Lecture Component of Comprehensive Exams

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Lecture Component of Comprehensive Exams

• Topic Attitudes Attitude Change
• This file contains lecture set 3 of 3
• 3 x 50-min lectures (in theory anyway)
• By Catherine Rawn

• Key Resources
• Aronson, E., Wilson, T. D., Akert, R. M., Fehr,
  B. (2004). Social Psychology, 2nd Canadian
  Edition. Pearson Toronto.
• Baumeister, R. F., Bushman, B. J. (2008).
  Social Psychology Human Nature, Annotated
  Instructors Edition. Thomson Wadsworth
  California.
• Myers, D. G., Spencer, S. J. (2001). Social
  Psychology, Canadian Edition. McGraw-Hill
  Ryerson Toronto.

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Attitudes Attitude Change

• Lecture 1 of 3
• 3rd Year Social Psychology Class

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Roadmap for theNext 3 Lectures

• What are Attitudes?
• Where do Attitudes come from?
• Why are some Attitudes stronger than others?
• Why do we have attitudes?
• When do Attitudes change?
• Why do Attitudes change?
• How can we resist Attitude change?

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Roadmap for TODAY!

• What are Attitudes?
• Definitions, types of attitudes
• Purpose of Attitudes
• Where do Attitudes come from?
• Immediate reactions
• Learning
• Watching our own behavior
• What makes some Attitudes stronger than others?

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What are Attitudes?

• Attitudes Global evaluations toward some object,
  person, or issue
• Like vs. dislike, in favor vs. opposed
• State your Attitudes to others
• Emotion-based
• Different from
• Beliefs pieces of information about something,
  facts, opinions
• Explain your Beliefs to others
• Cognition-based

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Attitudes vs. Beliefs
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Public vs. Private Attitudes

• Impression management People sometimes adjust
  what they say to please rather than offend others
• Therefore public attitude might not be the same
  as private attitude
• How can we measure attitudes if people dont want
  to share them?

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Bogus Pipeline Method(Jones Sigall, 1971)

• Hook people up to a fancy machine
• Convince people the machine can use their
  physiological responses to questions to measure
  private attitudes
• Example have machine give a read out revealing
  attitudes that P already reported in a pretest
  weeks earlier
• Ask P to predict the machines reading
• Thereby disclosing their private attitudes

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Bogus Pipeline revealing Racist Attitudes (Sigall
Page, 1971)
Scale -3 very uncharacteristic, 3 very
characteristic
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Dual Attitudes

• Different, competing evaluations of the same
  attitude object implicit vs. explicit attitudes
• Explicit attitudes controlled, conscious
  evaluative responses Aware of these
• Implicit attitudes automatic, nonconscious
  evaluative responses often NOT aware of these

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How do we measure implicit attitudes?

• Implicit Association Test (IAT)
• Greenwald Banaji, 1995
• Basic theory (using example of age)
• If your attitude toward old people is negative,
  it will be easier for you to match old people
  with negative words than to positive words

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Presuming attitude oldneg, youngpos
Try it yourself! https//implicit.harvard.edu/impl
icit/
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Where do Attitudes come from?

• Immediate reactions
• Learning
• Watching our own behavior

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1. Attitudes come from Immediate Reactions

• Attitudes occur unconsciously within first
  microsecond of thinking about something

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juvalamu
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chakaka
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bargulum
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fiaquita
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kershnoogle
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sharmes
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Mere Exposure Effect

• Familiarity breeds liking
• Just seeing something over and over makes you
  like it more
• Examples nonsense words, Chinese-like
  characters, photographs (Zajonc, 1968)
• Occurs in non-human animals as well
• Crickets (Harrison Fiscaro, 1974)
• Chickens (Zajonc et al., 1973)

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2. Attitudes come from Learning

• Classical Conditioning of Attitudes
• An object that elicits an emotional response is
  repeatedly paired with one that doesnt 2nd
  object takes on emotional properties of 1st
• Both implicit and explicit attitudes

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Classical Conditioning

• Think about the last time you felt nauseous or
  vomited
• Think about what you were eating or drinking
  right before that
• Can you eat that food/drink anymore?

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Operant Conditioning of Attitudes

• Type of learning where people are likely to
  repeat behaviors that have been rewarded and
  avoid behaviors that have been punished
• More positive attitudes toward behaviors that
  have elicited rewards
• More negative attitudes toward behaviors that
  have elicited punishments

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Operant Conditioning of Attitudes

• Brown, 1956
• Students wrote essay favoring capital punishment
• IV Received A or D

A on essay favoring capital punishment
More positive attitude toward capital punishment
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Social Learning

• More positive attitudes toward behaviors that
  have elicited rewards when someone else did them
• More negative attitudes toward behaviors that
  have elicited punishments when someone else did
  them

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• http//www.baitcar.com/video/i_was_caught_bait_car
  
• Why do they post these bait car videos online?
• So people can see others getting punished for
  this behavior

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3. Attitudes come from our Behaviors

• Self-Perception Theory (Bem, 1972)
• When we are unsure of our attitudes, we infer
  them by looking at our behavior in a given
  circumstance (like an observer would)

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Self-Perception Theory in Action

• Strack, 1988
• See a new comic (no prior attitude)
• IV hold a pen with teeth (use smiling muscles)
  OR hold a pen with lips (use non-smiling muscles)
• DV How funny are the comics?
• Result Funnier when holding pen with teeth!

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Try it!

• Sit in a moping posture, with sighing, downcast
  eyes, talking in a dismal voice
• OR
• Sit with your head up, small smile on your face,
  shoulders back, talking in upbeat voice
• How do you feel?
• Snodgrass, 1986

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Arm Flex Study (Cacioppo et al. 1993)

• Non-Chinese Ps rated Chinese characters
• IV pressing arms up under the table (upward
  flex) OR pressing arms down on top of the table
  (downward flex)
• Upward flex led to more positive ratings of
  characters
• Why?

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Why are some Attitudes stronger than others?

• Stronger attitudes resist change more than weaker
  attitudes
• Accept attitude-confirming evidence at face value
• Critical of attitude-DISconfirming evidence
• Four key determinants of attitude strength

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1. Ambivalence toward Attitude Object

• mixed feelings toward something
• Call to mind the attitude object/topic brings
  both pos neg thoughts, equally quickly
• Report feeling conflicted
• Newby-Clark et al., 2002
• E.g., feminism, abortion, capital punishment
• Leads to weaker attitudes that are more easily
  influenced than non-ambivalent attitudes

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2. Accessibility of Attitude

• How strongly an attitude is associated with an
  attitude object or idea affects the strength of
  the attitude
• Strong association attitude springs to mind
  immediately upon encountering object
• Weak association attitude slower to come to mind
  upon encountering object
• More accessible stronger more resistant to
  change

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3. Subjective Experience when Arguing Attitude

• Ease arguments in favor of an attitude spring to
  mind influence how strong that attitude is
  perceived to be
• Same logic as availability heuristic
• IV Call to mind 3 OR 7 arguments in favor of my
  attitude
• DV perceived attitude strength
• Attitude perceived as stronger after calling to
  mind 3 rather than 7 arguments

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4. Attitude Polarization

• Peoples attitudes become more extreme as they
  reflect on them
• May generate information we didnt consider when
  forming the attitude
• Especially likely when initial attitude is
  already strong
• Reluctance to admit wrong

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Lecture Comprehension Check

• What were the 2 main points of this lecture?
• What question(s) did this lecture raise for you?

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Summary

• What are attitudes?
• Public vs. private attitudes bogus pipeline
• Implicit vs. explicit attitudes IAT
• Where do attitudes come from?
• Immediate reactions, mere exposure
• Learning Classical, operant, social learning
• Behavior Self-Perception theory
• What makes some attitudes stronger than others?
• 4 key reasons/indicators of attitude strength

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Attitudes Attitude Change

• Lecture 2 of 3

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Roadmap for Today!

• Purpose of Attitudes
• Navigating social world
• Coping
• Predicting behavior?
• Changing Attitudes
• Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy
• Foot-in-the-Door
• Effort Justification
• Tying it together Drive for Consistency

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Purpose of Attitudes

• Good/bad is a basic mental categorization
  strategy
• 2 year olds categorize things as good or bad, and
  are especially quick to identify bad
• Helps us avoid death
• Help us adjust to new situations
• What are we drawn to (via positive attitude)?
• What do we avoid (via negative attitude)?
• Helps us navigate through thousands
• of commercial options in our society

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Coping by Knowing own Attitudes

• Knowing your attitudes has a buffering effect
  against stress
• Fazio Powell, 1997
• Frosh Measures of attitudes, health, stress
• Time 1 (within 2 weeks), Time 2 (2 months Later)
• Attitudes about school
• Examples pulling all-nighters, possible majors,
  presentations, class times
• Frosh who knew their attitudes about
  school-related topics had better physical
  mental health while adjusting to university

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Do Attitudes determine our Behavior?

• LaPiere 1934
• Strong anti-immigrant sentiment in US in 1930s
  (jobs)
• LaPiere and a Chinese couple drove across the
  U.S.
• 184 restaurants, 66 hotels/camps
• Received service in 249/250 places

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Driving Across U.S.Study, Continued

• 6 months later sent questionnaire to same places
• Would you accommodate Chinese guests?
• 92 said No!
• Do attitudes determine behavior?

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When do attitudes predict behaviors?

• When the attitude measured is specific to the
  behavior in question
• Example
• Behavior Will you donate blood this afternoon?
• Broad Attitude Do you like to help others?
• Specific Attitude How do you feel about donating
  blood today?

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When do attitudes predict behaviors?

• When more than one behavior is measured.
• Example
• Attitude Do you like helping others?
• Behavior number of times give blood in past
  year gives to charity volunteers to work with
  the homeless

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When do attitudes predict behaviors?

• When the behavior is framed as an instance of the
  attitude
• Example
• Behavior Will you donate blood this afternoon?
• Could call to mind multiple attitudes
• Attitude of interest to researcher I like
  helping people.
• Attitude in Ps mind I hate needles!

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When do attitudes predict behaviors?

• When the attitude is strong and accessible
• Example
• After weve spent an hour talking about helping,
  your attitude toward helping is likely to be
  accessible
• Might be more likely to sign up to give blood
  right after that class than next week

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Quiz When do attitudes predict behavior?

• Without looking at your notes, list the four
  situations in which attitudes are especially
  likely to predict behavior
• When the attitude is specific to the behavior
• When the attitude is measured by multiple types
  of related behaviors
• When people frame the behavior in terms of that
  attitude
• When the attitude is strong accessible

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Do Attitudes Change?

• When are attitudes more likely to change?
• When theyre weak or ambivalent

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Sources of Attitude Change

• Prior behavior Foot-in-the-Door Effect
• Prior speech Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy
• Prior behavior Effort Justification
• All instances of Need for Consistency

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Attitude Change Foot-in-the-Door Effect

• Tendency for people who have agreed to a small
  request to comply later with a larger request
• Freedman Fraser, 1966
• Safety volunteers went door-to-door
• Will you let us install Drive Carefully sign in
  front yard?
• Huge ugly sign
• 17 said Yes

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Foot-in-the-Door Drive Carefully Study
Be a Safe Driver

• IV ½ Ps were asked earlier if they if theyd put
  a 3-inch Be a Safe Driver sign in front window
  (almost all said yes)
• then were asked about big sign
• 76 said Yes!
• Why?
• First behavior was voluntary, no external
  justification possible makes salient attitude
  that person supports safe driving
• Attitude toward big sign changes depending on
  prior relevant behavior

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Attitude Change Counter-attitudinal advocacy

• Saying is Believing
• Advocating an attitude that is counter to what I
  really feel
• When someone states an attitude opposite to a
  private attitude, their private attitude changes
  in line with stated attitude
• Reducing discrepancy between public and private
  attitudes

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Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy

• Attitude change only occurs when no external
  justification for stating the opposing attitude
• External Justification
• An explanation for behavior that lies outside the
  individual (e.g., to receive a large reward or
  avoid a severe punishment)

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Attitude Change Effort Justification

• Tendency to increase liking for something they
  have worked hard or suffered to attain
• Thinking I must have gone through all of that
  for a good reason!
• E.g., extreme hazing in fraternities
• Very dangerous, deadly abuse
• Not reported partly due to effort justification

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Initiation Study

• Aronson Mills (1959)
• Volunteers to join a psychology of sex discussion
  group
• IV screening procedure either extremely
  effortful and unpleasant OR mildly unpleasant OR
  no screening
• Listen in on example discussion
• Discussion was actually really boring and dumb,
  with a couple of interesting points
• DV attitude toward group

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Initiation Study, Continued
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Need for Consistency

• People like to be consistent
• People expect that others will be consistent
• Why?
• Convey self-confidence, sincerity
• I know who I am
• Trust what Im saying
• Helps us know what to expect from others

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People dont like Inconsistency
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Need for Consistency

• Explain how one of these causes of attitude
  change relates to the need for consistency
• Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy
• Foot-in-the-Door Effect
• Effort Justification

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Lecture Comprehension Check

• What were the 2 main points of this lecture?
• What question(s) did this lecture raise for you?

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Summary

• Purposes of Attitudes
• Circumstances under which attitudes predict
  behavior
• Some causes of attitude change
• Need for Consistency

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Attitudes Attitude Change

• Lecture 3 of 3

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Roadmap for Today!

• Why do Attitudes Change?
• Response to Internal Cues
• Cognitive Dissonance
• Response to Social (External) Cues
• Persuasion
• Resisting Attitude Change
• Reactance
• Attitude Inoculation
• Knowledge is Power

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Cognitive Dissonance Responding to Internal Cues

• Leon Festinger
• Theory that inconsistencies in behavior and
  attitudes (or 2 attitudes) produce psychological
  discomfort
• Leads people to rationalize their behavior or
  change their attitudes

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Cognitive Dissonance and Smoking

• Behavior Smoking
• Attitude I dont want to die an early painful
  death
• Result Cognitive Dissonance because behavior is
  incompatible with attitude

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Cognitive Dissonance and Smoking

• Many ways to resolve cognitive dissonance

Change Attitude Im going to die anyway
Add Cognitions e.g., Vivid exceptions
Change Cognitions Smoking wont cause cancer
for me
Change Behavior Stop Smoking
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Peg-Turning Study (Festinger Carlsmith, 1959)

• Recruited Ps for Measures of Performance study
• All Ps spent an hour turning little wooden pegs a
  ¼ turn clockwise, taking little wooden spools off
  a tray and putting them back on gt BORING!
• All Ps then told study was about trying to
  motivate people to do these mundane tasks

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Peg-Turning Study, Contd (Festinger
Carlsmith, 1959)

• Told next P in waiting room in motivation
  condition
• Pay confederate to tell P that the task is really
  fun and enjoyable
• Confederate missing, can you fill in?
• IV paid either 20 OR 1 (or no lie)
• In 2007 USD 141 vs 7
• DV How much did you enjoy the peg-turning?

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Peg-Turning Study, Contd (Festinger
Carlsmith, 1959)
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Peg-Turning Study Cognitive Dissonance

• What was the initial behavior?
• What was the initial attitude toward that
  behavior?
• What event caused cognitive dissonance?
• How did Ps resolve this dissonance?
• Why did Ps in the 20 condition not show
  dissonance reduction?

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Cognitive Dissonance and Choice

• Free choice is a critical component of the
  cognitive dissonance process
• If dont have a choice, no reason to rationalize
  it
• Behavior is completely externally justified
• Only when I choose the behavior do I have to
  figure out how to explain it

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Cognitive Dissonance and Choice

• Linder et al., 1967
• Write an essay to ban controversial speakers from
  campus
• Contrary to attitudes in support of free speech
• IV youve been randomly assigned to write this
  essay OR we really need people in this
  condition, but its totally up to you
• DV Post-essay attitude toward the ban
• Results only people who chose the essay changed
  attitudes to agree with essay

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Cognitive Dissonance as an Emotional Reaction

• Is this just Self-Perception Theory?
• OR is dissonance an emotional reaction?
• Zanna Cooper, 1974
• Everyone given a sugar pill
• IV told pill would arouse them and make them
  feel tense OR told pill would relax them OR told
  pill would have no effect
• Everyone voluntarily wrote counter-attitudinal
  essay

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Cognitive Dissonance as an Emotional Reaction

• Results
• Pill is Arousing Condition
• I feel anxious, but its just due to the pill
• No dissonance reduction
• Pill is Relaxing Condition
• I feel anxious, but Im supposed to feel relaxed!
• Dissonance reduction!

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Explaining Why Attitudes Change Application

• Take one of the following phenomena we discussed
  last class and explain it in terms of cognitive
  dissonance theory
• (1) Initial attitude/behavior, (2) discrepant
  attitude/behavior, (3) resolution
• Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy
• Saying is Believing
• Advocating an attitude counter to what I really
  feel
• Effort Justification
• Increase liking for something they have worked
  hard or suffered to attain
• I must have gone through that for a good reason!

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Persuasion Responding to External Cues

• Yale Attitude Change approach
• Who, Says What, To Whom
• Elaboration Likelihood Model

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Yale Attitude Change Approach

• Effectiveness of Persuasive Communication depends
  on
• Who source of communication
• Says What nature of communication
• To Whom nature of audience
• Carl Hovland at Yale (Hovland, Janis, Kelley,
  1953)
• Aristotle

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Who The Source

• Credible
• Persuaded by people who know what theyre talking
  about
• Expert and Trustworthy
• Tiger Woods endorses Nike golf clubs and Buick
  cars

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Who? The Source

• Likeability
• Persuaded by people we like
• Similarity to self Attractiveness
• Attractiveness can be based on physical or
  personality attributes

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Says What?

• Appeal to reason or emotion
• Reason best for well-educated analytical people
• Humour people in a good mood are more receptive
  to message
• Fear not too much or get else defensive

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Says What?

• Repetition
• Increases liking if initial response was positive
• Mere exposure
• Decreases liking if initially negative
• Not too much or get worn out
• Use repetition with variation (same info,
  different format) to help avoid wear out

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To Whom?

• Need for Cognition
• Tend to engage in and enjoy effortful thinking
• Persuaded by strong arguments not persuaded by
  weak arguments
• Concern about public image
• Persuasive messages focusing on brand names and
  style appeal to people who are highly concerned
  about their public image

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To Whom?

• Distraction
• More often leads to persuasion
• Doesnt work if too distracted to pay notice at
  all
• Age
• Children easiest to persuade
• 18-25 most impressionable beyond that attitudes
  are more stable

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Yale Attitude Change Approach

• Source Who
• Message Says What
• Audience To Whom

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Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) Petty
Cacioppo, 1986

• 1. Central Route (Elaboration is likely)
• People are motivated and have ability to pay
  attention to arguments
• 2. Peripheral Route (Elaboration is unlikely)
• People do not pay attention to arguments but are
  swayed by surface characteristics (e.g., speaker)

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ELM Central Route Carefully Considering Content

• High Motivation to process
• Personally relevant topic (do I care?)
• Need for cognition
• High Ability to process
• Free from distraction
• Sufficient knowledge of topic to understand and
  identify flaws
• Quality of arguments presented is KEY
• Change occurs if initial attitude wasnt that
  strong

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ELM Peripheral Route Anything but the Message

• Not motivated or able to process the message
  content
• E.g., feeling good (but not neutral or bad)
• Persuaded by other aspects of the message
  (peripheral cues)
• Attitude change is temporary and susceptible to
  further changes

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ELM Peripheral Route

• Examples of peripheral cues
• Experts know best.
• More arguments better.
• Good products are more expensive.
• Beautiful is good heuristic.
• beautiful products, beautiful models

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ELM Yale Approach in action!

• What route of persuasion do the advertisers seem
  to use? 
• Was that a good choice? 
• Specifically, what central or peripheral cues are
  used?
• What else can you identify in these ads?
• Experts, likeable sources, emotion, etc.

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If you really want to touch someone, send them a
letter.
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Vancouver during the National Non-Smoking Week.
The car was placed at the Vancouver Art Gallery
and the message reads 'Death from car accidents
370, Death from smoking-related causes 6,027,
Quit now before it kills you.'
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Resisting Persuasion

• Reactance Theory
• Attitude Inoculation
• Knowledge is Power

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Reactance Theory

• People will do the opposite of what they think
  you want them to do
• Upset when someone tries to take away free
  choice, so react by reasserting it

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Attitude Inoculation

• Make people immune to persuasion attempts by
  initially exposing them to small doses of the
  arguments against their position (McGuire, 1961)
• What doesnt kill me
• makes me stronger
• Your Attitude

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Attitude Inoculation

• Perry et al., 1980
• Students in grades 7 8 inoculated against peer
  pressure to smoke
• Shown ads that imply liberated women smoke
• Taught to respond shes not really liberated if
  shes hooked on cigarettes
• Role-played situations of peer pressure
• Taught to respond Id be a real chicken if I
  smoked just to impress you

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Attitude Inoculation

• Half as likely to begin smoking that year
  compared to non-inoculated students
• Message Being inoculated against attacks on our
  attitudes serves to strengthen our original
  attitudes

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Knowledge is Power!

• Foot-in-the-door technique
• Recognize it when you see it dont fall prey!
• Central vs. Peripheral Route
• Dont make important purchases when distracted,
  tired, unmotivated

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Lecture Comprehension Check

• What were the 2 main points of this lecture?
• What question(s) did this lecture raise for you?

104
Summary

• Attitudes change in response to
• Internal cues Cognitive Dissonance
• External cues Persuasion
• Resisting attitude change by
• Reactance
• Attitude inoculation
• Knowledge