Definitions
Set of emotions, beliefs and behaviours towards a particular object, person, thing or event
Attitude
Other name for the components of attitudes
ABC Model of attitudes
They may emerge due to direct personal _______, or they may result from observation.
Experience
This allows us to predict what is likely to happen, and so gives us a sense of control. Attitudes can help us organize and structure our experience.
Knowledge
When people smoke (behavior) and they know that smoking causes cancer (cognition), they are in a state of cognitive dissonance.
Cognitive Dissonance
A type of attitude that we are consciously aware of and clearly influences our behaviour
Explicit Attitudes
This involves a person’s feelings / emotions about the attitude object. For example: “I am scared of spiders”.
Affective Component
Relate to how people are expected to behave in a particular role or context.
Social Roles
The attitudes we express (1) help communicate who we are and (2) may make us feel good because we have asserted our identity.
Self/Ego-expressive
What causes cognitive dissonance?
•Forced Compliance Behavior,
•Decision Making,
•Effort.
A type of attitude that are unconscious but still have an effect on our beliefs and behaviour
Implicit Attitudes
The way the attitude we have influences on how we act or behave. For example: “I will avoid spiders and scream if I see one”.
Behavioural Component
Attitudes can be _______ in a variety of ways
Learned
If a person holds and/or expresses socially acceptable attitudes, other people will reward them with approval and social acceptance.
Adaptive
An attitude toward a group that leads people to evaluate members of that group negatively
Prejudice
A phenomenon in which a person experiences psychological distress due to conflicting thoughts or beliefs.
Cognitive Dissonance
This involves a person’s belief / knowledge about an attitude object. For example: “I believe spiders are dangerous”.
Cognitive Component
People also learn attitudes by _______people around them. When someone you admire greatly supports a particular attitude, you are more likely to develop the same beliefs.
Observing
Refers to holding attitudes that protect our self-esteem or that justify actions that make us feel guilty. For example, one way children might defend themselves against the feelings of humiliation they have experienced in P.E. lessons is to adopt a strongly negative attitude to all sports.
Ego-Defensive
One advantage of a ________ is that it enables us to respond rapidly to situations because we may have had a similar experience before.
Stereotype
Fixed conventional ideas about groups and can give rise to prejudices and discrimination
Stereotype
Another name for Behavioral Component
Conative
Imagine a young man who has just started smoking. Whenever he lights up a cigarette, people complain, chastise him, and ask him to leave their vicinity.
This negative feedback from those around him eventually causes him to develop an unfavorable opinion of smoking and he decides to give up the habit. This is an example of:Operant Conditioning
Attitudes towards ourselves, for example, have a protective function (i.e. an ego-defensive role) in helping us reserve our self-image.
Positive
If we put effort into a task which we have chosen to carry out, and the task turns out badly, we experience ________.
Dissonance