Lecture 2 - Attitudes

Question 1

Attitude

Answer 1

• A psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree of favour or disfavour
• attitude functions
  > utilitarian
  > value-expressive
  > social-adjustive
  > ego-defensive

Question 2

utilitarian function

Answer 2

• attitudes guide our behaviour toward positive outcomes, away from neg
• we may have pos outlooks for things that give neg outcomes
• e.g. studying leads to good marks (pos outcome), smoking leads to poor health (neg outcome)

Question 3

value-expressive function

Answer 3

• attitudes help us express our values and communicate who we are to others
  > environmentalist attitudes are expressions of universalism/self-transcendence

Question 4

social adjustment function

Answer 4

• our attitudes help us fit in with our social groups. we are motivated to hold attitudes that will be approved of by others
• not always good e.g. attitudes towards binge drinking

Question 5

ago defensive function

Answer 5

• our attitudes can serve to protect our self esteem or justify actions that make us feel guilty
• e.g. social comparison: other students’ low grades might make you feel positive

Question 6

attitude formation

Answer 6

• twin studies point to genetic links to political beliefs & religiosity
• modelling/socialisation
• classical conditioning
• mere exposure

Question 7

classical conditioning

Answer 7

• NS paired with UCS to create CS
• e.g. celebrity endorsements which create a positive image of brands or products in marketing

Question 8

mere exposure (Zajonc 1968)

Answer 8

• merely being exposed to a stimulus even without meaningful engagement can be sufficient to produce positive attitudes
• repeating exposure even if people do not engage in it can create a positive image
• more exposure = more positive attitude
• exposure effects are more pronounced when people are less aware of the repeated exposure

Question 9

attitude-behaviour puzzle

Answer 9

• early studies reveal a low correlation
  > Lapiere (1934) - hotels accepted chinese customers but in a subsequent survey 92% said they would not
  > Wicker - found attitude-behaviour relationship of r = .15 (explained less than 3% of variance in behaviour)
• but not all attitudes are equally strong e.g. specific vs general attitudes

Question 10

attitude strength effects

Answer 10

• persistence (stable over time)
• resistance (not changing in resistance to counter argument)
• impact on info processing and judgement
• impact on behaviour (greater prediction of behaviours)

Question 11

aspects of attitude strength

Answer 11

• krosnick (1993)
  > extremity - extreme = less likely to change. linked to polarised beliefs
  > accessibility - stronger attitudes more easily recalled and expressed. linked to memory
  > knowledge - amount of info about the attitude normally means stronger attitude
  > importance - how much we care about a certain attitude. more important may be stronger & harder to change
  > ambivalence - uncertain/conflicted - may either be no opinion on something or both positive and negative thoughts at the same time leading to neutral answers.
• how to detect ambivalence or if someone is actually neutral?
  1. rate pos and neg aspect separately
  2. ask about emotional reaction like how conflicted or indecisive one is

Question 12

one example of strong attitudes

Answer 12

• moral mandates
• attitudes can be based on personal preferences, social norms or moral convictions
• moral convictions are based on evaluations of right and wrong
• anything can be deemed as a moral issue

Question 13

skitka: moral convictions - characteristics of attitudes based on moral convictions

Answer 13

• universality - personal moral standards apply to everyone
• objectivity - personal moral standards are perceived as objective facts
• autonomy - not concerned with being accepted by others or following the rules and norms
• emotions - strong emotional reactions. can tell if someone holds an attitude with a lot of strength
• motivate and justify action

Question 14

skitka: moral convictions - interpersonal and intergroup consequences

Answer 14

• intolerance - people avoid those who do not share their moralised views
• disobeying authorities and majorities - legal decisions are opposed vs supported if they align with indiv moral convictions. more likely to resist if legal decision goes against attitude
• barrier to conflict resolution - people are less likely to compromise
• political engagement
• BUT not all attitudes are equally strong: specific vs general attitudes

Question 15

specific vs general attitudes

Answer 15

• specificity matching
  > Target
  > Action
  > Context
  > Time
• Davidson & Jaccard (1979) - asked women about attitudes toward birth control pills. found correlation inc with specificity of attitude.

Question 16

Theory of planned behaviour (Ajzen 1991)

Answer 16

• most used theory to explain behaviour
• attitude can impact our intention to do something
• closer predictor of what we are going to do is our intention to do something. attitudes are not enough to tell us about our behaviour.
• tested across various types of behaviurs where some relationships are stronger e.g. voting behaviour vs losing weight.

Question 17

attitude change

Answer 17

• two main routes:
  1. persuasion - using arguments messages to change attitudes
  2. changing behaviours - to change ones attitudes

Question 18

attitude change - persuasion

Answer 18

• Yale research prgram (Hovland et al 1953)
  1. source of the message
  > expertise - status/expertise is more persuasive
  > popularity & attractiveness - e.g. pop stars used as endorsements
  2. content of the message
  > argument strength - better argument is more influential. weak arguments may produce change by tapping into emotions & values
  > emotions (fear) - fear inc so does arousal interest & attention. too much may mean we miss factual content.
  3. audience
  > initial position/attitude - differing attitudes harder to persuade. need to consider who audience is
  > self esteem - low esteem more suceptible to high esteem, Mcguire (1968) - u shape relationship.

Question 19

elaboration-likelihood model of persuasion

Answer 19

• people differ in how carefully and extensively they think about a topic. the amount of thinking will impact how they will be persuaded
• indiv difs and situational factors determine likelihood of elaboration
  > high engagement/elaboration = central route of processing. success persuasion depends on quality of argument.
  > low engagement/elaboration = peripheral route and not carefuk about processing info so have certain cues they should pick up on in your communication e.g. what the source of the message is.

Question 20

what determines the amount of thinking/whether central vs peripheral route is used

Answer 20

1. motivation
   > personal relevance - inc attention and inc processing
   > need for cognition - tendency to engage in and enjoy thinking about an idea. low tend not to enjoy thinking so depend on cues
   > emotions - sadness vs happiness - people more motivated depending on this. sadness associated with careful info processinf and happiness shallow. neg emotions can signal insufficient goal process
2. ability
   > intelligence - can they process arguments
   > knowledge - higher knowledge of topic more likely to take central
   > stress - less = able to process argument clearly
   - peripheral route = put cues in communication & CC
   - central route = e.g. for important issues that may inc more scrutiny, have personal effects and consequences. need good argument.

Question 21

values and persuasion

Answer 21

• campbell & kay (2014) - climate change is divisive
  > endorsement of conservative ideology related to less support for science
• use values to change views:
  > policy solutions to cc: more gov intervention & regulation
  > threaten free market ideology
• they sent messages that aligned with peoples ideologies
  > free market friendly condiiton
  > gov regulation condition
• different messaging changes beliefs
• inc belief & trust to perceive cc if use effective messaging