The cognitive dissonance theory indicates that we experience psychological tension when engaging in behavior that conflicts with our attitudes (Festinger, 1957). Aronson and Mills (1959) studied cognitive dissonance in terms of effort. That is, they hypothesized that we justify our effort by altering our attitude because dissonance can be experienced when there is a conflict between the amount of effort we put forth and the outcome of that effort. Aronson and Mills (1959) found that participants in a condition where they had to put forth more effort altered their attitudes about their condition and rated it more positively. An example of justifying effort that I remember is when my family went to visit my brother after he finished boot camp.
Most of the men in my family have been in the military. Fortunately, my parents encourage my brother and I to strive for something that will make us happy and have never pushed us to join the military for family tradition. My brother never showed an interest in joining until after his senior year of high school. We had him all packed and ready to go to Texas Tech (literally) when he announced that he was going to join to Army. He said that he needed to serve his country and was not ready to go to school because he needed more time to find himself. He chose the Army because they were the only branch that you could join for just two years (which is funny because in my family it's ok if you don't join the military, but there is an unspoken rule that you had better join the Navy if you do). Not long after his graduation from high school he left for boot camp in Kentucky.
My parents and I went up to Kentucky to see my brother graduate from boot camp, and he was able to give us a little tour of the base to show us where he slept, ate, and trained. Normally, my brother is pretty outgoing, doesn't like cleaning, and hates meaningless work. However, one of the things that I remember most from his tour was how proud he was of all the hard work he had done no matter how small. He even took us into his barracks and showed off the bathroom that he and a few other guys had cleaned. Although boot camp is known to be a difficult and intense experience, my brother took all the effort that he put in those long weeks and ended up rating the experience as very favorable.
I learned how to add photos!
Aronson, E. & Mills, J. (1959). The effect of severity of initiation on liking for a group. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 59, 177-181.
Festinger, L. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanfor, CA: Stanford University Press.
Petty and Cacioppo (1986) explained in their dual-process model of persuasion that there are two routes that individuals can take when processing a message. They described that the central route to persuasion is taken by an individual who thinks very carefully about the information presented and is influenced by the strength or quality of an argument. In addition, they described that the peripheral route to persuasion is taken by an individual who thinks little about the information presented and is influenced by other simple cues.
After reading the chapter on what influences which route we use to process information, I began to notice when and where I have used each one. The first example that came to mind of central route was when my parents started looking for houses before we moved back to The Woodlands. In research examining advertising effectiveness, it was found that individuals with high involvement used the central route to persuasion and were influenced the most about the strength of the argument presented (Petty, Cacioppo, & Schumann, 1983). Obviously, because my parents were looking to purchase a house they were highly involved and were very interested in the quality of information about the areas and houses that they were about to buy into. Before moving from and back to The Woodlands we took what people said about the different areas without much thought or argument; however, while preparing to move back into The Woodlands it took a lot more research and quality information about different areas to convince us where exactly we should live. The second example actually resembles the advertising effectiveness research previously discussed (Petty et al., 1983). They manipulated the strength of argument by providing participants with either strong arguments for a disposable razor which included scientific information or weak arguments which included beauty information. I recently went with one of my good friends to Wal-mart, and among other things she really needed to buy a new razor. While helping her to chose which razor she should buy I found myself taking the peripheral route by paying more attention to the colors (for some reason I really wanted her to buy a purple one) and attractiveness of the packaging. Fortunately, she tuned me out and payed more attention to cost and quality of the razors.
Petty, R. E., & Cacioppo, J. T. (1986). Communication and persuasion: Central and peripheral routes to attitude change. New York: Springer-Verlag.
Petty, R. E., Cacioppo, J. T., Schumann, D. (1983). Central and peripheral effectiveness: The moderating role of involvement. The Journal of Consumer Research, 10, 136-146
Ajzen (1991) explained in his theory of planned behavior that attitudes are not the only determinants of our behavior and influence on our intentions, but include subjective norms and our perceived control of the behavior. Specifically on subjective norms, his theory explains that perceptions of what others think we should do can influence our behavior in a direction that is consistent with or opposite of our attitude. That is, we can be pressured to act in ways that go against our feelings toward something or someone.
One of the pretty strong, negative attitudes that I have is toward fast-food restaurants. I like eating at sandwich or burrito type places (Subway/Chipotle), but when I do go to the tradition fast-food places like McDonald's or Sonic I only get drinks or shakes. I believe that this attitude was shaped during middle and high school by my family, particularly my father, and some close friends. My strong dislike for eating at fast-food restaurants is not because I'm some crazy health nut (believe me...I'm not...we can eat pretty unhealthy around my house), I just never felt comfortable with the cleanliness of those places and I always get a weird greasy feeling after eating there.
A simple example of how subjective norms have influenced my behavior in a way that was not consistent with my attitudes would be during every single church youth-group trip that I took in high school. Traveling anywhere with a large group of teens who are on a budget normally means eating at fast-food places. Despite my attitudes toward this dining option, they did not predict my behavior because I ate and I ate happily. In my mind, what everyone else wanted to do, grab a quick burger and fries, was more important than my attitudes towards food. Thankfully we occasionally were able to stop at a subway or Chick-fil-A (a fast food place that has chicken salad sandwiches!) along the way which always made me happy. :)
Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179-211.
The implicit personality theory is the relationships that we hold among particular traits; we assume that when an individual has a certain trait that they also have a network of other traits (Asch, 1946). There are also implicit personality theories about groups. For example, entity theorists, or people who view groups as having particular fixed traits, are more likely to use stereotypes than incremental theorists, or people who view groups as having less fixed traits (Levy et al., 1998). The Implicit Association Test (IAT) was designed to study how the unconscious mind works and how it diverges from the conscious mind. Its goal is to determine the private attitudes or preferences that we are hesitant to share and/or unconscious of. The way that the IAT achieves this is by requiring participants to rapidly respond to matching tasks. The more that two concepts are associated, the easier and faster that it should be to match them. Generally, it is easier to sort a liked concept with a positive word and a disliked concept with a negative word.
In their study on the IAT, Nosek, Greenwald, and Banaji (2005) explained the five steps included in the test. First, two topic categories will appear on opposite sides of the screen (i.e., Young and Old). The participant must then sort the pictures that appear on the screen as fast as they can into these categories by pressing the key that corresponds to the category in which it belongs. When taking the IAT online, the key the “e” key corresponds with one category and the “i” with the other. Second, the user must sort items into two polar opposite attribution categories (i.e., happy, friendly for good and horrible, angry for bad). Third, the first two steps are combined. That is, a topic category and attribution category are paired and the participant is asked to sort pictures and items (i.e., a picture of a white male or the word angry for the category White/Bad). Fourth and similar to the first step, participant must again sort pictures into their respected topic categories. However, the key that corresponds to the category is switched. Finally, the third step is repeated with the topic category and attribution category pairs switched (i.e., a picture of a white male or the word happy for the category White/Good).
The first test that I chose to take was the Young-Old IAT. The results suggest that I have a slight automatic preference for old compared to young, which corresponds with 4% of the web respondents. I feel that this result is consistent with my conscious beliefs and attitudes, and that it may be as a result of the environment of my upbringing. Newcomb (1934) found in his study of political attitudes of women who came from conservative backgrounds and encountered more liberal views in college, that attitudes are often formed as a result of our environment. The women in his study gradually became more liberal as they progressed through school. I have always been comfortable around older people and have enjoyed spending time with them. In high school, a couple of my friends and I would play music for a senior citizen center and often play games of chicken foot or bingo with them. I also was very close to my grandparents before they died, particularly my grandfather who would pick me up every day after school during my sophomore and junior year of high school (I had early release and no car). Perhaps if I was immersed in an atmosphere where older people were seen as bad and frustrating my attitude would begin to change.
I decided to take the Young-Old IAT again to see if I could change my results and was able to change them to a strong automatic preference for young compared to old. It did take me longer to sort the words and pictures into categories, but I just kept repeating in my head “old bad, old bad, old bad” whenever a picture of an older person was presented. This resembles the idea that attitudes can be formed through the process of learning. Staats and Staats (1958) presented college students with pairs of a nation’s name and either very positive or negative word. They found that when repeatedly presented with these pairs, the students later evaluated the nations more positively or negatively consistent with the words that were attributed to the nation’s name. Although I was able to change my result, I do not think that this ability discredits the IAT.If a person knows how the test works and tries hard enough then they can get the result that they desire; however, if a person takes the test with an open mind they may be able to learn more about their unconscious attitudes.
The second test that I chose to take was the Family-Career IAT. My responses suggested a moderate association of male with career and female with family. Although I expected to have an association of male with career and female with family, I was somewhat surprised about the strength of that association.It took some thought about why I might make this association, but I believe that it once again is a result of my upbringing. My parents have always followed the standard view in the Bible that the man is the head of the household. In addition, my family moved around a lot and this was always due to my father’s career. Moreover, his military career resulted in his absence for long periods of time during my childhood in which my mother was the primary caretaker. Receiving the result on this test did make me think more about prejudices and stereotypes. I began to explore my feelings toward women having a career because it seemed inconsistent with my behavior of going to college so that I could eventually have a career. Several reasons came to mind why I might make the association but not hold a prejudice. First, my father is the head of the house but my parents have always worked together as a team. My father always consults my mother whenever decisions are to be made, and they have always had a mutual respect for each other. Additionally, both of my parents have careers and have always insisted that I receive a good education so that I am able to have a career. There was never a question in our house of whether or not I went to college because my parents wanted me to be able to take care of myself. Although my family would always be there to support me, I was brought up to be prepared for any circumstance and to not assume that I would always have someone else to depend on.
Taking the IAT to explore my unconscious stereotypes and associations was an interesting experience. I think that it helped me to learn more about myself and how experiences have shaped the attitudes that I have concerning different groups of people. It was especially interesting to examine the moderate association that I have with male career and female family. I chose to take the Young-Old and Family-Career IATs first because those were the areas that I felt the most comfortable learning about and sharing, and second because those were the areas that I felt that I knew the most about my attitudes. However, I do plan on taking additional tests, including the more controversial IATs, to further explore my unconscious beliefs.
Asch, S. E. (1946). Forming impressions of personality. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 41, 258-290.
Levy, S. R., Stroessner, S. J., & Dweck, C. S. (1998). Stereotype formation and endorsement: The role of implicit theories. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1421-1436.
Newcomb, T. M. (1943). Personality and social change: Attitude formation in a student community. Fort worth, TX: Dryden Press.
Nosek, B. A., Greenwald, A. G., & Banaji, M. R. (2005). Understanding and using the Implicit Association Test: II. Method variables and construct validity. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 31, 166-180.
Staats, A. W., & Staats, C. K. (1958). Attitudes established by classical conditioning. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 57, 37-40.
Stereotypes, the assumptions of traits that we make about people simply based on the group in which they belong, are very common and frequently used. Although these stereotypes allow us to quickly make assumptions of people, they tend to cause us to overestimate the differences between groups and similarities within groups (Ford & Tonander, 1998). Furthermore, once a person has formed and cemented a stereotype, it is readily available and its influence comes easily to mind (Devine, 1996).
The time in my life that I feel that stereotypes were the most prevalent in my life was during middle school while living in Kentucky. The county I lived in was a rural farming area where its residents hold onto their history and are resistant to change. Often, people do not move from small rural towns causing stereotypes and prejudices to be passed down through generations and remain strong. It was definitely an experience moving to a community like this especially because my family had no history or ties there. We experienced some stereotyping ourselves (moving from Hawaii made us rich no matter how many times I told my friends that my father was in the Navy and we lived on a military base), but nothing compared to the long standing stereotypes that were held of people whose families had lived there for years and years.
There was a definite order in which people lived and unspoken rules that everyone seemed to obey. It was not unusual that if person's name came up in conversation for people to automatically categorize them into who their family was, where they lived, and what their daddy did for a living. Based on information like this, it seemed like others made automatic assumptions about who they were and would put limits on what they could do and what they were allowed to do. For example, the side of town you lived on determined not only how wealthy your family was, but also determined how smart you were and how successful your children would be. If you were related to the judge then you were automatically seen as an upstanding, christian citizen no matter how far that relation or what trouble you got in. If you were African American it didn't matter where you lived or who you were related to as people would automatically assume that you probably would not amount to much unless you played basketball. I don't want to make it sound like where I lived in Kentucky was awful because it really wasn't. Being such a small town, it seemed like a lot of the people thought along those stereotypical lines, but there really was a substantial group of people who genuinely wanted to get to know you for who you are and not what group you belonged to. The county school I attended, as opposed to the city school, was more diverse and people were close no matter where you were from. It was also important to my parents to make sure that my brother and I understood that stereotypes can be wrong and that we should get to know the person and not make assumptions.
Devine, P. G. (1996). Breaking the prejudice habit. Psychological Science Agenda, 10-11
Ford, T.E., & Tonander, G. R. (1998). The role of differentiation between groups and social identity in stereotype formation. Social Psychology Quarterly, 61, 372-384.
