Psychology 12

ATTITUDE Formation

DefinitionsWhat are attitudes?

How do attitudes develop?

Consistency?How often do we display the same attitude

to the same object, idea, or situation?

What's it like?

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What do you think?

Attitudes develop based on how we evaluate

something. We can only determine someone holds an attitude about anything

until he/she responds “evaluatively” to an Attitude Object (AO).

Attitude is a general and enduring positive or negative feeling about some person,

object, or issue.

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American History X

Attitudes refer to very general

evaluations that people

hold of themselves, other people, objects, and

issues.

1] Cognitive – beliefs about what is or is not true with respect to the AO.

2] Affective – feelings / emotions toward the AO.

3] Behavioral – tendencies to do certain things with respect to the AO.

Eg. Drinking and Driving

The three Components of Attitude

Rick Mercer Rant

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Habits (I wake up every morning and I feel angry!)

Values (beliefs that we held dear);

“You know what Maria… once I would like to wake up and find these dishes in the cabinet!”

Beliefs (They are assumptions, theories, explanations, conclusions and states of mind)

Opinions (a person's ideas and thoughts towards something)

Attitudes aren't ....

Both influence behavior

Habits are routine behaviors that are performed without evaluation of the behaviors’ consequences or the behavior itself

Attitudes are persistent evaluations

Attitudes & Habits

Rick Mercer Rant

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Both are evaluations

Although, saying that somebody values the dishes being placed in the cabinet after they have been washed is similar with saying that somebody has a positive attitude of the dishes being placed in the cabinet after they have been washed

Values are ideal, desirable goals - more global/general than attitudes

Values can encompass several attitudes – i.e., one can have several attitudes towards certain values

Attitudes & Values

Rick Mercer Rant

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Beliefs are propositions about the attributes (“that car salesman”) of objects (e.g., “will say anything to make a sale”)

Beliefs are primarily cognitive – they do not generally lead directly to an action

Difficult to distinguish attitudes from beliefs when a belief ascribes a positive or negative attribute to an object

Attitudes & Beliefs