Chapter 7: Attitudes and Attitude Change Influencing Thoughts and Feelings

Question 1

explain power of advertising for smoking men vs women

Answer 1

Advertising Can Have Powerful Effects
-Until early 20th century, men bought 99 percent of cigarettes sold

Advertisers began targeting women
-Virginia Slims: “You’ve come a long way, baby”; connecting smoking to women’s liberation
-Lucky Strikes: “Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet”; connecting smoking to weight control

Even though ads didn’t show women actually smoking

In 1965
-51.9 percent of adult men smoked
-33.9 percent of adult women smoked

In 2019
-15.3 percent of adult men smoked
-12.7 percent of adult women smoked

Question 2

explain the nature and origin of attitudes

Answer 2

People are not neutral observers of the world.
-They evaluate what they encounter.
-They form attitudes.

Question 3

what are attitudes

Answer 3

Evaluations of people, objects, and ideas

Question 4

what are the three kinds of attitudes

Answer 4

-Cognitively Based
-Affectively Based
-Behaviorally Based

Question 5

explain cognitively based attitudes

Answer 5

-Evaluations based on people’s beliefs
-Just the facts
-Information about something

Example—a car
-How many MPG does it get?
-Does it have air bags?

Question 6

explain affectively based attitudes

Answer 6

Evaluation based on people’s feelings and values
-Example – a car
-I feel “free” when I open the sunroof

Example – elections
-1/3 of voters know nothing about candidates, but still has strong feelings about them (Wattenberg, 1987)
-They have had an affective reaction to that person for whatever reason, but do not even know where they stand on important issues

Question 7

where do affectively based attitudes come from

Answer 7

Affectively based attitudes don’t come from examining facts

Where do they come from?
1) Values
-Example—religious, moral beliefs
2) Sensory reaction
-Example—liking the taste of something
3) Aesthetic reaction
-Example—admiring lines and color of a car
3) Conditioning of emotions

Question 8

what are the two kinds of conditioning of emotions

Answer 8

classical and operant

Question 9

what is classical conditioning

Answer 9

-Stimulus that elicits an emotional response is paired with a neutral stimulus
-Neutral stimulus takes on the emotional properties of the first stimulus

Question 10

what is operant conditioning

Answer 10

-Freely chosen behaviors increase or decrease when followed by reinforcement or punishment.
-Develops positive attitudes towards those behaviors

Question 11

what are behaviorally based attitudes

Answer 11

-Based on observations of how one behaves toward an attitude object

Example – car
-I’ve kept my car for 5 years without trading it in – I must like it!

Question 12

what is self perception theory

Answer 12

-Sometimes people do not know how their attitude until they see how they behave
-This happens when:
-initial attitude is weak or ambiguous
-no other plausible explanation for behavior

Question 13

explicit vs. implicit attitudes

Answer 13

Explicit Attitudes
-Attitudes that we consciously endorse and can easily report
-Deliberate, conscious, introspective, slow/cold, measured by self-report

Implicit Attitudes
-Attitudes that are involuntary, uncontrollable, and at times, unconscious
-Automatic, non-conscious, associative, fast/hot, measured by response time

Question 14

examples of explicit attitudes

Answer 14

You can just tell me…
-How do you feel about donuts?
-How often do you eat donuts?

Question 15

examples of implicit attitudes

Answer 15

-It’s unconscious, you can’t just tell me about it..
-But, you’ve all grown up in a culture where there’s pressure to eat healthy food
-So you may have some negative feelings about donuts

Quick reaction
-So how do we know these things exist?

Question 16

how can we know implicit attitudes exist

Answer 16

Implicit Association Test
-People make categorical decisions rapidly
-Response times can reveal how closely linked different concepts are in a person’s mind
-Controversial now because it was discovered that a lot of the formulas they were using were incorrect

Question 17

explain inconsistencies between attitudes and behaviors and the study about Chinese restaurants

Answer 17

Attitudes don’t always predict behavior

LaPiere (1934)
-LaPiere went on cross-country trip with Chinese couple
-Despite high prejudice against Chinese people, only one out of 251 establishments refused service
-Contacted establishments after trip about serving Chinese people
-90% said they would not

Why?
-Different people responded to survey and served them
-Attitudes could have changed
-Poorly conducted study (a lot of internal validity issues) – but the point remains…

Question 18

can attitudes predict spontaneous behaviors

Answer 18

Attitudes will predict spontaneous behaviors only when they are highly accessible to people.

Question 19

what is attitude accessibility

Answer 19

The strength of the association between an attitude object and a person’s evaluation of that object, measured by the speed with which people can report how they feel about
the object

Question 20

what makes an attitude accessible

Answer 20

-Direct experience important
-Indirect experience less important

Question 21

what are the best predictors of people’s planned, deliberate behavior

Answer 21

The best predictors of people’s planned, deliberative behaviors are their behavioral intentions. The best predictors of their intentions are their attitudes toward the specific behavior, their subjective norms, and their perceived behavioral control of the behavior.

Question 22

behavioral intentions are decided by? (three things)

Answer 22

-Attitude toward the behavior: people’s specific attitude toward the behavior, not their general attitude
-Subjective norms: people’s beliefs about how other people they care about will view the behavior in question
-Perceived behavioral control: the ease with which people believe they can perform the behavior

**Behavioral intentions then lead to behavior itself **

Question 23

what are the two ways that attitudes can change that we already talked about

Answer 23

1) Cognitive dissonance can lead to attitude change
-What are the three things we do to eliminate dissonance?

2) self-perception theory can lead to attitude change
-When attitude is weak to begin with

Question 24

explain the Yale Attitude Change Approach study by Carl Hovland

Answer 24

Carl Hovland was interested what factors influence whether or not someone will change their mind about something and he came up with who, what, and to whom factors

Who
1) Credible, attractive speakers
2) Sleeper effect: non-credible becomes credible with time

What
1) Message should not be obviously influential
2) Two sided arguments effective
3) Primacy and recency effects
-Stuff you hear in the middle is probably going to be the least influential

To whom
1) Distraction is good
-When people are distracted they are more easily persuaded
2) Low IQ, moderate Self esteem, 18-25
3) Cultural differences: I like vs. my family likes it
-Ads in eastern cultures will refer to how much the family likes something

Question 25

what is the elaboration likelihood model

Answer 25

An explanation of the two ways in which persuasive communications can cause attitude change

Question 26

what are the two ways attitude can change

Answer 26

1) Central route
-When people have motivation and ability to pay attention
-They’re persuaded by logic & strength of arguments
-they elaborate

2) Peripheral route
-When people do not pay attention (lack motivation and ability)
-They’re persuaded by surface characteristics
-charisma, attractiveness, celebrity status, liking, & trust of persuader

Question 27

explain commercials and how they are a peripheral route to attitude change

Answer 27

most commercials do not make good, logical, arguments for their products because we usually see commercials when we are not paying attention (zone out during the breaks of our shows)

Question 28

what two things influence motivation for attitude change

Answer 28

1) Personal relevance of the topic
-If it’s important, you pay attention – central route

2) Need for cognition: the extent to which people engage in and enjoy cognitive activities
-People high in this rely on central route
-People low in this rely on peripheral cues

Question 29

explain the study about the effects of personal relevance on attitude change (comprehensive exams for undergrad)

Answer 29

It has been talked about in the past implementing comprehensive exams in undergrad, brought in undergraduates and told them the university was thinking about implementing these exams; three IVS
1) How relevant it was: this may happen before you graduate vs. we mean in ten years
2) Arguments for why it was a good idea: argument was either coming from a high school student (low expertise source) vs. a Harvard research (high expertise source)
3) Kinds of arguments: strong vs. weak

Results: in the high personal relevance condition, when they heard strong arguments they were in more agreement than weak arguments; source did not matter
-In the low personal relevance model, the agreement was much higher in both strong and weak argument groups when information was given by an expert
-Showed that when something is relevant you listen more to the information given to you, not as concerned with who is giving it

Question 30

explain people who base their attitudes on a careful analysis of the arguments

Answer 30

they will be:

-More likely to maintain this attitude
-More likely to behave consistently with this attitude
-More resistant to counter-persuasion

Question 31

explain the heuristic systematic model of persuasion and its two ways to reach attitude change

Answer 31

Two ways in which persuasive communications can cause attitude change:
1) Systematically processing the merits of the arguments
2) Using mental shortcuts or heuristics
-Emotion can be a heuristic
-But there are many reasons we might feel an emotion

Question 32

what has research shown the best way to figure out where an attitude is coming from is

Answer 32

Several studies have shown that it is best to “fight fire with fire”: (try to figure out where the attitude is coming from and what strategy might be best to change it)

If an attitude is cognitively based
-Try to change it with rational arguments

If it is affectively based
-Try to change it with emotional appeals

Question 33

what are the two kinds of products

Answer 33

utilitarian and identity

Question 34

what are utilitarian products

Answer 34

things that need to work
-Air conditioners, toothpaste (these things you do not really care what brand you are using, just want to make sure they work)
-These kinds of things you Should have cognitive attitudes about them

Effective ads should stress their objective merits (facts)
-Price, reliability, efficiency

Question 35

what are identity products

Answer 35

things that say something about who we are
-Perfume, clothing

Should have affective attitudes about them

Effective ads should stress appearance, identity (emotion)
-How will we look with them, what does having them say about us?

Question 36

explain the study about ads and the attitudes about them

Answer 36

Study: looked at different kinds of ads (affect you emotionally vs. cognitively) and the way that it influenced the attitudes people had about the products (social identity vs. utilitarian)

Results: interaction if the product was utilitarian, the ads were most effective when it tapped into the cognitive based aspect; if the product was identity the ads were most effective when it tapped into the social identity aspect

Question 37

explain advertising in western and eastern cultures

Answer 37

Western cultures
-Effective ads stress independence
-“It’s easy when you have the right shoes.”

Eastern cultures
-Effective ads stress interdependence
-“The shoes for your family”

Question 38

what is fear arousing communication

Answer 38

Persuasive messages that attempt to change people’s attitudes by arousing their fears

Question 39

does fear arousing communication work

Answer 39

Strong amounts of fear fail if they overwhelm people.
-Become defensive
-Deny importance of threat
-Cannot think rationally about issue

Do fear-arousing communications work?
-Moderate amounts of fear work best
-Provide information on how to reduce fear

Question 40

explain the study about fear arousing communication with smoking film

Answer 40

-Smoking film shown to participants
-Conditions: no film and no instructions, film without instructions, film with instructions
-Results: no film and no instructions smokers stayed consisted; film without instructions initial drop off but then goes back up; film with instructions consistent drop off

Question 41

what are subliminal messages and the initial study about it

Answer 41

Words or pictures not consciously perceived but may nevertheless influence people’s judgments, attitudes, and behavior

-1950’s: James Vicary claimed to increase concession sales by subliminally flashing “Drink Coca Cola” and “Eat Popcorn.” He lied.
-He lied. No evidence that this works in everyday life.

Question 42

what is some actual laboratory evidence that subliminal messages might work

Answer 42

-Evidence for subliminal influence in carefully controlled laboratory conditions

Study: had people engage in some sort of a task on the computer; computer was giving them subliminal messages (Lipton ice vs. a scrambled word of lipton ice); then measured how thirsty people were (categorized as thirsty or not thirsty); found that people who got the subliminal message and were thirsty preferred the Lipton ice over water
-For people who were not thirsty to begin with it did not matter

Question 43

so when do subliminal messages work? and what are the limitations?

Answer 43

-Require a controlled environment
-Correct illumination of the room
-No distractions
-Right distance from screen

Limitations:
-No evidence that subliminal messages can get people to act counter to wishes, values, or personalities (Neuberg, 1988)
-Hard, nearly impossible, to get people to go against their already held beliefs

Question 44

what is attitude inoculation

Answer 44

-Making people immune to attempts to change their attitudes by initially exposing them to small doses of the arguments against their position
-Researcher found that people were more immune to actual arguments against their stance, when they were exposed to weaker arguments against their point early on

Question 45

what does peer pressure operate on

Answer 45

Peer pressure operates on values and emotions
-Liking and acceptance by peer group, not logical arguments

ex. Allen et al. (2003) found peer smoking is best predictor of adolescent smoking

Question 46

what can help people resist peer pressure

Answer 46

Attitude inoculation that focuses on inoculating against emotional appeals helps
-Role playing helps prevent smoking 3 years later (McAilster et al., 1980)
-Kids who go through a role play activity are less likely to smoke years later

Question 47

explain product placement and what forewarning does

Answer 47

Pay TV show or movie to incorporate their products into the script
-Can change attitudes (children and smoking – Heatherton & Sargent, 2009)

When people are forewarned
-Analyze what they see and hear more carefully
-More likely to avoid attitude change

Question 48

what is reactance theory

Answer 48

When Persuasion Attempts Boomerang: Reactance Theory
-We like to feel free to do whatever we want
-Humans do not like being told what to do
-When we don’t, we try to restore that feeling

Question 49

explain the bathroom graffiti study and reactance theory

Answer 49

Pennebaker and Sanders (1976): Graffiti study
-Took bathrooms in universities, in half of them wrote “do not write on these walls in any circumstance”, in half “please do not write on these walls”
-More graffiti found on the walls that have a stricter rule