Social Psychology 2
Attitudes
• Attitude – learned tendency to evaluate some object, person or issue in a particular way– Can you predict behavior from attitude?
Sometimes our behavior is different than our attitude…
Sometimes our behavior influences our attitude…
Attitudes are made up of…
• 1. Cognitive component - beliefs, thoughts, ideas about the attitude object
• 2. Behavior component - predisposition to behave ina particular way
• 3. Emotional component - feelings and emotions about the attitude object
Attitudes have a strong impact on behavior when…
• (1) outside influences on what we say and do are minimal
• (2) the attitude is specifically relevant to the behavior, and
• (3) we are keenly aware of our attitudes.
Foot in the door phenomenon
• the tendency for people who agree to a small request to comply later with a larger one.
Cognitive dissonance theory
• Leon Festinger• people feel discomfort when their actions
conflict with their feelings and beliefs; they reduce the discomfort by bringing their attitudes more in line with their actions.
When do attitudes influence behavior?
• attitude specificity - very focused => influences behavior
• attitude strength - stronger => more influence on behavior
• attitude relevance - extent to which attitudes objects actually have an effect on the life of the person holding various attitudes - vested interest Ex. campaign against raising drinking age
Prejudice
• Prejudice: A negative attitude toward people who belong to a specific social group while stereotypes are clusters of characteristics that are attributed to people who belong to specific social categories
• - person perception + attribution + attitudes => explain prejudice
People have a strong tendency to see people as:
• In group - a social group to which one belongs• Out group - a social group to which one does not belong• Out-group homogeneity effect - the tendency to see
members of out-groups as very similar to one another• In group bias - tendency to judge the behavior of in-group
members favorably and out-group members unfavorablyWe succeeded because we worked hard, they succeeded
because they lucked out
Prejudice has an • emotional component - hatred, contempt,
fear• behavioral component - discrimination -
privately sneering at, physically attacking
• authoritarian personality - obedient toward their superiors and domineering toward subordinates,
• - projection - unwilling to accept own faults but willing to place them on members of other groups
• - ethnocentrism- favoring own groups, prejudiced against other groups
People with low self-esteem, weren’t allowed to talk back to parents - channeled toward others
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