PY 372 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Garter Snake, Motivation, Cognitive Dissonance
Document Summary
Attitudes: attitude: an evaluation or judgement of liking, either positive or negative, of a person, object, event, etc. , that is manifested in our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors toward the attitude object three parts: the abcs of attitudes. Behavior - behavior causes attitudes and attitude causes behavior (two- directional) Attitude formation there are three views of how attitudes are accessed. Attitude functions: we form attitudes for a number of reasons: Utilitarian (instrumental) function categorize things as good or bad to know if we should stay away from them. Makes us feel better about ourselves and our lives. Put down things we don"t have and praise/focus on things we do have. Express our values to other people social-adjustive function. People like you more when you agree with them. Why don"t attitudes predict behavior? three potential causes of inconsistency: instability of attitudes/intentions intention-behavior incompatibility - measurement issue. Multidimensionality of attitudes: sometimes our attitudes can be overshadowed by social considerations, like norms.
