Behavior and Attitudes

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Behavior and Attitudes
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• Exam
• Reading
• Coins

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Attitude Survey

• 1SD 2D 3Neither 4A 5SA
• Engaging in exercise 3 times a wk promotes good
  health
• Eating a variety of foods each day, including
  five or more servings of fresh fruits and
  vegetables, contributes to wellness.
• It is essential that all citizens exercise their
  right to vote if government is to effectively
  reflect the will of the people.

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Attitude Survey

• 1SD 2D 3Neither 4A 5SA
• Homelessness is a serious social problem that
  needs attention.

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Behavior Survey

• Yes or No
• I take time to engage in regular exercise at
  least 3 times per wk.
• I regularly eat at least five servings of fresh
  fruits and vegetables each day.
• I voted in the last election for which I was
  eligible.
• Within the last year I have done something to
  address the problem of homelessness. (e.g., made
  a charitable contribution, talked with a homeless
  person, wrote my congressman regarding the
  problem).

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• Experiment Predictions

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Attitudes

• A favorable or unfavorable reaction toward
  something or someone
• Can you think of any problems in assessing
  attitudes?

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Affect, behavior, and Cognition

• Breckler (1984) - Demonstrates the use of
  different techniques of researching attitudes
  with research on snakes.
• Affect (heart rate, mood checklist)
• Behavior (Avg. dist. From vivid snake pictures,
  extent of contact with live snakes)
• Cognition (Snakes control rodent population,
  attack anything that moves...agreement, thought
  listing)

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How are Attitudes Formed?

• 1) Operant Conditioning
• Perform behavior, it gets reinforced - More
  likely to perform the behavior in the future.
• Positive attitudes toward behavior should form

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How are Attitudes Formed?

• 2) Classical Conditioning
• Unconditioned Stim --gt Uncond. Response
• Smile of Parents --gt Happy child
• Conditioned Stim-gt Conditioned Response
• Plate of veggies w/smile --gt happy w/veg
• Eventually wont need smile

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How are Attitudes Formed?

• 3) Balance Theory (Heider, 1958)
• We have a need for balance in our attitudes
• We frequently change our attitudes to create
  balance among them.
• Diagram
• Ex. Mustang Commercial, Will and Grace

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Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• What do you think?

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LaPierre (1934)

• Research on feelings toward Asians
• Anti-Asian sentiment at the time
• Goes to 250 rest/hotels - All except 1
• Month later...Calls
• Attitude 90 said they would not serve
• Behavior Almost everyone served
• Problems?

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Do Attitudes Predict Behavior...

• 1990 - 90 of Americans say pollution
  moderate/serious threat...Only 50 recycle
• 1996 - Americans rate nutrition as very
  important...Consuming more cal/fat than just 3
  years back
• Surveys about values - Honesty rises to top...yet
  91 admit lying frequently

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Do attitudes ever predict behavior?
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When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• 1) Direct Experience
• Ex. Attitudes toward Fraternity/Sorority
  members...
• SIDE NORMAL DISTRIBUTION

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When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• 2) Individual Differences
• Self-monitoring

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When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• 3) Bogus Pipeline

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When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• 4) The principle of Aggregation
• Power of situation
• Therefore, aggregate
• Baseball analogy (Any one at bat)

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When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• 5) Examining Attitudes Specific to Behavior.
• D.V. Class attendance on Friday
• Are academics important to you?
• Versus
• Is it essential to attend class daily to do well?

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When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

• 6) Attitudes predict behavior when the attitude
  is potent.
• Get people to think about their attitudes before
  acting...tend to see greater attitude behavior
  consistency.

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Do Behaviors Create Attitudes?

• Behavior seems to create atttitudes.
• Role Playing - Zimbardo Study
• Write Counterintuitive essay -gt Attitude more in
  line with what you wrote after writing it.

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Why do actions influence behavior?

• Which group do you think you would like better?
  First week as part of initiation...
• 1) Get up at 5 AM, run, do push ups/sit ups etc.,
  clean up after meetings, serve everyone during
  meals/meatings, clean bathrooms/toilets.
• 2) Have to show up 15 minutes early for meetings
  and set up for the first week of membership...
• What would reinforcement theory predict?

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What about this scenario?

• Participate in a boring experiment turning wooden
  knobs on a box for 45 minutes.
• I.V. - Paid 1 versus 20 to lie
• D.V. - How interesting was your experiment?
• Which one would you rate as more
  interesting/exciting?

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Theories to explain why behavior influences
attitudes

• 1) Cognitive Dissonance Theory (1957)
• Motivated to maintain consistency among our
  cognitions, behaviors/attitudes
• When we behave inconsistently we experience
  dissonance.
• Dissonance -gt What is it?
• Attitude behavior example we did in class...

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• 2 Cognitions/behaviors can be
• 1) irrelevant - and not cause dissonance (think
  health important/like psychology)
• 2) Consonant - They are consistent/no dissonance
  (think health important/like to jog)
• 3) Dissonant - 2 cognitions that are inconsistent
  (think health important/smoke)

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• Problem Frequently we behave in ways
  inconsistent with our attitudes. We cant change
  past behavior, therefore we must change our
  attitude.

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• Want to be healthy versus I smoke...
• What do you do?
• Quit smoking (Difficult)
• Smoking is not that bad for you (examples of old
  smokers)
• Staying healthy is not that important (difficult)
• Wont hurt me now...quit after college or X
• Dont smoke that much...some smoke 2 pack/day
• Im young, quit when older and things less
  stressful...just having some fun now

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• Ex. Person is attractive goes on very few
  dates
• Believe he/she is not really attractive
• Reduce efforts to date
• Make one of the cognitions less important (Dating
  is not important)
• Generate new cognitions that make dissonant
  cognitions consistent (Ex., Im
  choosy...consistent with being attractive and
  consistent with having few dates)

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Cognitive Dissonance

• Video

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• Foot in the door
• Door in the face
• Exam questions
• 19 MC 2 shorter essays 1 longer one

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• Aronson and Mills (1959)
• Women recruited to participate in sex talk
• Initiation...Make sure could cope
• I.V. - Initiation (control, mild, severe)
• Listen in on group (mating behavior of fruit
  flies)
• D.V. - How interesting do you rate group.
• Guess Results...

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• Aronson and Mills (1959)
• Results
• Control Boring
• Mild Boring
• Severe Very interesting/fascinating
• Why?
• Went through severe initiation to join group.
  Cant change behavior, therefore change attitude.

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Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger, 1957)

• Side Do we actually experience dissonance?
• Cacioppo Petty - found arousal/dissonance to be
  detectable as increased persperation/heart rate.

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Dissonance after decisions

• Tough decision...two equally attractive
  alternatives
• Upgrade what we choose
• Downgrade the alternative

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Self-Perception Theory (Bem, 1972)

• Look at our own behavior like an outsider
  would...Figure out our own behavior like we do
  for others.
• 6 pack of Mountain Dew
• Discussion...think to tone of voice...angry
• Do you like pancakes?

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Self-Perception Theory (Bem, 1972)

• Ex. The experimenter offers Karen 100 dollars
  to smash her guitar and she does...
• Experimenter offers Paul 1 to smash his guitar
  and he does...
• Assuming same quality guitar...Who do you think
  liked their guitar better?
• How does Self-Perception Theory explain previous
  findings...Festingers experiment or Aronson and
  Mills experiment?

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Self-Perception Theory (Bem, 1972)

• Bem argues that his theory is more parsimonious
  (Dont need to talk about internal mechanisms)
• Self-Perception theory especially intuitive for
  attitudes we dont feel strongly about.

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Self-presentation theory!
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Overjustification Effect

• Rewarding people for doing what they already like
  doing may cause them to attribute behavior to
  external reward rather than intrinsic interest.
• Book clubs for kids
• allowances

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Facial Feedback Hypothesis

• Somewhat related and fun

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Facial Feedback Hypothesis

• It seems as though behaviors can dictate
  attitudes...Can our facial expressions dictate
  our emotions?
• Changes in facial expression can rigger
  corresponding changes in subjective experiences
  of emotion...Facial expressions can evoke and
  magnify our emotional states.

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Facial Feedback

• If you want to feel happier...make yourself smile
  -)