Attitudes

Question 1

Functional approach

Answer 1

Attitudes as stable object-related associations stores & then evoked in memory
General & enduring positive or negative feeling about one person, object or issue
Relatively enduring organisation of beliefs, feelings & behavioural tendencies towards socially significant objects, groups, events or symbols
Certain attitudes stored in memory because it serves psychological goals & needs (useful)

Question 2

Psychological function

Answer 2

Knowledge; understanding environment, search for meaning (info) allows organisation & prediction of social world
Value-expressive;displays of what we see as important (self-image), allows us to express cherished ideas
Social-adjustive; provide barrier against harsh realities (self-protective), allows to protect ourselves from acknowledging threatening self-truths
Utilitarian; maximise benefits, minimise costs, allows to guide approach/avoidance behaviour

Question 3

Theory of reasoned action (functional)

Answer 3

Behaviour is a function of 2 aspects; attitudes & subjective norms, influence behavioural intention
Attitudes; general orientation towards behaviour evaluated
Subjective norms; influence of people, motivation to comply with others beliefs
Relative importance of A & SN influence intention & thus behaviour

Question 4

Limitations of theory of reasoned action

Answer 4

• Sometimes we have little power over our behaviour or at least believe that, not all behaviour volitional (able to choose) due to deeply ingrained habits, lack or resources or external obstacles
• intent doesn’t always lead to action
• assumes humans are rational
• assumes people can consciously control their behaviour
• doesn’t include persons prior experience with the behaviour
• factors other than intention may mediate control

Question 5

Theory of planned behaviour (functional)

Answer 5

Includes perceived behavioural control
Both models intended to predict behaviour towards an attitude object & explain when behaviour & attitudes don’t match

Question 6

Hamlin & Leith (2006); TPB

Answer 6

Found some support for TPB in country of origin cues for wine purchases
4 different wine labels, pp got one of each, counterbalanced between samples
Survey
Found consistent profiles of response differing by country-of-origin
Concluded that TPB would potentially work as model for country-of-origin attitudes to wine purchases

Question 7

Hamlin (2016) method; TPB

Answer 7

Similar study on meat products
Survey on attitudes to abstract concepts of beef, pork, lamb & chicken
Pp saw one type of product for each meat
Differed in amount of processing, visibility to customer, intrinsic;extrinsic cue ratio, how presented e.g. chilled

Question 8

Hamlin (2016) results; TPB

Answer 8

Revealed stable profiles that differed significantly between meet types
Experiments of actual meat purchases found no significant differences between meat
Concluded that TPB relies upon assumption that consumers apply complex & enduring attitude profiles with multiple dimensions in response to cues on products
But transient constructive attitudes may have a significant mediating role in process

Question 12

Constructive approach

Answer 12

Attitudes as temporary evaluations of an object constructed at a particular time in particular context
People compute on the spot according to contextual goals
People ‘make up’ attitudes based on relevant diagnosis of information available in context
Situated learning & cognition, goals generate temporary motivations
Direct experience with object may result in stronger attitude that better predicts behaviour
Direct experience makes strong use of human perceptual system

Question 13

Tversky & Kahnmann (1991)

Answer 13

Claim that decision making is based on either perceptual cues or cost-benefit analysis (CBA uses more cognitive resources)

Question 14

Contextual factors

Answer 14

Complexity of context
character of the other options in the choice set
Framing of the question that aims to elicit a preference
Representation or display of the choice set

Question 15

The problem that the constructive approach presents

Answer 15

Suggests that what researchers truly measure in attitude surveys are temporary evaluations
Hence attitudes are merely evaluative judgements formed via a constructive process in the context of an attitude question or decision problem
Argyriou & Melewar (2011)

Question 16

Information processing

Answer 16

Functional; deliberative or spontaneous associative

Cognitive; elementary info processing, computation strategies or heuristics

Question 17

Attitude retrieval

Answer 17

Functional; retrieval from memory, accesibility based on salience/importance of function, frequency of prior activation, strength of object-attitude association, can be influenced by situation

Constructive; construction on the spot, accessibility based on perceptual salience, diagnostic internal & external info about object in given context

Question 18

Nature & operation

Answer 18

Functional; attitudes stored in memory as object associations, but their manifestation may vary across situation & personality

Constructive; attitudes formed in the process of attaining a goal, hence they are temporary & contextual constructions

Question 19

Enduring attitudes

Answer 19

Even constructivists don’t deny some role for enduring attitudes
Even meat choices were only mediated by temporary, constructive attitudes so there was still an effect of enduring attitudes

Question 20

Attitude formation

Answer 20

Processes; mere exposure, classical conditioning, classical conditioning & mass media effects
Mere exposure; >exposure= >positive attitudes toward object due to familiarity
Classical conditioning; repeatedly pairing an object with either positive or negative stimuli (evaluative conditioning)

Question 21

Halbeisen et al (2017)

Answer 21

3-6 yr olds tested in 10 trials each, paired 1 or 2 types of computer generated animals with ice cream vs corn beef hash
Found the ice cream paired animals significantly preferred
Concluded this was evidence of evaluative conditioning of attitudes & its generalisations

Question 22

Kelldstedt (2000); mass media effects

Answer 22

Research shows that exposure to mass media influences attitudes
Studies media coverage of race & racial policy attitudes in the US over time, looked at media messages that were subtly in the direction of both
Saw how these mapped onto more vs less liberal attitudes to racial policy over time
Found that egalitarian (equal rights) media influenced racial policy attitudes

Question 23

Conclusions

Answer 23

These processes in the formation of attitudes are all concerned with attitudes as enduring associations with an object (functional) rather than created on the spot dimension (constructive)
Also we’ve only had time to look st a small selection of attitude formation processes