychosis?
Over 6-9 months:
- at the end, people’s brain responded differently to facial expressions
-> therapy can fundamentally alter how information is processed at a neural level
What are the implications for therapy on the effect of attitudes and beliefs on mental health?
The mind can change the brain
- Attitudes and beliefs are paramount in determining mental health problems
- Shaping them can change your brain
What doe the elaboration likelihood model of information processing propose?
Dual-processing model of information:
- Central route
- deep processing
- details, calculations
- > enduring changes in attitude - Peripheral route
- shallow processing
- easy-to-process information
- > short term changes in attitude
What is a dual-processing model?
A psychological framework that postulates 2 modes of information processing
- which differ in the extent to which individuals engage in an effortful thought about message content
- there are several dual process models
What determines wether the attitude change attempts are successful (long term) or not?
- Type of information in the message content
- Person’s motivation at the time
e. g. high motivation -> central route
What are the two types of attitudes?
- Explicit attitudes
- nature of evaluations is known to the individual
- explicit responses - Implicit attitudes
- nature of evaluations is unknown
- implicit (unconscious) responses
-> We are not always aware of our attitudes
What is a heuristic?
Simple rule that is used to form an attitude judgement with little cognitive effort
- they do not guarantee success
- they provide useful, immediate strategies
- rapid decision, little information
What kind of heuristics are used to form attitudes and beliefs?
- Representations
- base attitudes on level of similarity between a target and a population - Availability
- an event that is easy to remember or imagine seems more likely
How do heuristics that form attitudes and beliefs relate to mental health?
Addictions
- e.g. gambling
What are the benefits and costs of heuristics?
> Benefits:
- quick decisions made on limited information
> Costs:
- does not always provide ideal answers
What is the prevalence of gambling in the UK?
> 70% of population gambles once a year
> 2007: typical British family will spend 3.60£ each week
What are problem gamblers?
Gamblers who have difficulty in controlling how much they gamble
What did psychologists find on the types of cognition gamblers rely on (Steebergh et al., 2002; Raylu and Oei, 2004)?
> Cognitive distorsions:
- certain beliefs lead to an over saturation of one’s chances of winning
> Problem gamblers are more susceptible to these cognitive distortions
> Individuals with higher levels of these distortions respond less well to treatment
What is the effect of cognitive therapy on gambler’s cognitive distortions?
Seems to help problem gamblers better control their behaviour
How do gambling games lead to cognitive disorders?
> Near win or near miss
-> “almost winning” in gamblers’ minds
> Creates beliefs that you are more likely to succeed next time
- greater sensitivity to near misses
- > Sense of control changes their perception
- e.g. slot machines: turning the wheels themselves
> People are more likely to place larger bets when they throw dices themselves
People will pay a lot more money for lottery if they choose on the tickets
What is the gamblers fallacy?
Tendency for people to believe that an outcome that hasn’t occurred for a while is somehow becoming more likely
-> heuristic of representativeness
How does the roulette game used the gamblers fallacy?
> Roulette: red or black
> Gamblers fallacy -> heuristic of representativeness
-> Belief about probability: we expect a small sequence of outcomes to contain the same properties to be representative of a larger sequence
-> to a gambler, a run of red makes black more likely
(even though the wheel has no memory)
What are the biological processes underpinning the cognitive distortions of gamblers?
> For a near big win: brain activation similar to that of a win
> People responded to near wins as if they were wins
> Amount of activation associated with a win is influenced by the length of the colour run before the bet
