Chapter 6: Attitudes and Persuasion

These flashcards cover key concepts from Chapter 6 on attitudes and persuasion, summarizing definitions and important theories related to how attitudes form, influence behavior, and can be changed.

Attitudes

Inner evaluations or judgments toward something or someone.

Attitude object

The specific idea or thing that we evaluate when forming an attitude.

Univalenced decisions

Decisions that involve a single choice, such as a 'Yes or No' or 'Good or Bad' response.

Behavioral genetics

The study of how nature and nurture interact to influence behavior and attitudes.

Assortative mating

The tendency of similar organisms to mate with each other.

Twin studies

Research methods used to explore the genetic inheritance of attitudes by comparing twins.

Social learning

A process by which individuals learn attitudes through observing others.

Classical conditioning

A learning process that creates associations between stimuli and responses.

Operant conditioning

A method of learning that occurs through rewards and punishments.

Explicit attitudes

Attitudes that are expressed directly and measured through self-report.

Implicit attitudes

Attitudes that are indirectly assessed and may not be consciously recognized by individuals.

Bogus pipeline

A fake lie detector used to encourage honest reporting of attitudes.

Implicit Association Test (IAT)

A test used to indirectly measure attitudes and mental associations through categorization tasks.

Specificity principle

The concept that the connection between attitudes and behaviors is stronger when they are measured at the same level of specificity.

Self-perception theory

The theory suggesting that individuals infer their attitudes from observing their behaviors.

Cognitive dissonance

The psychological discomfort experienced when holding conflicting beliefs or behaviors.

Paths to persuasion

Strategies used to change attitudes, emphasizing the importance of message structure.

Direct persuasion techniques

Manipulative strategies aimed at changing attitudes, such as lowball and foot-in-the-door techniques.

Norm of reciprocity

The social expectation that favors should be reciprocated.

Door-in-the-face technique

A persuasion strategy that involves making a large request followed by a smaller, more reasonable request.

Not-so-free samples

Offering free samples with the expectation of a purchase or favor in return.