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Ch 4 - Behavior and Attitudes. Part 1: Feb 7. Attitudes. Favorable/unfavorable evaluation of an object. 3 dimensions of attitudes: Affective (feelings) Behavior (actions) Cognition (thoughts) How do attitudes develop?. Attitude Formation. Most social psych believe attitudes are learned
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Ch 4 - Behavior and Attitudes Part 1: Feb 7
Attitudes • Favorable/unfavorable evaluation of an object. • 3 dimensions of attitudes: • Affective (feelings) • Behavior (actions) • Cognition (thoughts) • How do attitudes develop?
Attitude Formation • Most social psych believe attitudes are learned • 1) Social learning – via interactions w/others • Classical conditioning – learning based on association (example?) • Observational learning – modeling • 2) Genetic factors may play a small role • Evidence of this from twin studies • How might this depend on the attitude?
Attitude - Behavior Link • Early history - assumed attitudes determined our behaviors • Example? • LaPiere’s study (1934) was first to question the attitude-behavior link • What were the study’s results? • In 60’s, Festinger suggested behavior may determine attitudes, rather than att beh • What does this imply?
1970’s attitude research • ‘Crisis of Confidence’ in attitude research • What was the crisis? • Better experimental control in 70’s: • Jones’ “Bogus Pipeline”… • How did this experimental procedure work? • What were the results of these studies?
The 70’s continued... • Fishbein & Ajzen - principle of aggregation • Attitude measures more effective if average over many behaviors. • Better track record than predicting a single behavior. • Example?
Level of Specificity (cont). • They also emphasized matching the level of measurement. • Specific attitude --> specific behavior • Bad example of specificity match? • Good example of specificity match? • In Fishbein & Ajzen’s model what is the best predictor of a behavior?
Automaticity • Sometimes behavior becomes automatic and we don’t think about our attitudes. • Can improve attitude - behavior link by forcing us to think about attitudes before acting. • Experiment with self-awareness (mirrors) • What were the results?
Direct Experience • Direct experience with behavior strengthens an attitude. • Crano’s (82) study - 1978 ballot to change drinking age in Mich from 18 to 21. • What did he measure? • What did he find?
Main Principles for when Attitudes Behavior • When external influences are minimal (reduce social influences or constraints) • When attitude is specific & used to predict specific behavior (level of specificity) • When we’re made to be self-conscious of attitudes (automaticity) • When we’re directly affected by an event
Role Playing • More evidence that behaviors partly determine attitudes. • Role - a set of norms that define how we should act when in a certain position. • The Stanford Prison Experiment - a famous social psych experiment. • 1971, Dr. Phil Zimbardo. • www.prisonexp.org
Stanford Prison Experiment • Aims - study “prison life” - 2 wk study. • Simulated prison environment in basement of Psych Dept at Stanford. • Recruited “normal” male students from ad in paper. No idea what was to happen. • Random assignment to ‘guard’ or ‘prisoner’
Stanford Prison Experiment • How did the experimenters set up anonymity for the prisoners? • How did the experimenters make the guards anonymous?
Stanford Prison Experiment • How were prisoners’ behaviors influenced? • How were guards’ behaviors influenced? • External sources during the experiment? • What were some results?
Stanford Prison Experiment • How did the experiment end? • Ethics of this experiment? • What is Zimbardo’s view of this? • What does it teach us about the power of roles?