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CHAPTER 2: ATTITUDES – DEFINITION AND STRUCTURE
Chapter objectives
This chapter introduces the concept of attitude as it relates to persuasion along with an
explanation of beliefs and values. Students should come away with an understanding of the
structure of attitudes and how people process information.
Terms and issues to know
Accessibility
Ambivalence
Assimilation and contrast
Attitude (concept & definition)
Attitude object
Balance theory
Expectancy-value theory of attitude structure
Implicit attitude
Latitudes of acceptance, rejection, and noncommitment
Psychology of strong attitudes
Resolving cognitive conflict (denial, bolstering, differentiation, transcendence)
Chapter outline
I. Concept of Attitude
A. Attitude is a psychological construct
B. Attitudes are never directly observed
C. Scholars define attitude as:
2. A psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity with
some degree of favor or disfavor (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993, p. 1) or
4. A more or less permanently enduring state of readiness of mental organization which
predisposes an individual to react in a characteristic way to any object or situation
with which it is related (Cantril, quoted in Allport, 1935, p. 804)
D. Perloff (this text) defines attitude as a learned, global evaluation of an object (person,
place, or issue) that influences thought and action
II. Characteristics of Attitudes
A. Attitudes are learned
B. People are not born with attitudes
C. Attitudes vary as a function of religion, social upbringing, even the cultural landscape in
which an individual was raised
D. People tend to cluster with those who share their attitudes (Bishop, 2008)
E. Tesser (1993) acknowledged that there is not a gene for attitudes but he argued that
III. Attitudes are Global, Typically Emotional, Evaluations
A. Some attitudes may develop more intellectually, some through reward and punishment of
previous behavior, and others through mostly affect
IV. Attitudes Influence Thought and Action
A. Attitudes and values organize our social world
B. Attitudes shape perceptions and influence judgments
C. Attitudes can influence behavior
D. Some attitudes are strong while others are weaker and susceptible to influence
V. Values and Beliefs
A. Values and beliefs are learned and shape the ways we interpret information
B. Values are:
1.
obtain (Maio & Olson, 1998)
3. anscend specific situations,
4. More global and abstract than attitudes
C. Beliefs are:
2. Cognitions about the world – subjective probabilities that an object has a particular
attribute or that an action will lead to a particular outcome (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975)
4. Can also be categorized into different subtypes
a. Descriptive beliefs are perceptions or hypotheses about the world that people
carry around in their heads
VI. Structure of Attitudes
A. Social scientists have proposed several models to aid in understanding the structure of
attitudes
B. The expectancy value perspective
1. Martin Fishbein and Icek Ajzen in 1975
3. Attitude is a multiplicative combination of:
a. Strength of beliefs that an object has certain attributes
b. Evaluations of these attributes
C. Symbolic approach of attitude structure
1. Attitudes are characterized by emotional reactions, sweeping sentiments, and
powerful prejudices
2. These sy
issues
D. Role of ideology
2. –
3. Shortcoming with this approach is that it assumes people operate on the basis of one
set of ideological beliefs
VII. Consistency of Attitudes
A. Ambivalence occurs when we feel both positively and negatively about a person or issue
(Thompson, Zanna & Griffin, 1995)
B. Ambivalence is characterized by uncertainty or conflict between attitude elements, e.g.
incompatible beliefs
C. Expectancy-value theory stipulates people can have strong beliefs about two or more
outcomes, but evaluate the outcomes very differently
D. Balance theory – asserts individuals dislike inconsistency among cognitive elements and
are motivated to reconfigure things mentally so as to achieve a harmonious state of mind
2. Cognitive elements have a positive or negative valence
4. Suggests several options to balance attitude
E. Abelson (1959) suggested people resolve their cognitive conflict in four ways:
2. Bolstering
4. Transcendence
VIII. Psychology of Strong Attitudes
A. Strong attitudes (Krosnick & Petty, 1995) are particularly likely to:
1. Persist over time
3. Guide behavior
4. Prove resistant to change
B. Strong attitudes are probably anchored by other beliefs and values, making them more
resistant to change
C. People are likely to know more about issues they feel strongly about, making them more
resistant to counterarguments
D. People are likely to associate with others who feel similarly on important issues, and
these people help maintain and support these attitudes
E. Strong attitudes are often more elaborated and accessible, making it more likely that they
their minds (Wang Erber, Hodges, & Wilson, 1995, pp. 437 438)
G. The symbolic approach suggests that people acquire strong attitudes at an early age
H. The ideological approach emphasizes that strong attitudes are likely to be organized
around principles and values
I. Attitude strength is a multifaceted concept
J. Strong attitudes are characterized by:
2. Ego involvement (the attitude is linked to core values or the self)
4. Certainty (we are convinced that our attitude is correct)
6. Knowledge (we are highly informed about the topic
7. Hierarchical organization (the attitude is internally consistent and embedded in an
elaborate attitudinal structure)
A. Strong attitudes influence message evaluations and judgments of communications
B. Social judgment theory emphasizes that receivers do not evaluate a message purely on
the merits of the arguments
1. People compare the advocated position with their attitude and then determine
whether they should accept the position advocated in the message
2. Articulates several core concepts:
3. Latitudes. Attitudes consist of a continuum of evaluations a range of acceptable and
4. The latitude of acceptance consists of all those positions on an issue that an
individual finds acceptable, including the most acceptable position
6. The latitude of noncommitment consists of those positions on which the individual
has preferred to remain noncommittal
8. Assimilation – people pull a somewhat congenial message toward their own attitude,
assuming the message is more similar to their attitude than it really is
9. Contrast effect – individuals push a somewhat disagreeable message away from their
attitude, assuming it is more different than it really is
a. Involvement seems to have a strong impact on latitudes and assimilation/
contrast
a. i. People are ego-involved when they perceive that the issue touches on
their self-concept or core values. They differ from less involved people
in three ways:They have larger latitudes of rejection relative to their
latitudes of acceptance and noncommitment
b. They contrast mildly disagreeable messages from their attitudes more
(Sherif et al.)
ii. Individuals with selective perception perceive events so that they fit their
preconceived beliefs and attitudes
iii. Individuals with biased assimilation assimilated ambiguous information to
their point of view, believing that it was consistent with their position
X. Attitude Accessibility
A. Attitudes vary along a continuum of strength
B. Weak attitudes are characterized by a familiarity with the object, but a lukewarm
evaluation of its net worth
C. Strong attitudes are characterized by well-learned associations between the object and
your evaluation
D. Accessibility theory key concepts are accessibility and association
1. Accessibility means the degree to which attitude is automatically activated from
memory
2. Associations are links among different components of the attitude. The stronger the
linkages are, the stronger is the attitude
4. One research method is measuring reaction time
a. Participants in the study view the name or picture of an attitude object on a
5. Key research findings:
a. The more frequently that people mentally rehearse the association between an
object and evaluation, the stronger the connection will be
b. Objects toward which we have accessible attitudes are more likely to capture
XI. Implicit Attitudes
A. Some strong attitudes are outside conscious awareness, we are not consciously aware
that we harbor certain feelings about the person or issue
B. Implicit attitudes are defined as evaluations that:
1. Have an unknown origin (i.e. people are unaware of the basis of their evaluation)
3. Influence implicit responses, namely uncontrollable responses and ones that people
do not view as an expression of their attitude and thus do not attempt to control
(Wilson, Lindsey, & Schooler, 2000, p. 104)
C. Implicit attitudes are habitual: they emerge automatically, in the absence of conscious
thought
D. Timothy D. Wilson and his colleagues (2000) argue that people have dual attitudes
1. An explicit attitude that operates on a conscious level and guides much everyday
behavior (and)
2. An implicit attitude that influences nonverbal behaviors and other responses over
which we lack total control
XII. Conclusions
A. Attitudes – emotional, evaluative, frequently formed at a young age – are a core
dimension of persuasion
B. Expectancy-value theory says that attitudes are composed of expectations (beliefs) and
evaluations of these beliefs
C. The symbolic attitude approach argues that symbolic predispositions, like prejudice and
deep-seated values, lie at the heart of attitudes
D. An ideological perspective contends that attitudes are organized around ideological
principles
E. Attitudes are not always internally consistent
I. Strong attitudes are characterized by personal importance, accessibility, and hierarchical
organization
J. Social judgment theory provides many insights into the nature of strong attitudes
Discussion points/ projects/ exercises
1. Create a list of some of your attitudes, beliefs, and values. Choose the ones that you feel
strongly about or that represent you best. Compare these with other classmates to see
what you may have in common. How similar or different are the attitudes, beliefs, and
values you came across?
2. People acquire emotional connections to symbols such as the US flag. Find examples
from newspapers, magazines, brochures, etc. depicting strong symbols. How are these
symbols being used to influence your attitude?