Social Psychology: The Self, Attitudes, and Cognitive Dissonance

Comprehensive practice vocabulary flashcards covering the Self, Attitudes, Persuasion, and Cognitive Dissonance.

Self-Concept

How an individual thinks about and perceives themselves across affective (emotions/feelings), behavioral (knowledge of actions), and cognitive (beliefs about the self) dimensions.

Independent View of the Self

A self-construal common in Western cultures that emphasizes agency, personal success, and defining oneself in terms of one's own internal thoughts, feelings, and actions.

Interdependent View of the Self

A self-construal common in Eastern and Asian cultures that emphasizes group cohesion, interpersonal harmony, and defining oneself in terms of relationships to other people.

Relational Interdependence

A tendency to focus predominantly on close, dyadic personal relationships (such as with a friend, child, or partner) when defining oneself, more commonly observed in women.

Collective Interdependence

A tendency to focus predominantly on memberships in larger groups or social categories (such as being a sports fan or fraternity member) when defining oneself, more commonly observed in men.

Introspection

The conscious process of looking inward to examine one's own internal thoughts, feelings, and motives.

Causal Theories

Culturally transmitted theories about the causes of one's own feelings and behaviors that people use to explain their reactions, even when the true causes lie outside conscious awareness.

Reason-Generated Attitude Change

Attitude change resulting from consciously thinking about and generating reasons for one's attitudes, which often leads to decisions based on easily verbalized reasons rather than actual underlying feelings.

Self-Awareness Theory

The theory that focusing attention on oneself leads an individual to evaluate and compare their current behavior against internal standards and values.

Self-Perception Theory

The theory that when internal cues and feelings are ambiguous and behavior is freely chosen, people infer information about their own attitudes, motivations, and emotions by observing their own actions.

Intrinsic Motivation

The desire to engage in an activity because of personal enjoyment and inherent interest, rather than external rewards or pressures.

Extrinsic Motivation

The desire to engage in an activity due to external incentives, rewards, evaluation, or social pressures.

Over-Justification Effect

The tendency to overestimate the extent to which one's behavior is driven by extrinsic reasons and underestimate the role of intrinsic reasons.

Task-Contingent Rewards

Rewards given simply for performing or completing a task, regardless of how well or poorly the task is executed.

Performance-Contingent Rewards

Rewards based directly on how well an individual performs a task, which convey competence and are less likely to diminish intrinsic interest.

Fixed Mindset

The belief that people possess a predetermined, unalterable amount of ability or intelligence.

Growth Mindset

The belief that achievement and ability are malleable qualities developed through hard work, seeking new strategies, and incorporating input from others.

Two-Factor Theory of Emotion

The theory that emotional experience is a two-step process in which people first experience physiological arousal and then seek an appropriate cognitive label or attribution to explain it.

Facial-Feedback Hypothesis

The hypothesis that changes in facial muscle movements can trigger and bring about corresponding changes in experienced emotion.

Misattribution of Arousal

The process whereby people make mistaken inferences about the true source or cause of their physiological arousal.

Social Comparison Theory

Leon Festinger's theory stating that people evaluate their own abilities and opinions by comparing themselves to others, particularly in the absence of an objective benchmark.

Upward Social Comparison

Comparing oneself to individuals who are better or more skilled at a particular trait or ability, often used to determine an aspirational standard.

Downward Social Comparison

Comparing oneself to individuals who are worse or less skilled at a particular trait or ability, typically used to feel better about oneself and protect self-esteem.

Impression Management

The strategic attempt by individuals to influence and control how other people perceive them.

Ingratiation

An impression management technique involving the use of flattery, compliments, or praise to make oneself likable to another person, especially someone of higher status.

Self-Handicapping

The strategy of creating obstacles and excuses for oneself prior to a task so that failure can be attributed to external impediments rather than personal inability.

Behavioral Self-Handicapping

Actively creating real physical obstacles that reduce the likelihood of succeeding on a task (such as staying up all night partying before an exam) to provide an excuse for failure.

Reported Self-Handicapping

Devising verbal, ready-made excuses in advance (such as complaining of feeling ill or having an injury) to protect self-esteem if one performs poorly.

Self-Regulatory Resource Model

A theoretical model viewing self-control as a limited resource that is depleted after mental exertion (ego depletion) but rebounds in strength with rest and practice.

Implementation Intentions

Specific 'if-then' plans detailing precisely when, where, and how an individual will enact behaviors to achieve a goal and resist temptations.

Attitude

An association between an attitude object (a person, place, physical thing, or concept) and an evaluation that is expressed upon encountering that object.

Explicit Attitudes

Consciously endorsed, controllable, and self-reported evaluations that operate through controlled cognition.

Implicit Attitudes

Involuntary, uncontrollable, and at times unconscious evaluations operating via automatic cognition that are activated without deliberate thought.

Affectively Based Attitude

An attitude grounded primarily in emotions, sensory feelings, and core values rather than objective examination of attributes.

Cognitively Based Attitude

An attitude rooted in beliefs and objective thoughts about the factual properties, merits, and utilitarian features of an object.

Behaviorally Based Attitude

An attitude derived from observing one's own actions toward an attitude object, typically formed when initial internal evaluations are ambiguous.

Classical Conditioning

A learning process in which a stimulus that naturally elicits an emotional response is repeatedly paired with a neutral stimulus until the neutral stimulus evokes that emotional response on its own.

Operant Conditioning

A learning mechanism whereby freely chosen behaviors become more or less frequent depending on whether they are followed by reinforcement (rewards) or punishment.

Social Learning

The acquisition and formation of attitudes, prejudices, and beliefs through observing and modeling other individuals, such as parents, teachers, and peers.

Attitude Accessibility

The strength of the association between an attitude object and its evaluation, measured by how quickly and spontaneously the evaluation comes to mind.

Theory of Planned Behavior

A model stating that deliberate behaviors are best predicted by behavioral intentions, which are determined by attitudes toward the specific behavior, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control.

Yale Attitude Change Approach

A framework studying persuasive communication based on the components of 'who said what to whom': the source of the communication, the nature of the message, and the characteristics of the audience.

Sleeper Effect

A phenomenon in which a message from a low-credibility source becomes more persuasive over time because people remember the message content while forgetting the source.

Elaboration Likelihood Model

A persuasion model specifying two routes through which persuasive communications can cause attitude change—the central route and the peripheral route—depending on motivation and opportunity to elaborate.

Central Route to Persuasion

Persuasion that occurs when people have both the motivation and opportunity to pay close attention to, elaborate on, and critically evaluate the quality and logic of arguments, leading to durable attitude change.

Peripheral Route to Persuasion

Persuasion that occurs when people lack motivation or cognitive capacity to analyze arguments and are swayed by superficial, incidental cues, producing less durable attitude change.

Need for Cognition

A personality trait reflecting the extent to which an individual engages in and enjoys effortful, analytical cognitive activity.

Fear-Arousing Communication

A persuasive attempt designed to alter attitudes by inducing fear, which is most effective when it generates moderate fear and provides clear, actionable instructions on how to reduce it.

Reactance Theory

The theory that when people feel their freedom to perform a behavior is threatened, an unpleasant psychological state is aroused that they reduce by performing the restricted behavior.

Attitude Inoculation

The technique of immunizing people against persuasion attempts by initially exposing them to mild doses of opposing arguments so they can practice counter-arguing.

Subliminal Messages

Words, images, or stimuli presented below the conscious threshold of awareness that can occasionally influence attitudes and behaviors in controlled laboratory settings, though not in daily commercial advertising.

Cognitive Dissonance

An unpleasant state of psychological arousal, introduced by Leon Festinger (1957), resulting from holding contradictory cognitions or behaving inconsistently with one's attitudes, especially when threatening the self-concept.

Self-Esteem

An individual's overall evaluation of their self-worth, functioning as the affective component of the self.

Irrelevant Cognitions

Cognitions that bear no logical or functional relationship to one another.

Consonant Cognitions

Related cognitions that have consistent, mutually supportive implications.

Dissonant Cognitions

Related cognitions that contradict one another and have mutually incompatible implications, producing psychological distress.

Self-Affirmation

A dissonance-reduction strategy wherein an individual restores self-worth by emphasizing unrelated positive attributes or competencies following a threat to the self-concept.

Impact Bias

The tendency to overestimate the intensity and duration of future negative emotional reactions, occurring because individuals fail to anticipate the unconscious effectiveness of dissonance reduction.

Post-Decision Dissonance

Dissonance aroused after making a decision, typically resolved by enhancing the attractiveness of the chosen alternative and devaluing the unchosen option.

Justification of Effort

The tendency for individuals to increase their liking for something they have worked hard, suffered, or undergone severe initiation to achieve.

Counter-Attitudinal Advocacy

Publicly stating an opinion or stance that contradicts one's private beliefs, which results in internal attitude change when executed with little external justification.

Insufficient Justification

The absence of sufficient external incentive or reward for performing a counter-attitudinal behavior, which prompts individuals to alter their internal attitudes to justify their actions.

Insufficient Punishment

The dissonance aroused when an individual lacks adequate external justification for having resisted a forbidden activity, leading to internal devaluation of the forbidden object or behavior.

Self-Persuasion

A durable, long-lasting form of attitude change that results from internal self-justification rather than external pressure, threats, or rewards.

Ben Franklin Effect

The phenomenon whereby performing a favor for someone makes an individual like that person more, driven by dissonance reduction explaining why the favor was done.

Justifying Cruelty

A dissonance reduction process wherein individuals dehumanize, blame, or disparage victims of their own harmful acts to resolve the inconsistency between their cruel behavior and their view of themselves as decent and fair.