1
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
Chapter 6
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Chapter Outline
I. Introduction
• Consistency theories in general posit that the mind operates as an intermediary between
stimulus and response.
o These theories assert that when people receive information (a stimulus), their mind
organizes it into a pattern with other previously encountered stimuli.
o If the new stimulus does not fit the pattern or is inconsistent, then people feel
discomfort.
o In these cases, consistency theorists note that there is a lack of balance among
varying cognitions, or ways of knowing, beliefs, judgments, and so forth.
• Leon Festinger called this feeling of imbalance cognitive dissonance; the feeling people
have when they “find themselves doing things that don’t fit with what they know, or
having opinions that do not fit with other opinions they hold” (Festinger, 1957, p. 4).
o This concept forms the core of Festinger’s Cognitive Dissonance Theory (CDT), a
theory that argues that dissonance is an uncomfortable feeling that motivates people
to take steps to reduce it.
• Roger Brown (1965) notes, the basics of the theory follow rather simple principles: “A
state of cognitive dissonance is said to be a state of psychological discomfort or tension
which motivates efforts to achieve consonance.
o Dissonance is the name for a disequilibrium and consonance the name for an
equilibrium.
o Brown points out that the theory allows for two elements to have three different
relationships with each other.
▪ A consonant relationship exists between two elements when they are in
equilibrium with one another.
▪ A dissonant relationship means that elements are in disequilibrium with one
another.
▪ An irrelevant relationship exists when the elements imply nothing about one
another.
II. Assumptions of Cognitive Dissonance Theory
2
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
• CDT provides an explanation for how beliefs and behavior change attitudes.
o Its focus is on the effects of inconsistency among cognitions.
• Four assumptions basic to the theory include the following:
o Human beings desire consistency in their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors.
o Dissonance is created by psychological inconsistencies.
o Dissonance is an aversive state that drives people to actions with measurable effects.
o Dissonance motivates efforts to achieve consonance and efforts toward dissonance
reduction.
III. Concepts and Processes of Cognitive Dissonance
• As CDT developed over the years, certain concepts were refined and other concepts were
added.
A. Magnitude of Dissonance
• The first concept is magnitude of dissonance, which refers to the quantitative amount
of dissonance a person experiences.
• Magnitude of dissonance will determine actions people may take and cognitions they
may espouse to reduce the dissonance.
• Three factors influence the magnitude of dissonance a person will feel (Zimbardo,
Ebbesen, and Maslach, 1977).
o The degree of importance, or how significant the issue is, affects the degree of
dissonance felt.
o The amount of dissonance is affected by the dissonance ratio, or the amount of
dissonant cognitions relative to the amount of consonant cognitions.
o The magnitude of dissonance is affected by the rationale that an individual
summons to justify the inconsistency.
▪ The rationale refers to the reasoning employed to explain why an
inconsistency exists.
▪ The more reasons one has to account for the discrepancy, the less
dissonance one will feel.
B. Coping with Dissonance
• Although CDT explains that dissonance can be reduced through both behavioral and
attitudinal changes, most of the research has focused on the latter.
3
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
• Many ways to increase consistency are cognitively based, and the theory suggests
several methods people may use to reduce their dissonance.
o People could add or subtract cognitions to change the ratio of consonant to
dissonant cognitions.
o People might try to reduce the importance of the dissonant cognitions.
o People could seek out information that advocates conflict in relationships and
stresses the benefits of open communication between partners.
C. Cognitive Dissonance and Perception
• CDT relates to the processes of selective exposure, selective attention, selective
interpretation, and selective retention because the theory predicts that people will avoid
information that increases dissonance.
• Selective exposure, or seeking consistent information not already present, helps to
reduce dissonance.
o CDT predicts that people will avoid information that increases dissonance and
seek out information that is consistent with their attitudes and behavior.
• Selective attention refers to looking at consistent information once it is there.
o People attend to information in their environment that conforms to their attitudes
and beliefs while ignoring information that is inconsistent.
• Selective interpretation involves interpreting ambiguous information so that it
becomes consistent.
o Utilizing selective interpretation, most people interpret close friends’ attitudes as
more congruent with their own than is actually true (Berscheid and Walster,
1978).
• Selective retention refers to remembering and learning consistent information with
much greater ability than inconsistent information.
• Attitudes seem to organize memory in this selective retention process (Lingle and
Ostrom, 1981).
• Confirmatory bias is the tendency to confirm a preconception or interpretation of
phenomena.
D. Minimal Justification
• Minimal justification refers to offering only the minimum incentive required to get
someone to change.
• The experiment that Festinger and his colleague James Carlsmith performed that
established the principle of minimal justification is the now-famous $1/$20 study.
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
• Festinger and Carlsmith (1959) argued that doing something a person does not believe
in for a minimal reward sets up more dissonance than doing that same thing for a larger
reward.
IV. Cognitive Dissonance Theory and Persuasion
• Much of the research following from Festinger’s work focuses on persuasion, especially
with regard to decision making.
• Several studies examined buyer’s remorse, which refers to the dissonance people often
feel after deciding on a large purchase.
o Robert Wicklund and Jack. W. Brehm (1976) point out that5 when a decision is
irrevocable, as in a bet placed, people have to work quickly to reduce the inevitable
dissonance that results.
o Vani Simmons, Monica Webb, and Thomas Brandon (2004) studied whether
cognitive dissonance principles could help college students stop smoking.
▪ They found that intentions to quit smoking were increased by making the
videos as CDT would predict.
o Some researchers have observed the relationship of dissonance and communication
strategies in situations other than decision making.
▪ Patrice Buzzanell and Lynn Turner (2003) examined family communication in
families where the major wage earner had lost his or her job within the past 18
months.
▪ Buzzanell and Turner found that job loss did create feelings of dissonance in
most family members, and the researchers argued that family members reduced
their dissonance about job loss by using three strategies.
❖ Families adopted a tone of normalcy, telling the interviewers that nothing
had really changed after the job loss.
❖ Families deliberately foregrounded positive themes and backgrounded
negative ones.
❖ Families maintained gendered identity construction, working to assure
the man who had lost his job that he was still the man of the family.
V. Integration, Critique, and Closing
• While some writers contend that the theory is a great theoretical achievement in social
psychology (Barrett, 2017), most of the criticisms relate to the theory’s utility and
usefulness.
A. Utility
5
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
• One concern of CDT relates to critics’ complaints that the theory may not possess utility
because other theoretical frameworks can explain the attitude change found in the
$1/$20 experiment better than cognitive dissonance.
• Irving Janis and Robert Gilmore (1965) argue that when people participate in an
inconsistency, they become motivated to think up all the arguments in favor of the
position while suppressing all the arguments against it.
o Janis and Gilmore call this process biased scanning.
o This biased scanning should increase the chances of accepting the new position.
• Other researchers (Cooper and Fazio, 1984) argue that the original theory of cognitive
dissonance contains a great deal of “conceptual fuzziness.”
• Some researchers note that the concept of dissonance is confounded by self-concept or
impression management.
o Elliot Aronson (1969) argues that people wish to appear reasonable to themselves
and suggests that in Festinger and Carlsmith’s (1959) experiment, if “dissonance
exists, it is because the individual’s behavior is inconsistent with his or her self-
concept.” (p. 27)
• Self-perception simply means that people make conclusions about their own attitudes
the same way others do—by observing their behavior.
• In Daryl Bem’s (1967) conceptualization, it is not necessary to speculate about the
degree of cognitive dissonance that a person feels.
• Claude Steele and his colleagues (Steele, 1988, 2012; Steele, Spencer, & Lynch 1993)
argue that dissonance is the result of behaving in a manner that threatens one’s sense of
moral integrity.
• Other scholars believe that CDT is basically useful and explanatory but needs some
refinements.
o Wicklund and Brehm (1976) argue that CDT is not clear enough about the
conditions under which dissonance leads to change in attitudes.
▪ They believe that choice is the missing concept in the theory.
▪ They posit that when people believe they have a choice about the dissonant
relationship, they will be motivated to change that relationship.
▪ If people think they are powerless, they will not be bothered by the
dissonance, and they probably will not change.
• Joel Cooper and Jeff Stone (2000) believe that group membership plays an important
role in how people experience and reduce dissonance.
o For example, they found that social identity derived from religious and political
groups had an impact on how people responded to dissonance.
• Other critics not that CDT is not as useful as it should be because it does not provide a
full explanation for how and when people will attempt to reduce dissonance.
6
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
o There is what has been called the “multiple mode” problem.
▪ This problem exists because, given a dissonance-producing situation, there
are multiple ways to reduce the dissonance.
B. Testability
• Testability refers to the theory’s likelihood of ever being proven false.
o Researchers have pointed out that because CDT asserts that dissonance will
motivate people to act, when people do not act, proponents of the theory can say
that the dissonance must not have been strong enough, rather than concluding that
the theory is wrong.
o In this way it is difficult to disprove the theory.
• Although CDT has its shortcomings, it does offer insight into the relationship among
attitudes, cognitions, affect, and behaviors, and it does suggest routes to attitude change
and persuasion.
o Social cognition researchers as well as communication scholars continue to use
many of the ideas from CDT.
Classroom Activities
1. Reducing Cognitive Dissonance
Objective: To encourage students to apply strategies to reduce cognitive dissonance
Materials: Opening case study from Chapter 6
2. Identifying Dissonance
Objective: To assist students in applying the principles of Cognitive Dissonance Theory
(CDT) to their lives
7
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
Materials: None
Directions:
a. Have students identify two of their own cognitions (attitudes, behaviors, beliefs) that
have a consonant relationship, two that have a dissonant relationship, and two that
have an irrelevant relationship.
b. Once they have their lists, have students focus on the dissonant relationship. Ask
them to analyze their dissonant cognitions by charting the magnitude of the
dissonance (importance, dissonance ratio, and rationale).
c. Have students answer the following question: How do (did) they cope with the
dissonance?
3. Testing the Untestable
Objective: To have students examine one of the criticisms of CDT while developing their
understanding of the concepts and challenges of research methodology
Materials: None
Directions:
a. Upon completion of the critique of CDT, ask students to examine critics’ claim that
CDT is not easily tested.
b. Either as a class or as individuals, invite students to brainstorm possible experiments
that could be used to test CDT.
c. As a moderator, ask students to share their studies and discuss whether these methods
may isolate dissonance as the precipitating factor in facilitating cognitive change.
4. Cognitive Dissonance and The Simpsons
Objective: To help students visualize and apply the major concepts from CDT (Note: This
activity can be used to review the concepts from both this theory and Symbolic Interaction
Theory.)
Materials: Episode 3G02 of The Simpsons, “Lisa’s Sax” (from Season Nine)
Directions:
8
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
a. Briefly review the theory’s major concepts, and ask students to look for examples of
these concepts, as well as any behaviors that seem inconsistent with the theory, while
watching the episode.
b. Show the episode, encouraging students to jot down notes as they watch.
c. Engage the class in a discussion of the following issues/topics, encouraging students
to use vocabulary from the theory and its framework in order to make sense of what
they saw. The following questions may be provided on a worksheet if desired.
• What examples of dissonance do we see in this episode (e.g., Marge feels
dissonance because Lisa is gifted, but they are not doing anything to support
her, no other efforts are being made, and it is not easy to explain away the fact
they are not doing anything to support Lisa; etc.)?
• What efforts are made to reduce dissonance (e.g., Homer and Marge begin
looking for ways to support Lisa’s potential; Bart decides that he does not care
what the school authorities think about him and thereby reduces the importance
of that cognition; etc.)?
• How might the various types of selective perception factor into these efforts to
reduce dissonance (e.g., Bart exercises selective exposure and attention by
focusing more on his schoolmates’ approval of his misbehavior than on the
school authorities’ disapproval of it; etc.)?
5. The Selection Process
Objective: To encourage students to examine communication using the selection process
Materials: “The Selection Process” worksheet (see below)
Directions:
a. Have students complete the selection process worksheet.
b. In small groups, have students discuss their worksheets. Challenge groups to
compare and contrast their lists and to draw some general conclusions about the
selection process.
c. Engage the class in a discussion about the general conclusions of each group.
9
Chapter 6: Cognitive Dissonance Theory
West, Introducing Communication Theory, 6e
“The Selection Process” Worksheet
Directions: First, write a definition for each of the concepts listed below. Then think of a
communication encounter where you employed that particular aspect of the selection process.
Think of a different illustration for each concept (don’t use one scenario to examine all four). Be
as specific as you can with your examples, and be prepared to share them with your classmates.
It should be clear how and why your example illustrates that particular concept.
Concept Definition
Communication Encounter Example
Selective Exposure
Selective Attention
Selective Interpretation
Selective Retention