Psych 301 9 19 3 Attitudes and Behavior How do attitudes guide behavior Experience and learning Attitude Evaluation of objects and ideas to indicate like or dislike The sources of attitudes Classical and operant conditioning Attitudes can be shaped through socialization Heritability of attitudes Specific attitudes not directly inherited Inherited personal characteristics may influence acquiring certain attitudes Attitudes sometimes predict behavior Implicit attitudes Attitudes that influence behavior and feelings at an unconscious level Attitude accessibility Ease of conscious retrieval Predicts stability and strangth of effect on behavior Explicit attitudes may not be predictive When attitudes contradict normative social values When they cause embarrassment Cognitive dissonance Leon Festinger 1957 An internal state of tension and anxiety Caused by discrepancies between two attitudes or an attitude and behavior Motivates people to seek to reduce tension by changing behavior by changing attitudes Festinger Carlsmith study Students performed boring task Three conditions Student persuaded to lie about task to next participant for 20 Student persuaded to lie about task to next participant for 1 Control condition no lying Results 1 group had insufficient justification rated task as enjoyable Postdecisional dissonance Attitude change following difficult decision Focus on positive characteristics of chosen option Focus on negative characteristics of rejected option Selective exposure active seeking of information to support choice made Effort justification Attitude change following effort to achieve goal The desirability of the goal is enhanced Effort justification can explain the power of initiation rites to organizations cults Related to sunk costs Economics Attitude change through persuasion Persuasion Active conscious effort to change others attitudes through communication Elaboration likelihood model Central route to persuasion Persuasion by logical argument Persistent attitude change Peripheral route to persuasion Minimal processing of message Transient changes in attitude Often based on irrelevant associations How do people form attitudes about others Attributions People s causal explanations of other people s behavior Personal attribution Explanation of behavior by reference to something within the person such as abilities traits or personal effort Situational attribution Explanation by reference to events outside actor s control such as luck accident or actions of others Biased social information processing Correspondence bias The tendency to expect people s behavior to agree with their dispositions Bias towards personal attributions over situational attributions More common in Western cultures Actor observer discrepancy Tendency to focus on situational factors when explaining one s own behavior Tendency to focus on personal factors when explaining others behavior Stereotypes Cognitive schemas allowing for quick inferences about people based on group membership Prejudice The affective or attitudinal responses associated with stereotypes Discrimination Inappropriate and unjustified treatment of people based on their group membership Avoiding stereotyping behavior Stereotyping is automatic categorization of a person People who are low in prejudice Experience the automatic reaction Override it to act in a nondiscriminatory way Cognitive rebound effect Active attempts to suppress thoughts can lead to later obsessions Cognitive aspects of stereotyping Illusory correlation Belief that stereotyped individuals show certain characteristics or behaviors Confirmation bias tendency to notice stereotype consistent facts Also a tendency not to attend to stereotype inconsistent facts Subtyping Creating a subcategory for individuals who do not fit a stereotype Tendency to favor our own groups In group favoritism Tendency to evaluate one s own group favorably and provide more privileges to them Out group homogeneity effect Tendency to view outgroup members as more similar to each other than ingroup members Evolutionary explanation Group membership and group success was essential for survival Stigma Strong devaluation of someone extending to a person s entire character The stigmatized person is viewed as deviant even less than human People who threaten a social group may be stigmatized Evidence of evolutionary artifacts Self fulfilling prophesy The process by which people behave in ways that confirm their own or others expectations Rosenthal s study of bloomers Stereotype threat Leads to poor performance in cases where people feel their behavior may confirm a negative stereotype Reducing prejudice and discrimination The contact hypothesis Prejudice comes from lack of familiarity with outgroup members Familiarity will reduce negative attitudes Desegregation demonstrated that simple contact was inadequate More recent research Separate groups require superordinate goals to reduce hostility Value of cooperation Jigsaw classroom
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