Chapter 4: Behavior and Attitudes Flashcards
When do attitudes predict behavior?
Our expressions of attitudes and our behaviors are each subject to many influences.
Our attitudes will predict our behavior…
(1) if these “other influences” are minimized,
(2) if the attitude corresponds very closely to the predicted behavior (as in voting studies), and
(3) if the attitude is potent (because something reminds us of it, or because we acquired it by direct experience.
Under what conditions does behavior affect attitudes?
The attitude-action relation also works in the reverse direction: We are likely not only to think ourselves into action but also to act ourselves into a way of thinking. When we act, we amplify the idea underlying what we have done, especially when we feel responsible for it.
Actions affect our moral attitudes and our racial and political behaviors help shape our social consciousness
What is the “foot-in-the-door” phenomenon?
The tendency for people who have first agreed to a small request to comply later with a larger request.
What is the “low-ball technique?
A tactic for getting people to agree to something. People who agree to an initial request will often still comply when the requester ups the ante. People who receive only the costly request are less likely to comply with it.
What is “cognitive dissonance”?
Tension that arises when one is simultaneously aware of two inconsistent cognitions.
For example, dissonance may occur when we realize we have, with little justification, acted contrary to our attitudes or made a decision favoring one alternative despite reasons favoring another.
How does cognitive dissonance relate to “insufficient justification?” How does the latter concept affect our attitudes?
Insufficient justification: reduction of dissonance by internally justifying one’s behavior when external justification is “insufficient”
Because attitude follows behavior if someone were to do something with little reward, their attitudes begin to try and justify it
Know the results from the Festinger study
When one’s actions are not fully explained by external rewards or coercion, we will experience dissonance, which we can reduce by believing in what we have done.
Those who were paid $1 would say that the experiment was interesting to justify their actions telling us this, whereas those were were paid $20 would say that the study was boring, but had sufficient reason for telling others it was interesting.
What is self-perception theory?
The theory that when we are unsure of our attitudes, we infer them much as would someone observing us - by looking at our behavior and the circumstances under which it occurs
How do our expressions affect our perceptions of emotions? Know the results from the Strack et al study (show on page 143).
Facial feedback effect: The tendency of facial expressions to trigger corresponding
feelings such as fear, anger of happiness
Facial expressions can also influence our attitudes
Know the results from the Strack et al study
Participants were instructed to rate the funniness of cartoons with the help of a pen either held between the teeth, between the lips or in the non-dominant hand.
The results demonstrated significant differences, where the funniness ratings were highest for participants who had been facilitated to smile, lowest for participants who had been inhibited to smile, and with the neutral condition perfectly placed in the middle.
What effect does over justification and motivation have on attitudes?
Unnecessary rewards can have a hidden cost.
Rewarding people for doing what they already enjoy may lead them to attribute their action to the reward. If so, this would undermine their self-perception that they do it because they life it.
Enjoyable activities:
–> No external rewards –> Self-perception: “I do this because I like it” –> Intrinsic motivation
–> External reward –> Self-perception: “I do this because I’m paid to” –> Extrinsic motivation
What is “Self-Affirmation Theory?”
A theory that (a) people often experience a self-image threat after engaging in an undesirable behavior, and (b) they can compensate by affirming another aspect of the self.
Threaten people’s self-concept in one domain, and they will compensate either by refocusing or by doing good deeds in another domain.
Insufficient justification
Reduction of dissonance by internally justifying one’s behavior when external justification is “insufficient.”
Over-justification effect
The result of bribing people to do what they already like doing, they may then see their actions as externally controlled rather than intrinsically appealing.
