The idea is, choosing something that is in opposition to how you feel or believe in will increase cognitive dissonance. Moreover, integration of cognitive dissonance and current CBT models of OCD (Aardema & Wong, 2020; Doron & Kyrios, 2005; Doron et al., 2007) can organize a variety of findings and theoretical concepts in a coherent and unified way. In cognitive dissonance addiction conclusion, considering dissonance theory and the self-affirmation perspective in conjunction with contemporary CBT models of OCD may enhance psychological understanding and generate interesting implications for cognitive-behavioral conceptualization and treatment of OCD. Consistency in behavior is something humans also strive for (Festinger, 1957).
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In fact, recent research has suggested that while a discrepancy between cognitions drives individuals to crave attitude-consistent information, the experience of negative emotions drives individuals to avoid counter attitudinal information. In other words, it is the psychological discomfort that activates selective exposure as a dissonance-reduction strategy. This definition of meat-animal dissociation shares similarities with, and is facilitated by, other constructs and processes. Bastian and Loughnan (2017) convincingly argued that people rarely consciously reflect on the moral implications of eating meat because societal mechanisms keep people’s cognitive dissonance in place. People often partake in rituals and traditions without reflecting on their rationale or consequences.
- When faced with a deadline, you could even cut corners to accomplish a task, but then experience discomfort when it’s done because you value hard work.
- It is recommended that future research investigate the use of cognitive dissonance and Internet-based approaches in schools.
- However, if you were paid only a couple of dollars, you might have more trouble justifying your lie, and feel less comfortable about doing so.
- Therefore, changes are more likely to happen in an element that is less resistant or less important (Cooper, 2007).
- Unknown to the subjects, this new subject was actually a confederate (an actor) and part of the research team.
- When there is an inconsistency between attitudes or behaviors (dissonance), something must change to eliminate the dissonance.
Eating meat
Only participants in a condition involving high dissonance (expenditure of effort via exercise and choice in this type of effort) showed weight improvement relative to comparison conditions involving different approaches to weight control. When Festinger (1957) proposed cognitive dissonance theory, the behaviorist perspective and reinforcement theory (e.g., Skinner 1938) were influential in how theorists thought about human behavior. According to the behaviorist perspective, people are motivated to hold particular attitudes and behave in certain ways to gain positive reinforcement and avoid punishment. As such, a person would be more likely to have a positive attitude toward…
Control of: behavior, information, thought, emotion
Imagine confronting a sunbather with the information that excessive sun exposure is the leading cause of skin cancer. The two thoughts – ‘sunbathing can cause cancer’ and ‘I am sunbathing’ – will cause the discomfort of cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance can be caused by feeling forced to do something, learning new information, or when faced with a decision between two similar choices. Cognitive dissonance theory aims to explain the relationships between the motivation, perceptions and cognitions of an individual.
Changing Behavior
- The two most studied phases of cognitive dissonance in the organisational context were the cognitive discrepancy and the discrepancy reduction phase.
- In psychology, cognitive dissonance occurs when a person holds contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values, and is typically experienced as psychological stress when they participate in an action that goes against one or more of them.
- DBIs have been criticized on theoretical grounds for using a variety of mechanisms to produce outcome changes and not solely dissonance-induction techniques.
- It feels good knowing you’re able to uphold certain values, like the ones you learned from your parents and caregivers or the ones you’ve carved out for yourself based on your own personal experiences.
- In other words, it appears that participants reduced the dissonance they felt by deciding that they hadn’t lied when they said the study was enjoyable and that they really had liked the study.
- The theory behind this approach is that in order to resolve the dissonance, a person’s implicit beliefs about their body and thinness will change, reducing their desire to limit their food intake.
- In Darley and Latané’s cognitive model of helping, people consult social cues at each step of the process of noticing, interpreting, taking responsibility, deciding, and implementing help.
Individualism is discouraged and putting “God” or the group first is the norm (in this case, “God” often proves to be the leader). Prohibited or censured thoughts, feelings and activities (of self or others) must be reported to superiors. Where people live and with whom they can live is highly significant, because members of destructive cults violate the human right of free association by ordering or shaming members into ostracizing, shunning or disconnecting from non-believers. Festinger, [2–4] in his ground-breaking Cognitive Dissonance Theory described how beliefs have a cognitive, an affective, and a behavioral component. In his study and his book [3,4], Festinger infiltrated students into a UFO cult.
- It proposes that inconsistencies in a person’s cognition cause mental stress because psychological inconsistency interferes with the person’s functioning in the real world.
- Freedom of movement is often limited, and permission demanded before any visit to a non-member.
- This is often very difficult, as people frequently employ a variety of mental maneuvers.
- Festinger argued that cognitive dissonance is more intense when a person holds many dissonant views and those views are important to them.
- In addition, research that did not involve an elaboration likelihood explanation has been reinterpreted as revealing the role of this process.
- However, if two cognitions are relevant, but conflicting, the existence of dissonance would cause psychological discomfort and motivate the individual to act upon this.
- In conclusion, considering dissonance theory and the self-affirmation perspective in conjunction with contemporary CBT models of OCD may enhance psychological understanding and generate interesting implications for cognitive-behavioral conceptualization and treatment of OCD.
- Consistency between cognitions and actions is most common, but it is easy to find examples of inconsistent cognitions (Festinger, 1957).
- The mild initiation group did not invest as much to listen to the discussion, so when they found it to be boring they did not feel cheated.
- There are also individual differences in whether or not people act as this theory predicts.
- He might ease this feeling by telling himself that the health warning is exaggerated or, more productively, by deciding to take action to change his behavior.
- Koller and Salzberger (2007) developed an eight-item consumer behavior scale.
