7.2 Attitude Formation, Consistency Theories, and Cognitive Dissonance

Attitude Formation, Consistency Theories, and Cognitive Dissonance

An attitude is defined in social psychology as an enduring psychological tendency to evaluate a particular entity—termed the attitude object (which can encompass individuals, groups, institutions, abstract concepts, or tangible products)—with some degree of favor or disfavor. Attitudes serve critical evolutionary and cognitive functions: they provide cognitive shortcuts for navigating complex environments, express core personal values, protect self-esteem, and guide behavioral decision-making.

1. Attitude Structure: The Tripartite Model and Implicit Associations

The classical conceptualization of attitudes is the Tripartite Model (often referred to as the ABC Model of Attitudes), which posits that an attitude consists of three interconnected, mutually influencing components:

                               [ ATTITUDE OBJECT ]
                                        │
                 ┌──────────────────────┼──────────────────────┐
                 ▼                      ▼                      ▼
          [ Affective (A) ]      [ Behavioral (B) ]     [ Cognitive (C) ]
          - Emotional feelings   - Overt actions        - Factual beliefs
          - Physiological states - Intentions           - Knowledge schemas
          - Evaluative conditioning - Past behavioral habits - Valenced thoughts

The ABC Components

1. Affective Component (A): The emotional reactions, physiological arousal, and gut evaluations elicited by the attitude object. Affective attitudes are frequently formed through evaluative conditioning (pairing a neutral stimulus with an intrinsically pleasant or unpleasant unconditioned stimulus) or the mere exposure effect (Robert Zajonc, 1968), wherein repeated, non-reinforced perceptual exposure to a neutral stimulus enhances positive evaluations.
2. Behavioral Component (B): The behavioral tendencies, observable motor actions, and behavioral intentions directed toward the attitude object. As demonstrated in behavioral reinforcement paradigms and Daryl Bem's self-perception model, past actions frequently anchor and reinforce current attitude states.
3. Cognitive Component (C): The explicit knowledge, factual beliefs, perceptual schemas, and logical arguments held regarding the attitude object. This involves conscious propositional assertions about the attributes, utility, or moral status of the target.

Explicit versus Implicit Attitudes

Modern social cognition distinguishes between two distinct operational levels of attitude representation:

• Explicit Attitudes: Conscious, deliberative evaluations that an individual can introspectively identify, verbally articulate, and endorse on standard psychometric self-report instruments, such as Likert scales, semantic differential scales (Osgood, Suci, & Tannenbaum), or Guttman scaling.
• Implicit Attitudes: Involuntary, automatic, and frequently unconscious evaluations that are activated spontaneously without conscious awareness upon encountering the attitude object. Because explicit self-reports are highly vulnerable to social desirability bias, impression management, and lack of introspective access, researchers rely on indirect, reaction-time-based measures.
• The Implicit Association Test (IAT): Introduced by Anthony Greenwald, Debbie McGhee, and Jordan Schwartz (1998) and later refined by Greenwald, Brian Nosek, and Mahzarin Banaji, the IAT assesses the relative associative strength between target concept pairs (e.g., Black vs. White faces, Elderly vs. Young faces) and evaluative attribute categories (e.g., Pleasant vs. Unpleasant words). Participants rapidly categorize stimuli via computerized keystrokes under congruent pairings (e.g., White faces / Good words sharing a key, Black faces / Bad words sharing another) and incongruent pairings (e.g., Black faces / Good words sharing a key). The latency difference between incongruent and congruent sorting blocks (the D-score, introduced by Greenwald, Nosek, and Banaji in 2003) operationalizes the degree of implicit evaluative bias.

2. Attitude-Behavior Consistency and the Theory of Planned Behavior

For decades, lay intuition assumed that holding a strong attitude guarantees corresponding overt behavior. However, classical empirical investigations shattered this straightforward assumption, exposing a profound attitude-behavior disconnect.

The Historical Disconnect: LaPiere (1934) and Wicker (1969)

• Richard LaPiere's (1934) Cross-Country Travel Study: During a period of virulent anti-Asian prejudice in the United States, sociologist Richard LaPiere spent two years traveling across the country with a young, well-dressed Chinese couple. The trio visited 251 hotels, campgrounds, and restaurants. Defying widespread societal prejudice, they were refused service at only one single establishment (a 99.6% acceptance rate), receiving courteous treatment at the rest. Six months later, LaPiere mailed a written questionnaire to all 251 establishments asking: "Will you accept members of the Chinese race as guests in your establishment?" Of the 128 establishments that responded, 92% unequivocally answered "No", with only one establishment replying "Yes" (the rest being undecided). LaPiere demonstrated that explicit verbal attitude surveys correlate catastrophically poorly with actual, real-world spontaneous behavior.
• Allan Wicker's (1969) Meta-Analysis: Wicker synthesized over 40 empirical investigations examining the relationship between attitudes and behavior across diverse settings (racial attitudes, job satisfaction, religious attendance). Wicker's devastating conclusion was that attitudes were only weakly correlated with overt behavior, rarely exceeding $r = .30$ (accounting for less than 10% of behavioral variance). Wicker controversially suggested that the attitude construct was so weak a predictor of action that psychologists should question its scientific utility.

When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

Subsequent research identified the critical moderating variables that determine when attitudes reliably predict overt behavior:

• Attitude Accessibility (Russell Fazio): Attitudes that are chronically accessible in memory—retrieved rapidly and effortlessly upon encountering the object—exert a powerful, direct influence on behavioral choices compared to weakly held, inaccessible attitudes.
• Direct Experience: Attitudes forged through direct, personal behavioral experience with an attitude object (e.g., participating in student protests, suffering a specific illness) predict subsequent behavior vastly better than attitudes formed indirectly via hearsay or media reading (Regan & Fazio, 1977).
• Self-Monitoring (Mark Snyder): Low self-monitors exhibit high attitude-behavior consistency because they look inward, using their personal values and internal dispositions as behavioral guides. In contrast, high self-monitors constantly survey the social landscape, modifying their behavior to match external social cues, resulting in low attitude-behavior consistency.
• Attitude Specificity (Principle of Compatibility): Formulated by Icek Ajzen and Martin Fishbein (1977), this psychometric principle dictates that an attitude predicts behavior only when both measures correspond precisely across four elements: Target, Action, Context, and Time (TACT). Assessing a general attitude (e.g., "What is your attitude toward religion?") fails to predict a highly specific behavior (e.g., attending Sunday church service this weekend). When the attitude is measured with the identical level of specificity as the behavior (e.g., "What is your attitude toward attending Sunday church service at your neighborhood chapel this weekend?"), the correlation surges ($r > .70$).

The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB)

To predict deliberate, planned, and volitional behaviors, Martin Fishbein and Icek Ajzen developed the Theory of Reasoned Action (1975), which Ajzen later expanded into the Theory of Planned Behavior (1985, 1991) by adding the construct of Perceived Behavioral Control:

  [ Attitude Toward Behavior ] ──┐
  (Specific evaluation of act)   │
                                 ▼
  [ Subjective Norms ] ─────────► [ Behavioral Intention ] ──► [ Overt Behavior ]
  (Perceived social pressure)    ▲
                                 │
  [ Perceived Behavioral ] ──────┤
  [ Control (PBC) ]              │
  (Perceived ease/difficulty)    └───────────────────────────► (Direct path if actual
                                                                control is high)

According to the Theory of Planned Behavior, the single most immediate, proximal predictor of overt behavior is Behavioral Intention (a person's conscious plan or motivation to exert effort toward performing the act). Intention is determined by three independent cognitive variables:

1. Attitude Toward the Specific Behavior: The individual's personal positive or negative evaluation of performing the concrete behavior in question (combining behavioral beliefs with outcome evaluations).
2. Subjective Norms: The individual's perception of social normative pressure from significant others (family, peers, society) regarding whether they should perform the action, multiplied by their motivation to comply with those expectations.
3. Perceived Behavioral Control (PBC): The individual's subjective perception of the ease or difficulty of executing the target behavior, accounting for anticipated obstacles, skills, resources, and opportunities. (PBC is conceptually analogous to Albert Bandura's concept of self-efficacy). Importantly, when actual control reflects perceived control, PBC can also exert a direct predictive path on behavior independently of intention.

3. Cognitive Consistency Theories: Balance Theory and Cognitive Dissonance

Psychological consistency models assume that the human mind strives for harmonious, stable, and coherent relationships among its cognitive elements (beliefs, attitudes, values, and behaviors). Incoherence produces psychological discomfort that compels mental reorganization.

Fritz Heider's Balance Theory (1946, 1958)

Heider formulated Balance Theory to model the structure of interpersonal attitudes using triads composed of three interconnected elements:

• P: The focal Person (the perceiver).
• O: Another Person.
• X: An impersonal Entity, Idea, Topic, or third Person.

Relations between elements can be positive ($+$, representing liking, approval, or belonging) or negative ($-$, representing disliking, disapproval, or rejection).

                   Balanced Triad (+1)                         Unbalanced Triad (-1)
                          P                                           P
                        /   \                                       /   \
                    (+)       (+)                               (+)       (+)
                      /       \                                   /       \
                     O ──(+)── X                                 O ──(-)── X
                 (+) * (+) * (+) = +1                        (+) * (+) * (-) = -1

• The Mathematical Rule of Balance: A P-O-X triad is psychologically balanced if and only if the algebraic product of its three signed relations is positive ($+1$). A triad is unbalanced if the algebraic product is negative ($-1$):
  • Balanced Triads ($+1$):
    1. Three positive relations: $(+) \times (+) \times (+) = +1$. (You like your friend, you like a candidate, your friend likes that candidate).
    2. One positive and two negative relations: $(+) \times (-) \times (-) = +1$. (You like your friend, you hate a movie, your friend also hates that movie; your shared hatred unifies you).
  • Unbalanced Triads ($-1$):
    1. Two positive relations and one negative relation: $(+) \times (+) \times (-) = -1$. (You like your friend, you love a political candidate, your friend hates that candidate). This creates cognitive strain.
    2. Three negative relations: $(-) \times (-) \times (-) = -1$. (You dislike Bob, you dislike the policy, Bob dislikes the policy). This creates ambiguity and imbalance.
• Resolution: Unbalanced states generate an unpleasant psychological tension, motivating Person $P$ to alter one of the relations (e.g., stop liking the friend, change their mind about the candidate, or persuade the friend to change their view) until positive algebraic harmony is restored.

Leon Festinger's Cognitive Dissonance Theory (1957)

Arguably the most influential theory in the history of social psychology, Leon Festinger's Cognitive Dissonance Theory asserts that holding two or more psychologically contradictory cognitions (beliefs, attitudes, or knowledge of one's own behavior) creates an aversive, drive-like state of psychological tension known as cognitive dissonance.

  [ Counter-Attitudinal Behavior ] ──► [ Aversive Motivational Dissonance ] ──► [ Attitude Change ]
     (e.g., Lie for \$1; endure            (Negative physiological arousal;        (Internalize lie;
      severe initiation)                   felt psychological discomfort)          magnify group value)

Because cognitive dissonance is experienced as an intrinsically uncomfortable motivational state (analogous to hunger or physical pain), individuals are intensely motivated to reduce or eliminate it. Festinger mathematically conceptualized dissonance magnitude as:

$\text{Dissonance} = \frac{\sum (\text{Importance} \times \text{Dissonant Cognitions})}{\sum (\text{Importance} \times \text{Consonant Cognitions})}$

Landmark Experimental Paradigms

1. The Induced Compliance / Insufficient Justification Paradigm:
   • Festinger & Carlsmith (1959): Male participants were recruited for a 1-hour laboratory experiment. They performed excruciatingly boring, repetitive, and monotonous physical tasks: repeatedly turning 48 wooden pegs a quarter turn clockwise with one hand, emptying and refilling trays with spools. Once finished, the experimenter feigned a crisis, explaining that the research assistant who usually briefs the next participant was absent. The experimenter asked the participant to do him a favor: tell the next waiting participant (a confederate) that the peg-turning task was fascinating, intensely enjoyable, and intellectually thrilling.
   • Experimental Manipulation: Participants were randomly assigned to be paid either $1 or $20 (a substantial sum in 1959, equivalent to over $200 today) for lying, while a Control Group performed the task but told no lie.
   • Results: Later, in an ostensibly independent interview, all participants rated how enjoyable the peg-turning task actually was. Participants paid $20 rated the task as boring and dull (identical to controls). However, participants paid $1 rated the task as significantly and genuinely enjoyable!
   • Theoretical Explanation: The $20 participants had abundant, overwhelming external justification for their behavior ("I lied because I received twenty dollars"). They experienced zero dissonance. The $1 participants lacked adequate external justification ("A single dollar is insufficient to make me compromise my integrity"). Experiencing intense dissonance between "I am an honest person" and "I lied about a boring task," they resolved the tension by changing their internal attitude, convincing themselves that the task really was interesting and fun.
2. The Post-Decisional Dissonance / Spreading of Alternatives Paradigm:
   • Jack Brehm (1956): Female participants evaluated eight household consumer appliances (toasters, coffee makers, blenders). As a reward, participants were offered a choice between two appliances. In the High Dissonance condition, they chose between two appliances they had rated virtually identical in desirability (e.g., ranked #3 and #4). In the Low Dissonance condition, they chose between a highly rated item (#3) and an inferior item (#8). After making their decision, participants re-evaluated all eight appliances.
   • Results: In the high-dissonance condition, participants exhibited a dramatic spreading of alternatives: they significantly upgraded their rating of the chosen appliance and drastically downgraded their rating of the rejected alternative. To eliminate post-decisional regret and dissonance regarding the attractive features of the unchosen item, people selectively bolster their choice.
3. The Effort Justification Paradigm:
   • Elliot Aronson & Judson Mills (1959): Female college students volunteered to join a prestigious university discussion group on the psychology of sex. Before joining, participants were subjected to an initiation screening: the Severe Initiation condition required reading a list of twelve highly graphic, obscene sexual words and two vivid descriptions of sexual acts aloud to a male experimenter. The Mild Initiation condition required reading five mildly sex-related words. The Control condition required no initiation.
   • Manipulation: All participants were then permitted to listen through headphones to what they believed was an ongoing live discussion of the group. In reality, they heard a pre-recorded, mind-numbingly dull, rambling discussion on the secondary sexual characteristics of lower reptiles.
   • Results: Participants in the mild and control conditions accurately rated the discussion as boring, pedantic, and worthless. Participants in the Severe Initiation condition rated the discussion as extraordinarily fascinating, insightful, and sophisticated! Having endured acute embarrassment and effort, experiencing the outcome as dull created intense dissonance ("I suffered for nothing"). To justify their intense effort, they cognitively amplified the perceived value of the group.
4. The Insufficient Deterrence / Forbidden Toy Paradigm:
   • Elliot Aronson & J. Merrill Carlsmith (1963): Children rated the attractiveness of several toys. The experimenter prohibited the child from playing with their second-favorite toy under threat of either a Mild Penalty ("I will be a little annoyed") or a Severe Penalty ("I will be very angry, pack up all the toys, and go home"). While the experimenter was out of the room, none of the children played with the forbidden toy. When they re-rated the toys afterward, children in the mild threat condition derogated the forbidden toy, whereas children in the severe threat condition did not. In a follow-up weeks later, Jonathan Freedman (1965) found that only about 29% of mild-threat children played with the toy when given the chance, compared with about 77% of severe-threat children. Lacking external deterrence, they generated an internal justification: "I didn't play with it because I don't really like it anyway."

Mechanisms of Dissonance Reduction

Festinger noted that individuals reduce dissonance through four primary cognitive avenues:

1. Changing Behavior: Ceasing the dissonant act (e.g., quitting smoking).
2. Changing Dissonant Cognitions: Modifying an attitude to align with behavior (e.g., "smoking isn't actually that dangerous").
3. Adding Consonant Cognitions (Rationalization): Generating new cognitive elements that justify the inconsistency (e.g., "smoking relieves my stress, which prevents heart attacks").
4. Trivialization: Minimizing the subjective importance of the dissonant elements (e.g., "life is short anyway, so who cares?").

• Claude Steele's Self-Affirmation Theory (1988): Steele demonstrated that cognitive dissonance is primarily a threat to the global integrity of the self-concept. Individuals can eliminate dissonance-induced attitude change without resolving the specific contradiction, simply by affirming an unrelated, positive aspect of their core identity (e.g., reflecting on their artistic talent or moral generosity).

4. Bem's Self-Perception Theory and the Integrative Resolution

In 1967 and 1972, Daryl Bem challenged the entire motivational foundation of cognitive dissonance theory by advancing Self-Perception Theory. Bem argued that social psychologists did not need to postulate an unobservable, aversive internal motivational drive state (dissonance) to explain attitude change.

       Festinger's Cognitive Dissonance                  Bem's Self-Perception Theory
       ────────────────────────────────                  ────────────────────────────
     [ Incompatible Cognition/Act ]                    [ Unambiguous Overt Behavior ]
                   │                                                 │
                   ▼                                                 ▼
     [ Aversive Emotional Arousal ]                    [ Cool Attributional Inference ]
   (Negative drive state, discomfort)               ("I did this for \$1, so I must like it")
                   │                                                 │
                   ▼                                                 ▼
     [ Defensive Attitude Change ]                     [ Rational Attitude Deduction ]

Bem's Radical Behaviorist Account

According to Self-Perception Theory, when internal cues (attitudes, emotions) are weak, ambiguous, or uninterpretable, individuals act essentially as outside observers of their own actions. They infer their own internal states by observing their own overt behavior and the situational context in which it occurs.

• Re-interpreting Festinger & Carlsmith: Bem demonstrated that an outside observer, reading an objective description of the $1 versus $20 experiment, logically concludes that the $1 participant must have enjoyed the task more because their behavior was not controlled by external financial reward. Bem argued that the actual participant executes the exact same cool, non-emotional attributional inference about themselves: "I agreed to do this for a mere dollar without being forced; therefore, I must have found the task interesting." No psychological tension or aversive drive is required.

The Overjustification Effect

A critical, highly testable deduction of self-perception theory is the Overjustification Effect: when an individual is offered an external, extrinsic reward (money, prizes) for performing an activity that they already find intrinsically rewarding, their intrinsic motivation declines. The introduction of salient external incentives causes the individual to discount their internal interest, re-attributing their behavior entirely to the external reward.

• Mark Lepper, David Greene, and Richard Nisbett's (1973) Drawing Study: Preschool children who demonstrated high intrinsic interest in drawing with colorful felt-tip markers during unobserved free play were placed into one of three conditions:
  1. Expected Award Condition: Promised a fancy "Good Player" certificate with a gold ribbon if they drew with the markers.
  2. Unexpected Award Condition: Drew with the markers and unexpectedly received the certificate afterward without prior agreement.
  3. No Award Condition: Simply invited to draw with the markers without any award.
• Results: Two weeks later, researchers recorded the percentage of free-play time children spontaneously chose to spend drawing with the markers. Children in the Expected Award condition spent significantly less time drawing than children in the Unexpected Award and No Award conditions. The extrinsic expectation "overjustified" their play, eroding their intrinsic motivation into contractual labor ("I only draw when I get an award").

The Grand Theoretical Synthesis: Fazio, Zanna, and Cooper (1977)

For a decade, cognitive dissonance theory and self-perception theory waged an intense theoretical battle. The controversy was brilliantly resolved by Russell Fazio, Mark Zanna, and Joel Cooper (1977), who integrated both models using Muzafer Sherif's Social Judgment Theory:

                                [ Attitudinal Continuum ]

     [ Latitude of Acceptance ]       [ Non-Commitment ]        [ Latitude of Rejection ]
     (Positions mildly discrepant)                            (Positions highly discrepant)
                 │                                                         │
                 ▼                                                         ▼
    [ Self-Perception Theory ]                                 [ Cognitive Dissonance ]
    - Cool attributional inference                             - Aversive emotional arousal
    - No physiological arousal                                 - Sympathetic nervous activation
    - Attitude deduction from behavior                         - Drive-reduction attitude change

1. Cognitive Dissonance Theory operates in the Latitude of Rejection: When behavior is highly counter-attitudinal—violating deeply held, core values and falling into the person's latitude of rejection—it generates genuine negative physiological arousal (elevated galvanic skin conductance, heart rate, and subjective discomfort). Attitude change under these conditions is driven by the aversive need to reduce physiological tension.
2. Self-Perception Theory operates in the Latitude of Acceptance: When behavior is only mildly discrepant from prior attitudes, or falls within the person's latitude of acceptance (or when prior attitudes are vague, nascent, or weakly held), no physiological arousal occurs. Under these conditions, attitude formation proceeds via cool, attributional self-inference as modeled by Daryl Bem.