attitudes

Question 1

attitude

Answer 1

an enduring evaluation of a person, object, or idea expressed at some level of intensity. Can be positive, negative, or mixed. Can be strong or weak, explicit or implicit.

Question 2

explicit attitude

Answer 2

conscious attitude

Question 3

implicit attitude

Answer 3

unconscious attitude

Question 4

cognitive based attitude

Answer 4

an attitude rooted in objective thinking

Question 5

affectively based attitude

Answer 5

an attitude rooted in emotion and values versus objective thinking

Question 6

behaviorally based attitude

Answer 6

an attitude towards observations of certain behaviors (i.e. “I really don’t like that I spend all my money going out.”)

Question 7

self report

Answer 7

how attitudes are usually measured, advantages: (1) resistant to faking if the participant doesn’t know what the study is about, (2) participants tell you how they feel (direct), (3) inexpensive. Disadvantages: (1) participants may be faking (social-desirabilty effects), (2) may not always be aware of what their attitudes are.

Question 8

Attitude-behavior link

Answer 8

attitudes aren’t necessarily correlated with behavior. They predict behavior best when they’re specific and strong, however, they still compete with other influences on behavior.

Question 9

Persuasion by communication

Answer 9

two routes: (1) central, (2) peripheral route

Question 10

Central route

Answer 10

the message prevails, audience thinks carefully about a message, and is influenced by the strength and quality of the message

Question 11

Peripheral route

Answer 11

“bells and whistles,” doesn’t think critically of the message, audience is influenced more by superficial cues/factors that are irrelevant to their attitude towards the message.

Question 12

Persuasion

Answer 12

process by which attitudes are changed

Question 13

Message source (messenger)

Answer 13

Believable sources must be credible and likable

Question 14

Message source (credibility)

Answer 14

to be seen as credible, the source must have two different characteristics: (1) perceived expertise, (2) trustworthiness.

Question 15

Perceived expertise (credibility)

Answer 15

appearing knowledgeable/speaking confidently

Question 16

Trustworthiness (credibility)

Answer 16

making eye contact or showing sincerity by arguing against self interest

Question 17

Message source (likability)

Answer 17

two factors influence a source’s likability: (1) similarity, and (2) physical attractiveness.

Question 18

Similarity (likability)

Answer 18

how similar the source is towards the messenger

Question 19

Physical attractiveness (likability)

Answer 19

degree of physical attractiveness can make the audience more receptive to the communicator’s message (central route), or it can trigger positive associations (peripheral route). Can be purely physical.

Question 20

The message

Answer 20

vary between strong (quality) to weak (low quality), the length of the message affects the strength of the message in the following ways: via the central route, the message length is a two edged sword, via the peripheral route, the longer the message the more valid it must be.

Question 21

Order of presentation (Miller and Camel,1959)

Answer 21

both messages are delivered in succession followed by a week long delay leads to the primacy effect, a week long delay between the two message leads to recency effect, and no delay doesn’t lead to any order effect.

Question 22

Primacy effect

Answer 22

the first message is most likely to be remembered.

Question 23

Recency effect

Answer 23

most recently presented items will be most likely to be remembered best.

Question 24

Need for cognition (the audience)

Answer 24

high need for cognition if taking the central route, low need if taking the peripheral route

Question 25

Motivation/ability (the audience)

Answer 25

high needed for central route, low needed for peripheral route.

Question 26

Elaboration-likelihood model

Answer 26

message (persuasion attempt) –> audience factors –> processing approach –> persuasion outcome

Question 27

Central route (elaboration-likelihood model)

Answer 27

message –> high motivation/ability to think about message (audience factors) –> deep processing, focused on the quality of the message’s arguments (processing approach) –> lasting change that resists fading and counterattacks (persuasion outcome)

Question 28

Peripheral route (elaboration-likelihood model)

Answer 28

message –> low motivation/ability to think about the message (audience factors) –> superficial processing, focus on surface features [communicator’s attractiveness] (processing approach) –> temporary change/susceptible to further change (persuasion outcome)

Question 29

Cultural considerations in relation to persuasion

Answer 29

Individualist –> more persuaded when appealing to individuality ex. “Clean with a softness that you will love.” Collectivist –> more persuaded when appealing to a group/collective, ex. “Clean with a softness that your family will love.”

Question 30

Petty et al. (1981)

Answer 30

Set up: DV –> agreement with argument, IV 1 –> relevance, IV 2 –> argument strength, IV 3 –> message source. Results: When the issue was highly relevant, audience were swayed more by quality of message and less by expertise of speaker (central route). When the issue was less relevant, people were more swayed by the expertise of the speaker and less so than the message (peripheral route).

Question 31

Resisting attitude change

Answer 31

done through attitude inoculation and/or psychological reactance

Question 32

Attitude inoculation

Answer 32

technique used to make people immune to attempts to change their attitude. Done by first exposing them to small arguments against their position. Exposes person to a weak logical argument that is contrary to their preexisting attitude, which triggers the creation of counter-arguments against said weak logical argument in response.

Question 33

Psychological reactance

Answer 33

aversive affective reaction in response to threats on one’s (perceived) freedom and autonomy

Question 34

Reactance

Answer 34

occurs when person feels that someone or something is taking away their choices or limiting the range of alternatives.