week 3 (attitudes, emotions and behaviour)

Question 1

Describe the study by LaPiere (1934) on attitudes and behaviour

Answer 1

• Visited 128 hotels and resturants with a chinese student of his, and found that all but one served the chinese student
• 6 months later wrote to the 128 resturants and hotels and asked ‘will you provide service to a member of the chinese race’, and found that most said no and only one said yes
• this shows that there is a discrepancy between the attitudes and behaviour between the staff at these places

Question 2

What is a prospective attitude behaviour study?

Answer 2

a study that measures the attitude first, and the behaviour later

Question 3

Outline wickers review on attitude behaviour studies

Answer 3

• Wicker conducted a review of empirical prospective attitude behaviour studies
• He found that there was little evidence to support the existence of stable, underlying attitudes in an individual which can actually influence behaviour

Question 4

What is a criticism of the methodologies of Wickers studies

Answer 4

• certain attitude behaviour studies dont take into account contextual information

Question 5

Outline Azjen and Fishbeins compatibility principle

Answer 5

• when investigating attitudes and behaviours, the attitudes and behaviours must be matched in respect to four elements

1. TARGET at which action is directed
2. ACTION
3. CONTEXT in which action is performed
4. TIME at which action is performed

(e.g rather than asking do you like eating ice cream, and measuring whether someone eats it right now, ask what is your attitude towards eating ice cream right now”)

Question 6

Outline Azjen and Fishbeings 1977 analysis of attitude behaviour associations

Answer 6

• Coded studies for how compatible the attitude and behaviour measaures were
• conducted a review of the studies
• found that when there was low compatibility between the attititude and behaviour measures there was no relationship between attitudes and behaviour
• when there was partial compatibility between attitude and behaviour measures there was mixed results on whether there was a relationship
• when there was high compatibility between the measures the was a significant and positive relationship between attitudes and behaviour

implication:
- attitudes do predict behaviour but the reason why some studys say they dont is because they have violated the compatibility principle

Question 7

outline sieget et al’s study on organ donation and attitudes

Answer 7

• measured:
  1. some pppts general attitude towards organ donation
  2. other ppts attitude to joining the organ donor register themselves
• found that the relationship between attitudes and behaviour was greater for the specific attitude measure than it was for the general attitude measure

Question 8

What is Azjen and Fishebeins theory of reasoned action?

Answer 8

• Our attitude towards a behaviour, combined with our subjective norms (a summary of what we believe other peoples attitude to the behaviour is) influences our behavioural intention (so whether or not we intend to do something).
• Its on the basis of this intention that we actually act.

Question 9

What was Mcmillan and connors method for their experiment on drug use intentions?

Answer 9

-study on undergraduates

• Asked to report:
  own attitudes towards illicit drugs
  what they believe others attitudes are towards them
  their intentions to use drugs in the next 6 months
• they used measures of this information to see how well each measure predicts a person intention

Question 10

What were the results of Mcmillan and Connors experiment on drug use and intention?

Answer 10

For all the drugs:

Attitude has a strong predictive effect on intention when you control for injunctive norms
Injunctive norms has a not so strong but still positive effect on intention when you control for attitude

implication: attitudes are important for shaping intentions but so too are social norms

Question 11

What is Azjens theory of planned behaviour?

Answer 11

• azjen developed his theory of reasoned action into the theory of planned behaviour
• he added the variable of percieved behavioural control onto attitude and subjective norms
• this means that if someone feels that they dont have control over the behaviour then they are unlikely to have the intention to do that behaviour

Question 12

What is Lavin and Groarkes study on the theory of planned behaviour?

Answer 12

• used a questionaire to measure peoples attitudes, norms, perceivced behavioural control and intentions regarding dental flossing
• used a self report diary to then measure whether they do the behaviour 3 weeks later

RESULTS

• Attitudes had a significant positive effect on intentions
• subjective norms had no impact on intentions
• Percieved behavioural control had the strongest impact on intentions
• the three variables together explain 47% of the variation in peoples intentions
• intentions have a significant positive impact on behaviour
• Perceived behavioural control also had a positive relationship with behaviour

Question 13

what did the meta analysis of all the theory of planned behaviour studies show?

Answer 13

Intentions predict only 22% of variation in behaviour

Question 14

what is the difference between the correlational studys and the experimental studies on the theory of planned behaviour

Answer 14

• correlational studies measured if there was a correlation between peoples intentions and their behaviour
• experimental studies manipulated a persons intentions to see if that change in intentions then resulted in a change in behaviour

Question 15

what did webb and sheehans meta analysis of experimental studies on the theory of planned behaviour find and what does this imply

Answer 15

a medium- large size change in intention translated only to a small- medium size change in behaviour

this implies that the correspondence between intentions and behaviour is not perfect, meaning there is an INTENTION BEHAVIOUR GAP

Question 16

what is one way of bridging the intention behaviour gap and give 3 reasons why it works

Answer 16

IMPLEMENTATION INTENTIONS (in situation Y i will do behaviour X)

it works because:

1. we are planning. We are more likely to act on intentions if we plan when where and how
2. it requires anticipation of a situation and sppecification of the behavioural response
3. it reqiures a mental simulation of what will be done and when and where we will be doing it

Question 17

what are 4 aspects of the theory of planned behaviour

Answer 17

attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioural control

intentions

behaviour

Question 18

describe what study provides evidence for the implementation intentions as a what of bridging the intention behaviour gap

Answer 18

• Sheeran and orbell smear test study
• postal questionairre was sent with smear test reminder, questionaire was collecting scores for intentions etc using the theory of planned behaviour model
• one group had an extra slip setting an implementation intention, asking them when and where they will do the smear test
• the experimental group had far higher attendence to the smear test

Question 19

what are the differences between emotions and moods?

Answer 19

EMOTIONS:

shorter duration, intense, clear target

MOOD:

longer duration, in the background, no clear target

Question 20

what is the distinguishing feature of emotions in terms of motivational relavents

Answer 20

• emotions have a clear target (moods dont)
• e.g of target is angry at someone or bored with a task
• this can give people motivation for behaviour e.g quit task

-

Question 21

What is the defintion of emotion and what are 3 things to consider?

Answer 21

emotion = display of feelings that are evoked when important things happen to us

1. is a display actually required for us to experience the emotion
2. what does important mean?
3. are all emotions short lived?

Question 22

What does the theory of basic emotions (eckman) argue

Answer 22

• there is a collection of emotions that is universally present
• universally present means that it is present in all cultures among all peoples
• in eckmans early work there was 6: fear, suprise, happiness, anger, disgust, sadness

Question 23

What are other concepts, not included in ekmans 6, that could be considered to be emotions?

Answer 23

boredom

shame

guilt

love

schadenfreud (pleasure in others misfortune)

pride

Question 24

what are 3 possible families of emotions?

Answer 24

• basic emotions
• self conscious emotions (e.g shme, pride)
• moral emotions (e.g contempt, empathy)

Question 25

what did freud say about happiness?

Answer 25

unhappiness is our basic state

Question 26

what was zelensky and Larsens study testing freuds theory on unhappiness

Answer 26

• gave uni students 3 short emotion questionairres a day
• gave a list of positive and negative emotions that they could report themselves as
• found that students were on average almost 5 times more often happy than sad
• this disproves freuds statement that unhappiness is the default state

Question 27

what did darwin say about emotions?

Answer 27

our outward expression of emotions will intensify our emotions

e.g smiling will intensify happiness

the repression of outward signs of emotions softens our emotions

Question 29

what is the James Lang theory of emotions?

Answer 29

a stimulus which we then interpret which leads to an autonomic response which then leads to an emotion

this is counterintuitive

e.g we feel sad because we cry / we feel scared because we tremble

Question 30

what studies can be used as confirmation of the James Lang theory of emotion?

Answer 30

1. strack martin and stepper facial feedback study (using pens in mouth)
2. Havas et al study showing botox injections can inhibit emotions

Question 31

Why did cannon and bard say that the james lang theory is not correct?

Answer 31

• cannon and bard say that emotion and arousal occur at the same time, so emotion is not the result of arousal
• the physiological changes are too slow to be able to cause the emotional changes
• inducing physiological change that should result in emotional change usually does not lead to these changes

Question 32

What is Schater and Singers theory of emotion?

Answer 32

• emotions are determined jointly by perception of physiology (james lang) and cognitive assesment of the situation
• if an individual has no causal explanation for an arousal state they will still come up with a reason to explain it that is available to you
• in the event that an individual has an appropriate explanation for arousal then alternative cognitive labelling will be unlikely
• under identical ‘cognitive circumstances’ he or she will only respond to the emotional experience to the degree that he or she is physiologically excited

Question 33

how does dutton and aarons study support schater and singers theory of emotion

Answer 33

• they gave men either a stable or wobbly bridge to cross
• the men with the wobbly bridge were more likely to contact the attractive woman after
• maybe the men were mistaking nervousness for attraction?