Psychology 2070A/B Lecture Notes - Safe Sex, Parenting Styles, Ridicule

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 2070A/B
• Professor: Kelly Olson

Document Summary

Attitudes always have a target - may be broad, almost an infinite number of targets. Three parts of attitudes: affective/emotional reactions, ex. Cockroaches make you feel sick because they are disgusting: cognitive information, ex. Remembering that you"ve killed them in the past so obviously if you remember killing them, you"ll conclude that you dislike them. Ambivalent attitudes - evaluations of targets that include both positive and negative elements - an unpleasant experience: ex. Chocolate cake - positive feelings, yummyyy - negative beliefs, fattttt: ex. Susan"s jokes - make you laugh - but she can be an idiot so no. Ambivalent attitudes can lead to different behaviour over time because either the positive or the negative elements about the target may come to mind at a particular point, and whichever element is dominant will drive behaviour. Low ambivalence = no variable responses - you either love it or hate it, like cockroaches.