Behavior and Attitude

Behavior
and
Attitudes
KRIS HANLEY M. DALAN, MA, LPT
Attitude
• In psychology, an attitude refers to a set of emotions, beliefs, and

behaviors toward a particular object, person, thing, or event. Attitudes
are often the result of experience or upbringing. They can have a
powerful influence over behavior and affect how people act in various
situations.
Behavior
• Behavior is how someone acts. It is what a person does to make

something happen, to make something change or to keep things the
same. Behavior is a response to things that are happening: internally -
thoughts and feelings. externally - the environment, including other
people.
How well do our attitudes predict
our behavior?
• Attitude become a poorer predictor of behavior when asking about general intentions
(intent to exercise) instead of measuring specific actions (e.g., climbing stairs or lifting
weights) and when the behavior isn't stable (when things change between intention
and behavior).
• People's attitudes are often a good predictor of their behavior. If someone has a
positive attitude towards something, they're more likely to act in a positive way towards
it. Likewise, if someone has a negative attitude, they're more likely to act in a negative
way.
Moral Hypocrisy and Cognitive
Dissonance
• Moral hypocrisy (MH) is the desire to behave morally while seeking opportunities to
avoid adopting behaviors that actually result in morally good outcomes (Batson et al.,
1997).
• Cognitive dissonance is a mental conflict that occurs when your beliefs don't line up
with your actions. It's an uncomfortable state of mind when someone has contradictory
values, attitudes, or perspectives about the same thing.
When does our behavior affect our
attitudes?
• Other influences on what we say and do are minimal
• The attitude is specific to the behavior
• The attitude is potent.
When social influences on what we
SAY are minimal.
• We say what we think others want to hear.
• Implicit Association Test (IAT). A computer-driven assessment of implicit attitudes. The
test uses reaction times to measure people’s automatic associations between attitude
objects and evaluative words. Easier pairings (and faster responses) are taken to
indicate stronger unconscious associations.
When other influences on behavior
“DO” are minimal.
• Would averaging across many situations enable us to detect more clearly the impact of
our attitudes?
• Example: Religious attitudes and behaviors
• Principle of Aggregation. The effects of an attitude become more apparent when we
look at a person’s aggregate or average behavior.
When the attitude is specific to the
behavior.
When the attitude is specific to the
behavior.
• Theory of planned behavior. Knowing people’s intended behaviors and
their perceived self-efficacy and control
• Encouraging new intentions encourages new behavior.
The attitude is potent.
• Attitude predicts our behavior because something reminds us of it, or because we

acquired it by direct experience.
When does our behavior affect our
attitude?
• Cherry is hypnotized and told to take off her shoes when a book drops on the floor. Fifteen
minutes later a book drops, and Cherry quietly slips out of her loafers. “Cherry,” asks the
hypnotist, “why did you take off your shoes?” “Well . . . my feet are hot and tired,” Cherry replies.
“It has been a long day.
• Jonel has electrodes temporarily implanted in the brain region that controls his head
movements. When the neurosurgeon stimulates the electrodes by remote control, Jonel always
turns his head. Unaware of the remote stimulation, he offers a reasonable explanation for his
head turning: “I’m looking for my slipper.” “I heard a noise.” “I’m restless.” “I was looking under
the bed.”
Role Playing
• Role. A set of norms that defines how people in a given social position ought to
behave.
• Example:
• Guards and prisoners in the Stanford prison simulation quickly absorbed the roles they
played (Zimbardo, 1972). They developed a “growing confusion between reality and
illusion, between role- playing and self-identity...
Saying Becomes Believing
• In expressing our thoughts to others, we sometimes tailor our words to what we

think the others will want to hear, and then come to believe our own words.
• Example:
• University students read a personality description of someone and then
• summarize it for someone else, who was believed either to like or to dislike that
person. The students wrote a more positive description when the recipient liked
the person (Higgins & McCann, 1984; Higgins & Rholes, 1978).
Evil and Moral Acts
• Evil sometimes results from gradually rising commitments.

• Actions and attitudes feed each other, sometimes to the point of moral
numbness.
• The more one harms another and adjusts one’s attitudes, the easier it becomes
to do harm.
• Moral action, especially when chosen rather than forced, affects moral thinking.
• Positive behavior fosters liking for the person.
Why does our behavior affect our
attitudes?
• Self-presentation theory
• Cognitive dissonance theory
• Self-perception theory
Self-Presentation: Impression
Management.
• Self-presentation Theory. assumes that for strategic reasons we express
attitudes that make us appear consistent.
Cognitive dissonance theory
• Self-Justification: Cognitive Dissonance.

• Cognitive Dissonance Theory- assumes that to reduce discomfort, we justify our actions to ourselves.
• Cognitive Dissonance- tension that arises when one is simultaneously aware of two inconsistent
cognitions.
• Example:
• A UFO cult’s expecting to be rescued by flying saucers from a cataclysmic flood anticipated on
December 21, 1954. As the day approached, the most devoted followers quit their jobs and disposed
of their possessions, with some even leaving their spouses. The “prophesy failed. BUT the group did
not abandoned their beliefs, but with increased dedication. Their faithfulness according to them had
persuaded God to spare the world—a message they now proclaimed boldly.
Cognitive dissonance theory

• Selective Exposure. The tendency to seek information and media that agree with one’s
views and to avoid dissonant information.
• Insufficient Justification. Reduction of dissonance by internally justifying one’s behavior

when external justification is “insufficient.”
Self-perception Theory
• Facial Feedback Effect. The tendency of facial expressions to trigger corresponding feelings such
as fear, anger, or happiness.
• Example:
• When people are instructed to sit straight and push out their chest, they feel more confidence in
their written ideas than when sitting slouched forward and with eyes downcast ( Briñol et al., 2009).
• Over Justification Effect

• The result of bribing people to do what they already like doing; they may then see their
actions as externally controlled rather than intrinsically appealing.
Over Justification Effect

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Behavior

• In psychology, an attitude refers to a set of emotions, beliefs, and

• Behavior is how someone acts. It is what a person does to make

• Attitude predicts our behavior because something reminds us of it, or because we

• In expressing our thoughts to others, we sometimes tailor our words to what we

• Evil sometimes results from gradually rising commitments.

• Self-Justification: Cognitive Dissonance.

• Self-Justification: Cognitive Dissonance.

• Insufficient Justification. Reduction of dissonance by internally justifying one’s behavior

• Over Justification Effect

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