CF

Cognitive Dissonance Theory — Comprehensive Study Notes (Notes Only)

Core Concepts of Cognitive Dissonance Theory

  • Cognitive dissonance arises when there is inconsistency between cognitions (elements of knowledge) that are relevant to each other.
    • Relevant cognitions can be either consonant (one follows from the other) or dissonant (the obverse of one cognition follows from the other).
    • Irrelevant cognitions do not trigger dissonance.
  • Dissonance is a psychologically uncomfortable state that motivates efforts to reduce the dissonance.
  • Magnitude of dissonance depends on the balance of consonant and dissonant cognitions.
    • Formal expression (dissonance ratio):

      ext{Dissonance magnitude} \,=\frac{D}{C+D}

      where
    • $D$ = number of dissonant cognitions
    • $C$ = number of consonant cognitions
    • As the number or importance of dissonant cognitions increases, dissonance increases. As the number or importance of consonant cognitions increases, dissonance decreases.
  • Dissonance can be reduced by one or more of the following strategies:
    • Remove dissonant cognitions (e.g., stop the dissonant behavior or reconsider the dissonant belief).
    • Add new consonant cognitions (justify the behavior by adding favorable beliefs).
    • Reduce the importance of dissonant cognitions (devalue their importance).
    • Increase the importance of consonant cognitions (bolster the value of supporting cognitions).
  • The likelihood that a cognition will change to reduce dissonance is determined by resistance to change of that cognition.
    • Resistance to change depends on:
    • Responsiveness of the cognition to reality.
    • The extent to which the cognition is consonant with many other cognitions.
    • For behavioral cognitions, resistance to change also depends on the pain or loss entailed and the satisfaction obtained from the behavior.
  • Classic illustrative example (Festinger, 1957): habitual smoker learns that smoking is bad for health and experiences dissonance because the belief (smoking harms health) is inconsistent with the behavior (continuing to smoke).
    • Reduction options include: stop smoking (consonant with the health belief); change the belief about smoking’s health effects; add positive effects of smoking (e.g., tension relief, weight control); or reduce the importance of the health risk.
  • Since Festinger’s original work, cognitive dissonance theory has generated extensive research, revisions, and controversy due to its abstract formulation and wide applicability across cognition, motivation, and emotion.

An Introduction to Dissonance Theory: Multiple Cognitions and Topics

  • A person can hold cognitions about behaviors, perceptions, attitudes, beliefs, and feelings; cognitions can concern the self, other people or groups, or the environment.
  • The theory is highly general and applicable to many topics, enabling broad exploration of cognition-motivation-emotion interactions.

Research Paradigms in Dissonance Research

  • The Free-Choice Paradigm
    • After a difficult decision between close alternatives, dissonance arises because negative aspects of the chosen option and positive aspects of the rejected option are dissonant with the decision.
    • Positive aspects of the chosen option and negative aspects of the rejected option are consonant with the decision.
    • Prediction: more dissonance (and more dissonance reduction) after difficult decisions than easy ones.
    • Reduction via: removing negative aspects of the chosen option, removing positive aspects of the rejected option, adding positive aspects to the chosen option, or adding negative aspects to the rejected option.
    • Outcome: spreading of alternatives – the chosen option is rated more desirable and the rejected option less desirable after choice.
    • Foundational study: J. W. Brehm (1956) using eight products; later replications continue to use free-choice paradigms.
  • The Belief-Disconfirmation Paradigm
    • Dissonance arises when people are exposed to information inconsistent with their beliefs.
    • If dissonance is not reduced by changing the belief, it can lead to misperception, rejection, seeking support, and attempting to persuade others.
    • Classic study: Festinger, Riecken, & Schachter (1956) on a flood prophecy maintained by a group after the prophecy failed; belief-disconfirmation led to intensified proselytizing.
  • The Effort-Justification Paradigm
    • Dissonance is aroused when an unpleasant effort is required to obtain a desirable outcome.
    • Greater dissonance with greater unpleasant effort.
    • Reduction may involve exaggerating the desirability of the outcome (adding consonant cognitions).
  • The Induced-Compliance Paradigm (Forced-Compliance)
    • Dissonance arises when a person does or says something contrary to a prior belief or attitude, and inducements (rewards or punishments) create consonant cognitions justifying the behavior.
    • The smaller the reward for saying something counter to one’s belief, the greater the attitude change toward that counter-attitudinal statement (negative-incentive effect).
    • Original landmark study: Festinger & Carlsmith (1959) – participants performed boring tasks and were paid $1 or $20 to tell another person that the tasks were enjoyable; those paid $1 showed greater attitude change toward the activity than those paid $20 or those with no instruction to persuade.
    • Choice influences: higher perceived freedom to choose leads to greater dissonance under induced-compliance; lower choice yields less dissonance because the counterattitudinal behavior is more justifiable.
    • Related paradigms: forbidden-toy paradigm (threat of punishment) and variations exploring choice and justification.
  • The Forbidden-Toy Paradigm
    • A variant of induced compliance using threat of punishment rather than reward.
    • Children threatened with mild punishment for playing with an attractive toy later evaluate the toy less positively than those threatened with severe punishment.
  • Other Paradigms
    • In early studies, Mills (1958) examined honesty vs. cheating and found attitude changes consistent with dissonance theory after honest behavior was performed.
    • Contemporary work also explores dissonance in real-world moral concerns (e.g., meat consumption, animal welfare) and related processes such as motivated forgetting.
    • Meat-eating studies show reduced moral concern for animals after meat consumption, consistent with reducing dissonance via changes in moral judgments.

Alternative Accounts of Dissonance Phenomena

  • Self-Perception Theory (Bem, 1967, 1972)
    • Argues that dissonance effects are not motivated by the need to reduce discomfort but are inferred from behavior and context.
    • Explains negative-incentive effects as attitudes formed from behavior when external cues are not seen as controlling; if cues are perceived as controlling, attitude change may not occur.
    • Misattribution paradigm: Zanna & Cooper (1974) showed that misattributing arousal (tenseness) to a pill can prevent attitude change, supporting the misattribution idea and challenging pure dissonance explanations.
  • Impression-Management Theory (Tedeschi, Schlenker, & Bonoma, 1971)
    • Attitude changes may reflect attempts to manage others’ impressions rather than genuine attitude change.
    • Dissonance processes still yield genuine cognitive changes in many studies (e.g., private measures, observer-blinded assessments), challenging the idea that changes are only impression-management artifacts.
  • Empirical Challenges to Self-Perception Theory
    • Evidence showing physiological arousal and psychological discomfort accompanying dissonance, along with cognitive changes that follow rather than mere self-perception, suggests that self-perception alone cannot explain all dissonance effects.
  • Integration and Limitations
    • The self-consistency and self-affirmation accounts, among others, have contributed to a richer understanding of how the self, responsibility, and affect influence dissonance.
    • Some findings show dissonance effects across species (e.g., nonhuman animals), indicating that metacognitive self-representation is not strictly necessary.

Culture, Society, and Cross-Cultural Considerations

  • Early cross-cultural findings suggested cultural moderation of dissonance reduction (Heine & Lehman, 1997): immigrants from Japan/China showed less spreading of alternatives than Canadians, leading to the claim that dissonance effects might be culturally constructed.
  • Cultural differences are interpreted through the lens of individualism vs collectivism (Markus & Kitayama, 1991):
    • Collectivistic cultures emphasize social roles and relationships; internal attributes (attitudes) may be less central than situational factors.
    • Individualistic cultures emphasize internal attributes; attitudes may be more central to self.
  • Later work shows that dissonance reduction occurs across cultures, but the triggers and reductions can be moderated by culture and context:
    • Some Asian samples (e.g., Japanese, Chinese) show substantial spreading of alternatives in certain contexts (Izuma et al., 2010; Qin et al., 2011).
    • Studies indicate cultural and situational variables can influence arousal and strategies of reduction, but dissonance processes are not solely culturally constructed.
  • Cross-cultural work also includes observations that perspective-taking and social context can shape discrepancy reduction (e.g., Japanese viewing counterattitudinal behavior from others’ perspectives; Asian Canadians vs European Canadians differences in self vs friend decisions).
  • Broad conclusion: dissonance processes occur broadly across cultures, with modulation by cultural norms, social roles, and context; however, core mechanisms of dissonance and consequent attitude change appear robust across species and contexts.

Methodological Considerations and Debates

  • Early concerns about methods (Chapanis & Chapanis, 1964) were addressed; later criticisms focused on whether spreading of alternatives could be attributed to measurement artifacts.
  • Chen & Risen (2010) argued that spreading of alternatives could be explained by measurement error in predecision attitudes or by the choice itself biased by preexisting preferences (i.e., the decision process affects post-decision ratings).
    • They conducted art-print experiments to test whether predecision attitudes were sufficiently varied to produce postdecision spread; results suggested that measurement error and other factors could contribute, though not necessarily account for all dissonance effects.
  • Subsequent work has identified design features that increase potential measurement error (e.g., many ratings, many decisions, rushing participants) and contrasted them with classic designs (fewer options, single decision, longer evaluation times).
  • The debate has led to methodological refinements and more robust demonstrations of dissonance effects under various paradigms, including “blind choice” (decisions made without seeing decision options) which still yields spreading of alternatives, supporting dissonance as a robust phenomenon.
  • A consensus emerged that methodological criticisms have been addressed to a degree, though no single criticism fully negates the theory; rather, they prompted improvements and clarifications.

Revisions and Extensions of Dissonance Theory

  • Self-Consistency (Aronson, 1968, 1992)
    • Emphasizes inconsistency between self-concept and behavior (e.g., lying while viewing oneself as moral).
    • This revision spurred new paradigms focusing on self-relevant cognitions and the role of the self in dissonance processes.
  • The New Look (Cooper & Fazio, 1984)
    • Suggests that dissonance arises from feeling personally responsible for producing aversive consequences; the focus is on responsibility rather than mere inconsistency.
    • This revision stimulated research on arousal and the conditions under which aversive outcomes are produced or anticipated.
  • Self-Affirmation Theory (Steele, 1988; Steele et al., 1993)
    • Proposes that dissonance effects reflect threats to one’s sense of integrity; attitudinal change can be reduced by self-affirmation in other domains.
    • This revision explores when self-affirmation decreases or increases discrepancy reduction and has generated substantial empirical work (e.g., Aronson, Cohen, Nail).
  • Original Version Reaffirmed and Integration Attempts
    • Some theorists argue that Festinger’s original formulation remains viable and should be integrated with revisions.
    • Proposals like the Action-Based Model attempt to preserve core dissonance principles while linking them to action control and goal-directed behavior.
  • The Action-Based Model (Harmon-Jones and colleagues, 1999; 2009; 2015)
    • Cognitions with action implications that conflict produce dissonance because they impede effective action.
    • The model emphasizes that dissonance is most likely when a commitment to a course of action is strong and information conflicts with that commitment.
    • It links dissonance to neural and motivational processes and to left-frontal cortical activation associated with dissonance reduction in some experiments.
  • Integrative perspective
    • Different revisions highlight distinct mechanisms (self-concept, responsibility, self-affirmation, action implications).
    • An integrative view posits that cognition representations can range from concrete (e.g., “my index finger pressed the key”) to abstract (e.g., “I am writing this article to fulfill a need for competence”).
    • Dissonance can arise from discrepancies at both concrete and abstract levels, with potentially different affective and motivational consequences.

The Present Volume: Structure and Highlights

  • The second edition expands on Festinger’s original theory with new extensions and connections to broader motivational processes.
  • Key additions include:
    • A detailed action-based model (Chapter 4) and connections to other motivational processes (Chapter 6).
    • A focus on how cognitive consistency relates to information processing (Chapter 5).
    • Mathematical modeling (Chapter 10) and neural correlates (Chapter 11).
    • Attitude change measures and affective measures (Chapter 12).
  • The volume groups chapters into three parts:
    • Part One: Perspectives Using the Original Version of the Theory
    • Mills (Chapter 2) offers improvements to the original theory, including redefinitions and new paradigms.
    • Beauvois & Joule (Chapter 3) present radical dissonance theory focusing on rationalization rather than cognitive consistency.
    • Harmon-Jones & Harmon-Jones (Chapter 4) present the action-based model as a challenger to the “new look” and other revisions.
    • Gawronski & Brannon (Chapter 5) argue for cognitive consistency as a broad information-processing principle.
    • McGregor, Newby-Clark, & Zanna (Chapter 6) examine ambivalence and discrepancy detection.
    • Part Two: The Role of the Self in Dissonance
    • Aronson (Chapter 7): Self-consistency interpretation and hypocrisy paradigm; aversive consequences are not essential.
    • Aronson, Cohen, & Nail (Chapter 8): Self-affirmation reformulation and its implications.
    • Cooper (Chapter 9): The New Look and its implications for the self in dissonance processes.
    • Part Three: Mathematical Models, Neural Activations, and Affective Responses
    • Read & Monroe (Chapter 10): A connectionist mathematical model of dissonance processes.
    • Izuma & Murayama (Chapter 11): Neural correlates of cognitive dissonance and choice-induced preference changes.
    • Devine et al. (Chapter 12): Attitude change is not the sole informative measure; incorporate self-reported affect.
  • The editors emphasize that authors present their own views and that disagreement is expected and productive for advancing theory.

Implications, Applications, and Future Directions

  • The theory has broad explanatory power across topics involving cognition, motivation, and emotion.
  • It provides a framework for understanding how people manage cognitive inconsistency and how this management affects attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors.
  • Cross-cultural research highlights the role of social context, norms, and self-construals in how dissonance is experienced and reduced.
  • The integration of cognitive, affective, neural, and behavioral data continues to refine our understanding of when and why dissonance reduction occurs and which pathways (consonant/ dissonant cognitions) are most influential in different domains.
  • Methodological debates have strengthened the field by clarifying the conditions under which dissonance can be observed, measured, and interpreted.

Key References (selected from the transcript)

  • Festinger, L. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance.
  • Festinger, L., Carlsmith, J. M. (1959). Cognitive consequences of forced compliance.
  • Brehm, J. W. (1956). Postdecision changes in the desirability of alternatives.
  • Zanna, M. P., Cooper, J. (1974). Dissonance and the pill: An attribution approach to studying arousal properties of dissonance.
  • Aronson, E. (1968, 1992). Dissonance theory and self-consistency views.
  • Cooper, J., Fazio, R. H. (1984). A new look at dissonance theory.
  • Steele, C. M. (1988); Steele, S. J., & Lynch, M. (1993). Self-affirmation and dissonance.
  • Harmon-Jones, E. (1999, 2000a, 2000b, 2017); Harmon-Jones & Harmon-Jones (various chapters).
  • Heine, S. J., & Lehman, D. R. (1997). Culture, dissonance, and self-affirmation.
  • Izuma, K., Murayama, K., et al. (2010). Neural correlates of cognitive dissonance.
  • Chen, M. K., & Risen, J. L. (2010). How choice affects and reflects preferences: Revisiting the free-choice paradigm.
  • Read, S. J., & Monroe, B. M. (Chapter 10). Mathematical models of dissonance.
  • Egan, L. C., Bloom, P., & Santos, L. R. (2010); Egan, S. & colleagues (2010s). Dissonance across species.

Quick reference: Core formulas and terms

  • Dissonance magnitude (dissonance ratio):
    ext{Dissonance magnitude} = rac{D}{C+D}
    where $D$ = number of dissonant cognitions and $C$ = number of consonant cognitions.
  • Spreading of alternatives: after a difficult choice, the chosen option’s desirability increases while the rejected option’s desirability decreases.
  • Negative-incentive effect: greater attitude change when the counterattitudinal behavior is rewarded with a smaller payoff rather than a larger one (e.g., $1$ vs $20$ dollars).
  • Key paradigms to know for exams:
    • Free-Choice Paradigm
    • Belief-Disconfirmation Paradigm
    • Effort-Justification Paradigm
    • Induced-Compliance Paradigm
    • Forbidden-Toy Paradigm
    • Additional paradigms: honesty/cheating, meat eating

Notes for exam preparation

  • Be able to define consonant vs dissonant cognitions and explain how their balance affects dissonance magnitude.
  • Explain at least three strategies for reducing dissonance and provide a concrete example for each.
  • Describe the Free-Choice paradigm and how spreading of alternatives supports dissonance theory.
  • Summarize the major alternative accounts (Self-Perception Theory, Impression-Management Theory, Misattribution) and how empirical findings support or challenge each.
  • Discuss cultural considerations in dissonance research and the major findings (Heine & Lehman; Izuma et al.; Kitayama et al.).
  • Identify the main revisions to Festinger’s original theory and describe how the Action-Based Model differs from the New Look and Self-Consistency theories.
  • Understand the methodological critiques (Chen & Risen) and how subsequent work addressed them.
  • Recognize how the three-part structure of the volume frames current research: original theory perspectives, self-focused revisions, and mathematical/neural/affective integrations.