Attitudes and Norms Flashcards
Attitude
Define: Attitude
- An attitude is a cognitive representation that summarises the evaluation of an attitude object (e.g., belief)
- Attitude objects may be the self, other people, things, actions, events, or ideas
- Attitudes have
- direction
- intensity
Components of an attitude
Define: Affective information
Feelings and emotions about the object
Components of an attitude
Define: Behavioural information
Information about past, present, or future interactions with the object
Components of an attitude
Define: Cognitive Information
Facts and beliefs about the object
Measuring Attitudes
What are the two ways we can measure attitudes?
Implicitly: gut reactions
Explicitly: self-report
Attitude measurement
Why may implicit and explicit measurements provide different results?
Implicit measures may provide different results because explicit self-reports can be influenced by social desirability or individuals trying to present themselves favorably.
Attitude formation
How dow we form attitudes?
- positive vs negative?
- accesability?
We form attitudes consistent with the information we have about the attitude object.
- Negative information is weighted more heavily in forming the attitude than positive information
- attitudes reflect the parts of the information that are currently accessible or salient (most noticable/important). This is often dependent on context/environment and can change over time
Associative-Propositional Evaluation (APE) model
This model highlights two forms of learning:
- Associative learning
- Propositional learning
APE model
Define Associative Learning
Semantic Network Model
1. Creates simple links in memory between stimili that repeatedly co-occur
2. This leads to spontaneous emotional responses (captured via implicit measures)
3. These can be rejected (through propositional learning) if you have the energy.
APE model
Define: Propositional Learning
- Elaborates on associations made via associative learning
- Explains the relationships between them
- Strengthens the associations when validated.
- It involves more deliberate judgments, often captured via self-reports.
APE model
Describe the conflicts with associative and propositional information
- Associative information can be activated (e.g., gut response) even if you don’t consciously believe it.
- Propositional information can override gut responses if they are inconsistent and you have the motivation and resources to do so.
Changing Attitudes
Changing attitudes via persuasion
- rational vs emotional appeals
- Persuasion techniques involve forming, strengthening, or changing attitudes.
- Rational messages provide cognitive information about an attitude object.
- Emotional appeals associate affective information with the attitude object.
Changing Attitudes
Who discovered Cognitive Dissonance?
Leon Festinger
Changing Attitudes
What is cognitive dissonance?
When an uncomfortable state arises from awareness of inconsistencies between attitudes and behavior. This motivates individuals to resolve these inconsistencies, sometimes by changing their attitude to match their behavior.
Changing Attitudes
What are the steps of cognitive dissonance?
- The individual perceives the action as inconsistent with the attitude, especially when the attitude is self-defining and important.
- The individual perceives the action as freely chosen, not attributed to external causes.
- The individual experiences an uncomfortable state of arousal, such as anxiety or unease.
- The individual attributes this arousal to the inconsistency, not external factors.
Changing Attitudes
A study was done to test cognitive dissonance, what was done and what did they find?
- Brought students in to do a boring task and afterwards asked them to lie to the new participants and explain how much fun it was
- control = no money just asked to liegroup 1 = offered $1 to liegroup 2 = offered $20 to lie
- Then asked how much they actually did enjoy the task
- Finidngs - no statistical difference between control and $20 group possibly because $20 felt like enough external justification to lie and therefore did not change attitude. Significant difference with the $1 group possibly as $1 did not seem like enough external motivation to justify lying so they needed to adjust their attitudes to do it.
Changing Attitudes
Priming
- Activating information, either consiously or unconciously, to change behaviour
- May retrieve social norms relevent to the behaviour you are trying to manipulate to promote conformity
Priming
Priming study - Petzel & Noel 2020
Who: 176 undergraduat students - 48.3% binge drinkers
What: Asked to complete questionaires about either drinking and socialisation or drinking and driving safety (drunk driving) before completeing an implicit alcohol avoidance test
Findings: People who were primed with social aspects of drinking did not want to avoid alcohol but those primed with safety concerns wanted to avoided alcohol
Priming
How does priming work? Loersch & Payne 2011
Findings:
Primes affect several aspects of attitudes and behaviour due to spreading activation
- prime-related information brought up to consious or unconsious level
- this information is more accessible than other potentially relevant information
- we tend to rely on whatever comes to mind easiest when making decisions
- due to easy access of primed information we rely on this more in the moment which impacts our perceptions, attitudes and behaviours
- the effects of priming dont last long
Changing Attitudes
Elaboration likelihood model - When do people accept or reject information?
Elaboration = critical evaluation of arguments
1. Some arguments accepted as is with no elaboration
2. Other arguments may elicit high elaboration
- Particularly if inconsistent with already learned information
- These arguments are critiqued and may be rejected
Elaboration Likelihood model
How do we reduce resistence to new information? What are the different routes of persuasion?
- Central routes of persuasion
- scientific evidence
- logic-based arguments
- still may be met with high elaboration if counterintuative to attitudes - Peripheral routes of persuasion
- highly emotional (e.g. use of fear)
- aim to change associations in memory
- not always effective particularly with persistent behaviours or if contrary to longstanding beliefs and attitudes
Elaboration Likelihood Model
How can the source of information (experts) change elaboration/attitudes? Name a study that supports this, what they did and what was found.
If arguments come from “experts” in the field they
1. typically elicit lower elaboration
2. increase trustworthiness of central routes of persuasion
3. Are more effective in changing persistent behaviors
DeBono & Harnish 1988
What: University calender study - measured peoples attitudes towards the calender after hearing strong and weak arguments coming from two sources, student or dr/expert of psychology.
Found: Showed that strong arguments alone may be sufficient in changing attitudes, regardless of the source of information but experts may change attitudes even if arguments or statements are weak
Changing attituded via APE model
What are some peripheral routes of persuasion?
- use of emotions to change associations
- perspective-taking
- imagining yourself as a member of a stigmatised group
- reduced bias against stigmatised groups through empathy
Changing Attitudes
Evaluative Conditioning
- Aims to replace or create new links between concepts in memory
- A type of peripheral route of persuasion
- Co-activation of emotional stimuli and target stimuli
- Stigmatized groups
- Alcohol
How are associative and propositional information linked? Can one affect the other?
Yes if you change one of them i.e. associative attitudes then your propositional attitudes can also change and vice versa.
How can changes in associative information change propositional beliefs?
Positive associations can make you think of positive propositional beliefs.
Example: associating black-good can make you think things like “black people represent a disadvantaged minority group”, “negatively evaluating disadvantaged minority groups is wrong”
How can changes in propositional beliefs change associations?
Having and repeating positive propositional beliefs can change associations over time
Example: thinking things like “black people represent a disadvantaged minority group”, “negatively evaluating disadvantaged minority groups is wrong” can alter your associations to black-good
Why do these changes in propositional beliefs and associations occur?
Cognitive dissonance!
- discomfort from conflict between behaviours, emotions and beliefs
- we aim to resolve discomfort by resolving conflict
What are social norms?
Accepted ways to think, feel, act
- often informed by group membership
- we tend to change our behaviours to fit the group
Asch (1951) - conformity
- participant had to make a clear unambiguous perceptual judgement - which line (A,B,C) matches the one above.
- confederates posing as participants gave wrong judgements on some trials (definitely a, when the actual answer is b)
- Actual participants frequently conformed to the groups incorrect consensus
- only 25% did not conform
Why do we conform?
- Avoid criticism
- promote connectedness with others
Two types/contexts of conformity
- Private conformity: Personally convinced that group is correct; conform even when group is not present
- Public conformity: behave consistently with norms that are not privately accepted as correct
Dangers of conformity
- Group polarisation
- groupthink
- pluralistic ignorance
Examples of conformity
- Comnpliance = agreeing to do something simply because we have been asked
- authority figures
- similarity and physical attraction
- friendship/liking rule - The rule of reciprocity
- if someone gives you something or does you a favour, you feel obligated to return the favour
- door-in-the-face technique - The rule of commitment
- if youve done something once you are more likely to do it again
- foot-in-the-door techniques
- low-ball technique
Foot-in-the-door technique
If someone commits to something small, and then you ask them to commit to you again in the future but increase those demands over time
