Learning Targets:

Identify important figures and research in the areas of attitude formation and change.
Discuss attitude formation and change, including persuasion strategies and cognitive dissonance.

AP psychology course and exam description, effective fall 2020. (n.d.). https://apcentral.collegeboard.org/media/pdf/ap-psychology-course-and-exam-description.pdf

Attitudes

Attitudes are our learned tendency to evaluate some object, person, or issue in a particular way. Attitudes can be positive, negative, ambivalent, or mixed. Attitudes have three components:

Components of Attitudes
COGNITIVE COMPONENT: Your beliefs, thoughts, or ideas about an object
BEHAVIORAL COMPONENT: Your predisposition to act in a particular way.
EMOTIONAL COMPONENT: Your feelings and emotions about a particular object.

The Effects of Attitude on Behavior

Usually, actions guide our attitudes, but sometimes we find ourselves in situations where our attitudes guide our actions. Attitudes tend to guide our actions if:

Attitudes are extreme or frequently expressed.
They have been formed through direct experience.
You are knowledgeable about the subject.
You have something personally to gain or lose by a particular outcome.

When actions guide attitudes, you will change your attitude to make it consistent with your behavior. For example, say you hate running. If you begin running regularly, your attitude towards running changes.

Leon Festinger

Leon Festinger was an influential social psychologist who is best known for his theory of cognitive dissonance. This theory explains the psychological discomfort we feel when our beliefs or attitudes conflict with our behaviors. Festinger argued that this discomfort motivates us to reduce the dissonance by either changing our beliefs/attitudes or changing our behavior. His work on cognitive dissonance has been widely applied to areas such as attitude change, decision-making, and persuasion, and has had practical applications in advertising, politics, and social activism.

Cognitive Dissonance

Cognitive dissonance describes the unpleasant state of psychological tensions occurring because of inconsistent thoughts or perceptions. Cognitive dissonance occurs when one has two conflicting attitudes, the original attitude vs. the realization that you behaved in a way inconsistent with the attitude. When the two clash we feel motivated to justify our actions, thus changing attitudes to match our behaviors.

Persuasion

Central Route to Persuasion

In psychology, persuasion refers to the process of changing someone's attitudes or beliefs. The central route to persuasion is one of two main ways this can be achieved. The central route involves using logical arguments and evidence to persuade someone to change their attitude. This approach is most effective when the audience is motivated and able to carefully consider the information presented to them.

For example, if a politician wants to persuade voters to support their campaign, they might use the central route by presenting logical arguments and evidence to support their platform. This would be effective if the voters were motivated to learn about the candidate and had the ability to carefully consider the information presented.

Peripheral Route to Persuasion

The peripheral route to persuasion is the second of two main ways this can be achieved. Unlike the central route, which uses logical arguments and evidence to persuade, the peripheral route focuses on more superficial aspects of a message, such as the source of the message, its emotional appeal, or the use of catchy slogans or images.

The peripheral route to persuasion is most effective when the audience is not motivated or able to process information deeply. This can happen when the audience is distracted, under time pressure, or lacks the knowledge or interest to engage with the topic. For example, a person might be persuaded to buy a product based on a celebrity endorsement, attractive packaging, or a memorable jingle, rather than the product's actual features or quality.

[CC BY 4.0] UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED | IMAGES: LICENSED AND USED ACCORDING TO TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION