Attitudes and Cognitive Dissonance Notes

Internship A: Xsoftworks Inc. requires $15$ hours a week, with at least $10$ hours on-site and $5$ hours optional work from home for approximately $\$1,200$ a month.
Internship B: Vandalay Industries requires $15$ hours a week on-site for approximately $\$800$ a month.
Discussion Prompt: Which internship would you enjoy more, assuming all other factors are equal?

Definition: An unpleasant state arising when an individual recognizes inconsistency between their actions and their attitudes or beliefs.
Mechanism: 1. Witness inconsistency between thoughts and actions. 2. Inconsistency creates unpleasant emotion. 3. Resolution of inconsistency to eliminate the emotion.
Conditions for Dissonance: - Behavior was freely chosen. - Behavior was not sufficiently justified. - Behavior had predictable negative consequences.

Options for Reducing Dissonance: Change behavior, change attitudes, rationalization, or self-affirmation.
Rationalization: Occurs both before a decision (rationalizing negatives) and after a decision (rationalizing consequences).
Effort Justification: The tendency to justify time, effort, or money devoted to something that proved unpleasant or disappointing (e.g., car ownership, parenthood).
Self-Affirmation: Focusing on a different, strong self-aspect or self-schema to bolster one area of self-image while tolerating a hit to another.

Induced (Forced) Compliance: Compelling someone to behave inconsistently with their beliefs. Humans often act as if they wanted to do it all along.
Festinger and Carlsmith ( $1959$ ): Research suggesting that changing attitudes is most effective when using the smallest amount of incentive or coercion necessary.
Incentive Rule: A substantial reward will not change the underlying attitude, whereas a barely sufficient reward has a better chance of doing so.
Extinguishing Behavior: "The Forbidden Toy" study: - Severe Punishment: Involved being "very angry" and taking all toys away; did not change the rating of the toy. - Mild Punishment: Involved being "very annoyed"; resulted in participants liking the toy significantly less.

Concept: Attitudes are inferred via behavior rather than introspection; there is no real unpleasant state of arousal.
Comparison with Cognitive Dissonance: - Cognitive Dissonance: Used when behavior conflicts with strong, pre-existing attitudes; involves tension/arousal. - Self-Perception: Used when attitudes are weak or non-existent; involves no arousal.

Icebreaker: What would constitute a "perfect" day for you?
Scenario Analysis: Tiffiny, a hardworking tennis player, parties the night before a match instead of practicing and subsequently loses. How could Tiffiny resolve this dissonance?
Discussion Question: When else do you think cognitive dissonance happens?