attitude and attitude change 1 – Flashcards
Unlock all answers in this set
Unlock answersquestion
Bem: Attitudes
answer
-Likes and dislikes - not percise enough
question
Allport: Attitudes
answer
- a relatively enduring mental and neural state of readiness (attitudes exist in brain) organized through experience (learned) which exerts a directive or dynamic influence upon the indis responses to all objects and situation with which it is associated.
question
Zanna and Rempel: Attitudes
answer
the categorization (mental neural) of a stimulus object along an evaluation dimension (good vs bad) which can be based upon or developed form 1) cognitive information 2) affective information and or 3) behavioural information - this is the best definition
question
Eagly and Chaiken: Attitudes
answer
a psychological tendency that is expressed (psych pre-disposes us) by evaluating a particular entity (target) with some degree of favor or disfavor -not as much kinda confusing and vague
question
Definitions of attitudes: key aspects
answer
-Evaluation ( good - bad, like- dislike, favorable- unfavorable) -Target ( what is evaluated positively or negatively)
question
attitudes are
answer
enduring and important
question
enduring important attitudes
answer
1)Attitudes toward climate change 2) Attitudes toward ethnic groups 3) Attitudes toward important types of behaviors
question
Overall definition of attitude
answer
An overall evaluation of an object that is based on cognitive, affective, and behavioral information
question
Sources of attitudes: CAB
answer
1)Cognitive information 2)Affective information 3) Behavioral information
question
Cognitive info
answer
-Beliefs about an object -Knowledge on object -Expectations of object's costs and benefits -Examples Attitude based on cognitive info -Scissors - functional or not function - our attitude based on effectiveness -Attitudes based mainly on cognitive information warning labels - effective about risk and info about what we should do
question
Affective sources
answer
-Feeling toward object -Emotions elicited by object -Pleasure or pain associated with object -Example of attitude based on affective Eating raw oysters - look gross taste gross Kittens - awwww
question
Behavioral sources of attitudes
answer
-Previous actions toward object -Past/current ownership of object -Planned actions toward object in future -Behaved negatively toward object because we behaved negatively to it in past.
question
Attitudes differ in
answer
1) Valance/ direction (favour, disfavour, neutral) 2) Differ in strength
question
Measuring CAB: Semantic differential dimensions: crites, fabrigar, petty
answer
-To assess cognition and affective responses toward different dimensions that can be used to assess cognitive or affective information toward different types of attitude objects or have used the same semantic differential dimensions to assess both cognitive and affective Reponses toward a particular attitude object =Cognitive dimensions: useful, useless, wise-foolish, beneficial-harmful, valuable- worthless, perfect-imperfect, wholesome-unhealthy, =Affective components: love-hateful, delighted-sad, happy-annoyed, calm-tense, excited- bored, relaxed-angry, acceptance-disgusted, and joy-sorrow.
question
Measuring CAB: Semantic differential dimensions: Breckler and wiggins
answer
-Use the same semantic differential scales to asses both cognition and affect for a particular object but framed the scales differently. -For instance in assessing cognitive and affective reactions toward blood donations: measured cognitions by having participants respond to the stem blood donation is on the dimensions bad-good,, wise-foolish, useful -useless, and important- unimportant. Affective Reponses toward this object were assessed by having participants respond to the stem blood donation makes me feel on the same semantic differential scales.
question
Measuring CAB: Semantic differential dimensions: Pros
answer
1) They are simple to administer and complete 2) When they use the same dimensions across different attitude objects they can be used to compare the favorability of responses across attitude objects.
question
Measuring CAB: Semantic differential dimensions: Cons
answer
1) The attentive reader will have noticed that the semantic differential measures mentioned only the cognitive and affective components. 2) The diffuse nature of behavior has made it difficult for researchers to imagine valid semantic differential scales for this component
question
Open- ended measures of the CAB components
answer
-Participants are asked to write down the thoughts, feelings, and behavioral experiences they associate with and attitude object. -Cognition measure asked participants to list the characteristics, attributes, and values they associate with the attitude object. -Affective measure - list feelings, emotions they associate with the object The behavior- asked participants to list relevant past experiences they have had with the object -Having listed the feelings they associate with the object participants will then rate how positive or negative each emotion is in relation to the attitude object. Our participant might indicate the anger gets a rating of -1 while disgust gets a score of -2 from these Reponses we can compute a score that is the average of these valence ratings (in this case -1.5)
question
Open- ended measures of the CAB: Pros
answer
1) This technique enabled researchers to devise a measure of the behavioral component allowing for a more comprehensive test of the multicomponent model of attitude. 2)Respondents are asked to indicate the cognitive, affective and behavioral responses that are the most personally salient and relevant permitting them to unrestrained form the dimensions provided by close-ended response formats
question
Open- ended measures of the CAB: Con
answer
1) Participants may find it hard to articulate the thoughts, feelings, and past experiences they associate with particular attitude objects meaning they might not provide any responses for one or more components. 2) These measures require more time and effort form participants. If researchers are interested in measuring cognitions affective responses an past behaviors for many attitude objects it might to be feasible to use the open-ended approach
question
Do CAB components predict attitudes? Abelson, Kinder, Peters, Fiske
answer
-Respondents ascribed personality traits to the democratic and republican primary candidates in 1980 and reported their feelings about each candidate. The participants were also asked to indicate their attitude toward each candidate. -Favorability of their beliefs about the candidates (which were also uniquely predictive of attitudes) -Cognitive and affective information contribute to the prediction of political attitudes.
question
Do CAB components predict attitudes? Intergroup attitudes esses, haddock, zanna
answer
-Open-ended measures of cognition and affect -Participants listed the beliefs and feelings they associate with various ethnic groups and rated the positivity and negativity of each belief or feeling. -Correlations between participants overall attitudes and the average ratings for the beliefs and for the feelings indicated that the cognitive and affective responses were both important for predictive prejudice -The relative contribution of cognitive and affective responses depended on the target group under the study the attitudes towards strongly disliked groups were best predicted by cognitive information in the form of symbolic beliefs whereas attitudes toward liked groups were best predicted by affective information.
question
Gender issues
answer
-The evaluative implications of both cognition and affect were positively significantly correlated with the favorability of attitudes and that the unique contribution of each class of information is to some degree a function of the attitude object under examination -Affect contribution signitfacntly predicted some attitudes but beleifs were the more important predictor in most instances
question
Role of cognition and affect in predicting attitudes
answer
-Both cognitive and affective information predict attitudes but which was dependent on the object -Example: affect was found to best predict attitudes toward blood donation whereas cognitive information was found to best predict attitudes toward abortion and comprehensive exams. -Maintaining positive beliefs about an attitude object is associated with positive affective responses about that object.
question
Huskinson and haddock
answer
-People differ reliably in the extent to which they use the favorability of their beliefs and feelings to derive their overall attitudes. Some people based their attitudes predominantly on their affective responses whereas other based their attitudes predominantly on tier cognitive responses. -Many people half attitudes that were based equally on cognition and affect. Importantly these differences were found to have important implications for a number of outcomes such as persuasion.
question
Attitude structure: One-dimensional perspective
answer
-Ppl will see good in all or bad in all
question
Attitude structure: Two-dimensional perspective
answer
=One dimension reflects whether the attitude has few or many positive elements and the other dimension reflects whether the attitudes has few for many negative elements. =Ppl can posses any combination of positivity ot negativity in their attitudes =Contain positive and negative elements which leads to attitudinal ambivalence. =Issues: are they ambivalent or do they just not know =Response polarization - ppl who are highly ambivalent toward an object are more strongly influenced by features of their environment that make salient the objects positive or negative attributes. This causes them to behave more favorably toward the object when the positive elements are salient that when the negative elements are salient. =In contrast non-ambivalent people are less strongly influenced by the acute salience of the positive or negative attributes
question
Types of ambivalence:Potential ambivalence
answer
-a state of conflict that exists when ppl simultaneously possess positive and negative evaluations of an attitude object. -E.g., love chocolate cake because it tastes good but hate it because it makes you fat. -Researchers can calculate he amount of conflict between peoples positive and negative evaluations of an attitude object using one of several different formulae developed for the purpose. - an important reason for labeling this type of ambivalence as potential ambivalence is that the ambivalence may or may not be consciously perceived by the individual
question
Types of ambivalence:Felt ambivalence
answer
-is the actual feeling of tension that people experience when they consciously think about the attitude object. -Assessed by asking people to rate the extent to which their feelings are conflicted mixed and indecisive. -Ambivalent and non ambivalent attitudes influence how people process issue-relevant information and the degree to which attitudes predict behaviour. With regard to the former issues ambivalent attitudes tend to cause greater scrutiny of information that can help to resolve the ambivalence issues. -Ambivalent attitudes are less likely to predict behavior that non ambivalent attitude
question
Attitude functions: Smith: Attitudes serve three primary functions
answer
1) Object appraisal - refers to the ability of attitudes to summarize the positive and negative attributes of objects in our social world. For exampl attitudes can help people to approach things that are benefirical for them and avoid things that are harmful 2) Social adjustment - is fulfilled by atttiudes that help us to identify with people whom we like nd to dissoate form people who we dislike. For example indis may buy a certain soft drink because this drink is endoresed by favourtie singer 3) Externalization - is fulfilled by attitudes that defend the self against internal conflict
question
Attitude functions: 4 attitude functions
answer
1) Knoweldge Attitudes can simplify interactions with the environment. - Attitudes can simplify interactions with the environment -Highly accessibly attitudes increase the ease with which people make attitude-relevant judgments and decrease physiological arousal during these judgments. These findings support the conclusion that the object- appraisal function is more strongly `served by attitudes that are spontaneously activated from memory than by attitudes that are not spontaneously activated.
question
Limitations of this research: Attitude functions
answer
1) Limitations in the current approaches to measuring the attitude functions. (example kereks AFI relies on peoples ability to know the functions of their own attitudes, but evidence indicates the people are sometimes sport at knowing the basis for their attitudes.) this seen most in ego-defensive attitudes. 2) Ambiguity in the distinctions between different attitude functions. For instance a persons attitude toward partying the night before an exam might reflect the extent to which he or she values achievement and therefore by value-expressive. At the same time the persons value of achievement itself reflects a utilitarian concern. Iso is the attitude value-expressive or utilitarian?
question
Linking attitude content structure and function
answer
-Synergistic content (CAB) influence the structure of the attitude -The link between attitude content and attitude function: if attitudes toward a style of clothing fulfill a psychological need to enhance social relations then these attitudes should be based on beliefs about the extent to which the style is preferred among ones friends. -Structure and function: same attitude functions may operate at both the unidimensional and bidimensional structural levels by varying degrees. For instance the object appraisal function should be served more strongly by unidimensional attitudes than by bidimensional attitudes because the bidimensional atttiudes evoke more decision conflict. In addition It is possible that socila norms make is occasionally desirable to have high ambivalence in an attitude such as when an issues is controversial. In this situation people who appear ambivalent may give the impression of being fair and knowledge. These individuals may also be inoffensive to others because they agree with everyone to some extent
question
Stable
answer
-Relevant to the quality and strength of the attitudes -Asked by asking how important it is to you ( emotional) certain they are of the attitude (cognitive) -Faster attitude retrieved more accessible - more accessible attitudes serve a stronger utilitarian/object appraisal function. High accessibility might reflect unipolar attitude structure
question
How strong attitudes diff form weak: 4 manifestations of strong attitudes
answer
1) More persistent 2) More resistant to change - when faced with a persuasive appeal strong attitudes are less likely to change to weak attitudes 3) Strong attitudes are more likely to influence information processing - people devote greater attention to information that is relevant to strong versus weak attitudes. 4) Strong attitudes are more likely to guide behaviour.
question
Attitudes stored in memory os is a temporary evaluations
answer
1)Mem - attitudes are stable across time and context 2)Tem - attitudes are simply constructed on thr stop.
question
Self-perception theory
answer
-Just as observers infer others' attitudes form their actions, so do people sometimes infer their own attitudes form their own actions -Most likely when the attitudes is weak or ambiguous ( ie., when we do not have a strong attitude that we can easily retrieve) -Occurs when attitudes are not especially strong Example: attitude towards -brown bread "Done eat it .: don't like it" -Golf "havent played in a couple of years therefore I don't think I like it"
question
Three sources of attitudes
answer
-Components may sometimes be consistent with one another E.g., all negative: cockroaches Sometimes components are inconsistent Eg. Dentist: positive beliefs (know its good for you), negative feelings ( don't like going)
question
Consequences of attitudes
answer
Attitudes can influence behavior affect and behavior.
question
Explicit vs. implicit attitudes
answer
-Social psychs have focused on people's explicit attitudes ( those which are consciously reported) -Since 1995 some researchers have been studying people implicit attitudes ( attitudes that cannot be measured with traditional measures/ automatic response to object and its evaluative [good/bad]) may occur without awareness.
question
Implicit attitudes key aspects
answer
-Evaluation -Target automatic -May occur without awareness -Usually primarily affective
question
Implicit attitudes
answer
-Implicit attitudes are usually consistent with explicit attitudes, and indivuals are usually aware of their implicit attitudes -But sometimes implicit attitudes may differ form explicit attitudes and people may not be aware of their implicit responses. -Explicitly unracist but implicitly racist Inconsistency between implicit and explicit attitudes might involve an unwillingness to admit to oneself the implicit evaluations -Inconstancy between implicit and explicit attitudes might involve an unwillingness to admit to oneself the implicit evaluation -Or inconsistency might reflect and ambivalent attitudes which contains both positive and negative content. -When this happens they predict diff thing -explicit attitudes: predict deliberate behavior ( e.g., conscious decisions) -Implicit attitudes: predict spontaneous behavior ( e..g, nonverbal reactions)
question
Values
answer
-Broad ideals or goals that guide peoples lives -General principles that people hope to follow tin their actions -Can be considered very general attitudes -Considered live goals -In general values are positive concepts for everyone but some people consider them more important than others : Example: For example, almost everyone thinks that freedom is a good thing. But some people regard freedom as one of their most important goals to pursue, whereas other people consider it a lower priority in their lives
question
Shalom shwartz
answer
Found 9 fundamental value domains ◦ conducted cross-cultural research in more than 60 countries ◦ identified 9 fundamental value domains ◦ these 9 domains were present in all cultures ◦ the 9 domains can be organized in a circumflex that reflects their similarity Self-Direction: freedom, creativity Universalism: wisdom, social justice Benevolence: helpfulness, honesty Conformity/Tradition: humility, devoutness Security: social orderliness, cleanliness Power: authority, wealth Achievement: success, ability Hedonism: pleasure, enjoyment of life Stimulation: daring, a varied life -Domains that are close to one another will evaluate them in the same way -Same behaviors that work to one you believe in consistent to related close domains and against opposite domains.
question
Beliefs
answer
-One cognitive source of attitudes -Bits of knowledge or information about object -Formal definition of a belief: A cognitive link between a target and an attribute -Example of belief: Milk is nutritious Target: milk -Attribute: nutritious -Beliefs are held at a level of probability between 0 (low) and 1 (high) , which reflects the strength of the belief
question
Functions of attitudes
answer
-Why do people hold attitudes? (Or why did humans evolve to develop attitudes?) -This issue relates to the functions of attitudes -Benefits -Goals it fulfills
question
Functions:1
answer
-Smith Katz 1) Object appraisal functions (smith) Utilitarian function (Katz) -Most basic and universal function -Attitude provides rapid evaluation of target -Altitudes induces approach or avoidance of target -Attitude maximizes rewards and punishments.
question
Functions: 2
answer
2) Value-expressive function ( Katz) social adjustment function ( smith ) -Attitude links person with value others -Attitude facilitates social interaction -Attitudes expresses a persons identity -Attitude reflects persons central values.
question
Functions: 3
answer
3) Ego - defensive function ( katz) externalization function (smith) Look up -Eg some professors have negative attitudes toward students. - professors rather think students are wrong and don't realize good teaching rather than they are not a good teacher.
question
Functions: 4
answer
4) Knowledge function ( katz) -Attitude helps person to understand something that otherwise is confusing -Attitude integrates beliefs about -Attitude integrates beliefs that are otherwise inconsistent -Attitude allows person to predict the future more confidently -E.g.: child's positive attitude to magic, individual's negative attitude to victims -Eg persons negative attitude toward disputants in longstanding conflict. Ppl frustrated with failure for ppl to work things out and consequences attitude toward group is negative. - helps understand something otherwise cant understand. -Eg just world theory
question
Functions of attitudes
answer
Usefulness of functional view of attitudes Explains how or why attitudes form spontaneously Effectiveness of attitude change strategies ma depend on whether they address or match the function of the attitude Compatible with recent perspective on implicit attitudes, in the functions might be subconscious, - eg ego definesive
question
Limitations of functional view of attiudes
answer
Difficult to measure functions especially if they are subconsious Some attitudes do fulfill multiple functions for a given person Some functions can overlap conceptually e.g., if attitude facilitates interaction with other ( social adjustment) it might increase the individuals rewards (utilitarian)
question
1920s Lousi Thurstone/ Rensis Likert
answer
-Developed ways to measure attitudes through the equal appearing interval and likert scale approaches. -Demonstrated that attitudes can be quantifiably measured
question
Richard LaPiere
answer
Found that a persons attitude does not necessarily impact their behavior. ( served asain couple but said they wouldn't)
question
The real world
answer
-WWII made ppl study topics of: conformity, power and group dynamics, propaganda Study of attitudes gained momentum in an attempt to tackle greater societal concerns. -Theodore: Research on authoritarianism played an important role in understanding the development of prejudicial attitudes: Developed f scale ( f for fascism) -Cold war-> persuasive messages -> when and how attitudes change -> how and when persuasion is likely to occur. -Festinger's group: Cognitive dissonance theory. - Attitude functions. ( smith and katz) ( lecture before)
question
Social cognition: definition
answer
grounded in understanding how individuals elaborate upon and process information: introspective and deliberative information processing. = introspective and deliberate information processing.
question
Theory of reasoned action
answer
was developed to predict deliberative and thoughtful behavior from attitudes. -> this theory paved the way for hundred of studies that shared a common goal - understanding the effects of attitudes on behavior.
question
Wicker attitudes were poor predictor of behavior
answer
-> lead psychs to question the value of the attitudes to predict behavior -> lead to more studies of how and when attitudes predict behavior -> found that attitudes do predict behavior in some conditions better than others
question
A new wave of attitude research
answer
-Research on the content of attitudes began to flourish: addressed questions such as: how ppl organize their thoughts, feelings, and past experiences about a particular attitude object. -2 models 1) the elaboration likelihood model - central and peropheral route ( less attention) 2) heuristic-systematic model- processing requires individuals to carefully scrutinize the contents of a persuasive appeal whereas heuristic processing requires less effot. = both are dual-process model in that they specify two different routes to persuasion.
question
Ongoing developments
answer
-Attitude strength, strong attitudes are more a) persistent over time b) persistent over time b) resistant to change c) likely to influence information processing d) likely to predict behavior. -Also helps to look at attitudes that are stable versus temporary -implicit measurement and brain imaging. Implicit measurement assess attitudes without individuals being aware of their attitudes are being assessed. -Interestingly research has revealed that in many domains responses are being assessed. Interstingly research has revealed that in many domains responses on implicit measures of attitude are often not consistent with peoples self-reported rating of their own attitudes. Similarly implicit measures of attitude often predict different outcomes from self-report questions measures. -Brain imaging techniques study attitudinal phenomena. -Time course in which attitude judgments are made
question
How are attitudes measured?
answer
-Attitude measures directly ask respondents to indicate their attitude, whereas implicit attitude measures assess attitudes without needing to directly ask the respondent for verbal report.
question
reliability
answer
-measure is said to have a high reliability if it produces similar results under consistent conditions.
question
test-restes reliability:
answer
same measure at two times
question
internal reliability
answer
items within the measure
question
validity
answer
how generalizable
question
Face validity
answer
Test appears to measure the construct
question
Content validity
answer
Test samples from all relevant domains of the construct
question
Convergent/discriminant validity
answer
: Scores on the measure correlate with conceptually related measures and do not correlate with conceptually unrelated measures
question
Predictive validity:
answer
: for of convergent valdidity. Diff though cause talk about real outcomes. Scores on the measure predict relevant outcomes and actions
question
rely on self-report, because
answer
-Most convenient method -People should be aware of their explicit attitudes: Though they are not necessarily aware of implicit attitudes, which require different techniques -People should be willing to report their explicit attitudes honestly: Unless there are strong social desirability demands, such as when some attitude positions are regarded as undesirable (e.g., negative attitudes toward minorities), which require different techniques
question
Thurstone's Method of Equal-Appearing Intervals (1928)
answer
Goal is to create scale that has "interval" properties: each unit represents the same increase in favorability (each unit reps concretely this variable 3 is 3x as favorable as 1) Ask numerous judges to sort 15-20 statements on a scale into 11 ["equally spaced" ??] piles ( average of all the judges) Select limited number of items (e.g., 7-9) that have approximately equally spaced scale values (e.g., 1.5; 3.1; 4.7; 6.0; 7.3; 8.9; 10.3) When ask ppl to ask which ones they agree with - their attitude is the mean of the items they agree with - If person only likes the last one their score is 10.77 -If participant agreed with items 3, 5, and 6, then his/her "attitude score" would be: 3.00 + 5.06 + 7.38, divided by 3 = 5.15 (mean)
question
Problems with Thurstone scales:
answer
-Time-consuming to create -It doesn't't achieve an Interval property of score in the complete sense
question
Likert's Method of Summated Ratings (Likert, 1932)
answer
-Designed to be simpler than Thurstone -Generate pool of statements (e.g., 15-20) on the issue that are clearly favourable or clearly unfavourable; no neutral items -Initial group of participants indicate their agreement/disagreement with each item (e.g., 7-point responses ranging from "strongly disagree" to "strongly agree") -All items are scored so that high scores represent the same attitude (e.g., agreement with favourable items = disagreement with unfavourable items) got to reverse score one of these two subsets. -Researcher conducts "item analysis" to eliminate ambiguous or invalid items: E.g., item-total correlations must exceed .3 -Final scale includes only those items that passed the item analysis -If participant's responses were 4, 2, 4, 3, 3, then his/her attitude score would be: 4 + 2 + 4 + 3 + 3 = 16 (sum) or 3.2 (mean)
question
Problems with Likert scales
answer
-Time-consuming to create -Agree-disagree ratings can be ambiguous ( could disagree for diff reasons not always what research thinks it is)
question
Osgood's Semantic Differential Scale (Osgood et al., 1957):
answer
-Simpler than either Thurstone or Likert -Designed to measure "connotative meaning" of objects/concepts ( any word has a denotative meaning which is the def the connotative definition is the hidden meaning of that word) -Based on factor analyses of people's ratings of many different objects on a wide array of bipolar adjective scales. -They did factor analysis ( how did items go together) found Three underlying dimensions were identified: -Evaluation (good-bad) -Potency (strong-weak) -Activity (active-passive) -Evaluative dimension represents attitudes -Participants rate attitude object on several bipolar evaluative scales, such as: Good-bad Beneficial-harmful Wise-foolish Like-dislike -Can be used to measure attitudes toward any object or issue -Place an "X" to indicate your rating on each dimension: -Each scale is scored 1-2-3-4-5 (or 5-4-3-2-1), so higher (lower) scores reflect more negative attitudes toward drinking coffee
question
Problems with Semantic Differential scale
answer
-Need to make sure that the chosen evaluative dimensions make sense with regard to the attitude object -Evaluations can mean different things to different people
question
Jaccard et al. (1975) examined the reliability and convergent-discriminant validity of Thurstone, Likert, Osgood, and single-item rating scales
answer
-Measured participants' attitudes toward (1) smoking and (2) capital punishment using each of the 4 techniques on two different occasions -Conclusions form all these studys not much difference - so take the easiest one (semantic differential method) -All measures of explicit attitudes to date have used "absolute" rating scales, e.g.: -"How favourable are you toward religion?": Extremely unfavourable - Extremely favourable -"Rate religion on the following scales:"Good - Bad; Favourable - Unfavourable -"Religion has positive consequences for society": Disagree strongly - Agree Strongly
question
Olson, Goffin, & Haynes, 2007
answer
-Tested whether "relative" measures of attitudes might be better than absolute measures -Relative measures require comparisons of target to others: E.g., taller or shorter -Absolute measures reflect qualities of the target directly: E.g., height in inches -Built on earlier research by Goffin on relative measures of performance in work settings: -Relative Percentile Method: Rate performance on scale from 0 to 100, where the number reflects the percentage of other workers whose performance is worse than target: Also obtained objective measures of job performance (e.g., sales) -Relative ratings predicted objective measures of work performance better than traditional, absolute measures (e.g., "extremely good performance" to "extremely poor performance")
question
Self-Report Measures of Attitudes: olson
answer
-Olson et al. used the relative percentile method to measure attitudes For relative measure of attitudes, participants received detailed explanation: "We want you to rate your attitude toward a number of targets, using a relative attitude scale. On this scale, you should compare yourself to all students in Psychology 020 at UWO." -How favorable are you relative too........ -This is an absolute scale. - Five domains:1) organized religion 2) reading for pleasure 3) drinking alcohol 4) exercising 5) watching sports -Half used absolute measure -Other used relative measure -In a separate questionnaire, participants reported the frequency with which they had performed various behaviours in a specific time period (e.g., the past month), - Correlation coefficients between the measures of attitudes and the measures of behaviour were computed separately for: 1) those participants who completed relative measures of attitudes vs. 2) those participants who completed absolute measures of attitudes -Relative has higher correlation to behavior then the absolute measure
question
Why do relative measures predict behaviour better?
answer
(1) Respondents must consider more information before making rating (e.g., must also think about other people's attitudes) (2) Gives all respondents the same interpretation of labels on the scale, e.g., pick 80 means your are 80% more favorable to it compared to the average student. (3) Respondents think more about behaviour, because they must use behaviour to infer others' attitudes. Think in behaviour way
question
Problems Affecting Self-Report Scales
answer
1) unaware of underlying attitude toward an object, subtlw difference in item presentation can infleunce responses to direct measures of attitude (1) Social desirability Give answers that are most socially acceptable Strategies to reduce problem: 1) Anonymity - no names 2) Innocuous items 3) "No right or wrong answers" 4) Use scale to measure tendency to give socially desirable answers (2) Acquiescence Tendency to agree with all statements Strategies to reduce problem: Use "balanced" scale where high scores on some items reflect agreement and high scores on other items reflect disagreement- likert technique (3) Carelessness Tendency to answer randomly Strategies to reduce problem: Stress importance of task Keep questionnaires short (4) Context effects from other items -Answers to items can be affected by prior questions/items: Prior items can influence the interpretation of words/concepts, Prior items can make certain exemplars of a category accessible, which can provide a context for subsequent ratings Both assimilation and contrast effects are possible -Strategies to reduce problem: Vary order of questions Construct scale with awareness of order effects
question
Example of assimilation/contrast effects
answer
Strack et al., 1985 -Participants thought of 3 positive events that had happened to them or thought of 3 negative events -Some participants were asked to recall recent events; others were asked to recall events that happened at least 5 years ago -Then participants reported their current life satisfaction -Ppl saying what used to be im happy or miserable -Contrast effect - ask them to do one task get context effect on subset measure.
question
Alternatives to Self-Report Measures of Explicit Attitude: 1: behaviour
answer
-Problem: they tend not to be sensitive, time consuming -Because self-report measures of explicit attitudes are affected by such things as social desirability and carelessness, some researchers have used other strategies to get at explicit attitudes indirectly (1) Behaviour measures: Attitudes are assumed to influence behaviour, so perhaps behaviour can be used to measure attitudes (a) E.g.: Interpersonal distance can be used to infer liking - how close you stand to someone, or race) (b) E.g.: Lost Letter Technique (Milgram et al.,1965) -Addressed, stamped letters are "lost" throughout the city -The addresses represent the targets of attitudes, e.g., "Young Communist League" vs. "Youth Conservative Party" -Number of "lost" letters delivered to address is assumed to reflect attitudes toward target groups -Can only measure community-level attitudes, not individual attitudes
question
Alternatives to Self-Report Measures of Explicit Attitude: 2: physiological
answer
-Physiological measures: Attitudes can affect physiological processes, so perhaps they can be used to infer attitudes (a) E.g.: measures of stress/arousal, such as GSR and heart-rate Problem: these reactions indicate intensity but not direction of evaluations (b) E.g.: facial EMG (electromyography) of muscles in face (forehead, jaw, mouth) Problem: these reactions indicate direction but are not very sensitive to intensity Problem: these measures are time-consuming to obtain
question
Alternatives to self-report measures of explicit attitude 3: Bogus pipeline technique
answer
Bogus pipeline technique Edward E. Jones & Hal Sigall (1971) -pipline to the soul -Participants hooked up to machine that measures physiological reactions - Led to believe that machine can tap their inner feelings, like a lie detector. (you have measured their attitudes already) want them to try and fool the machine =Asked several attitude questions previously assessed in another context =Equipment seems to give correct answer =Then ask the things you acctually want to know t they tell the truth because they think the machine knows. -Then participants asked to "predict" what the equipment shows -Asked the critical questions (including some that have social desirability problems -Participants' "predictions" are the measures of attitude -Actually a self-report measure of attitudes, but is disguised as phyisological measure -Results show more socially undesirable responding with bogus pipeline than with standard self-report measures -E.g., participants admit more prejudice -E.g., participants admit more dishonest behaviour
question
Problems with bogus pipeline:
answer
-Time-consuming to use -Unethical? Participants are always supposed to be allowed not to respond. -May introduce negativity bias? -May be possible simply to threaten the use of a lie detector to obtain more honest responses - more dishonest behaviour admittied and more prejudice admitted
question
Measures of Implicit Attitudes
answer
-Attitudes are latent constructs and thus have to be inferred from indirect information (observed variables) -Latent construct ( cant directly observe the variable) -Implicit attitude: An automatic evaluative response to a target, which may occur without awareness -Cannot be measured by self-report, because may be unconscious -Usually measured with reaction time procedures -Most common measure of implicit attitudes: Implicit Association Test (IAT), Greenwald et al. (1998)
question
Evaluative priming
answer
-The strength of the association; between memory and a given object and summary evaluation; reflects the accessibility of an attitude from memory and the likelihood that the evaluation is spontaneously active when we encounter the attitude object. -E.g., if you hate something stronger to respond than if you don't like them -White you were faster to response to white then black
question
IAT
answer
-IAT asks them to sort items and associate with good meanings or bad meanings. Sorta target categories as well as words with good or bad meanings -Demonstration - the second is harder because feel more negatively to insects therefore easier to sort with bad meanings -Examples of 5 blocks needed for study 1)Categorize male and female names 2) Participants are presented with a variety of positive and negative adjectives. Press s key for positive adjective or k key if negative 3) Participants are instructed that they will see names or adjectives and that they are to press the s key when see names or adjectives that are males or positive adjective and k when see female name or negative adjective 4) Similar to 2 but reversed 5) Similar to block 3 but press s key when a male name or negative adjective appears and the k key when a female name or positive adjective appears. -Key are 3 and 5 see which are faster
question
Criticisms of IAT
answer
-Measures the difference in evaluations of two concepts, not attitudes toward one concept =Possible to develop a single-category IAT (e.g., "exercise"), with no contrasting category =In one block of trials, participants must categorize the single category (exercise) with "good" words =In another block of trials, participants must categorize the single category (exercise) with "bad" words =If participants are faster to categorize single category (exercise) with "good" than with "bad", then they have a favourable implicit attitude (toward exercise) -Might reflect knowledge of social norms, rather than personal attitudes =Participants may be influenced by perceptions of how the categories are typically perceived by most people (e.g., show "The Bachelor" is seen as good by most people, even though I dislike it) =Can use "I like/I dislike" rather than "good/bad" -Can be influenced by response biases, such as conscious attempts to control latency =Must stress importance of answering quickly
question
AIT for children
answer
-Kids allowed more time to respond -The positive and negative attributes are words that are frequently used in kids vocab and are spoken aloud through headphones or speakers. -Buttons are used to record responses rather than keys on a keyboard.
question
Paper and pencil AIT
answer
-Stimuli are presented as a series of items running down the center of a page. At the top of the page there are two categories, with one on each side of the column of items. Participants are asked to indicate beside each item whether it belongs in the category that there is left or right of it. -Sort into males/positive column, or female/column or reverse. Have to do as quickly as possible in a specific amount of time
question
Another measure of implicit attitudes: The Affect Misattribution Procedure (AMP) Keith Payne et al. (2005)
answer
-Participants' task is to rate the pleasantness of neutral, ambiguous stimuli ("more pleasant than average" to "less pleasant than average") example pleasantness of chinese pictographs. Just before you do this you show them the target you want to measure attitudes before -Immediately before the neutral stimulus is presented, participants are shown another stimulus (e.g., a flower or an insect for 75 milliseconds), which is the actual target of attitude measurement -If they like the target they will be more likely to like to pictograph. -Mis-attributing liking of target to pictographBased on immediate affective response. -Measure this by liking at mis-attribution -Participants are told to ignore the initial stimulus and judge the pleasantness of the second stimulus -If neutral stimulus is judged as pleasant, then the attitude toward the preceding object is assumed to be favourable; if neutral stimulus is judged as unpleasant, then the attitude toward the preceding object is assumed to be unfavourable -Multiple examples of the attitude concept are presented, followed by neutral stimuli
question
Payne et al., 2005
answer
-Experiment 1 -Neutral, ambiguous stimuli = Chinese pictographs -Pleasant photos (e.g., a smiling baby) produced more favourable ratings of the pictographs than did unpleasant photos (e.g., a spider) -Experiment 6 =For White participants, photos of White individuals produced more favourable ratings of neutral Chinese pictographs than did photos of Black individuals =For Black participants, photos of Black individuals produced more favourable ratings of neutral Chinese pictographs than did photos of White individuals
question
Other measures of implicit attitudes have also been developed
answer
Researchers are still just learning about the connections between implicit and explicit attitudes, including the conditions under which implicit and explicit attitudes are similar and the conditions under which implicit and explicit attitudes diverge
question
Other things
answer
-Implicit tests are both on internal consistency and test-retest correlations. -Implicit tests on prejudice is consistent over time
question
Event- related potentials (erps)
answer
-measure electrical activity in the brain. How make attitudinal judgments
question
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)
answer
-this attempts to uncover the brain locations associated with attitudinal responding by assessing changes in blood flow and blood oxygenation within the brain. This can be used to infer the degree to which the brain region is active. Issues relevant to the measurement of attitudes.
question
Attitude Structure
answer
(1) Intra-attitude structure - structure within the attitude (a) What are the internal components of attitudes? (what attitude mad up of) Labelled "attitude content" in Chapter 2 (first "witch") (b) How many dimensions underlie attitudes? Labelled "attitude structure" in Chapter 2 (second "witch") -Are attitudes unidimensional? Extremely negative - neutral - extremely positive: One diminesional - cant see ambivalence -Or are they bidimensional? Not At All Negative - Extremely Negative and Not At All Positive - Extremely Positive: Ambivalent - contain both negative and positive attitudes.
question
Ambivalent attitudes:
answer
-Less stable over time -More easily changed -Less predictive of behaviour -When aware of abivalence Unpleasant for perceiver because: =we dislike inconsistency =we dislike uncertainty
question
Conner et al., 2002: ambivalent
answer
-Measured attitudes toward eating a low fat diet, both the overall favourability of the attitude and the ambivalence of the attitude Overall attitude: unidimensional semantic differential (-3 to +3) If I were to eat a low fat diet, it would be: unpleasant - pleasant unenjoyable - enjoyable
question
Ambivalence of attitude: separate positive/negative ratings
answer
-Considering only the unfavourable qualities of eating a low fat diet and ignoring the favourable characteristics, how unfavourable is your evaluation of eating a low fat diet? Not at all unfavourable - extremely unfavourable -Considering only the favourable qualities of eating a low fat diet and ignoring the unfavourable characteristics, how favourable is your evaluation of eating a low fat diet? Not at all favourable - extremely favourable -These separate ratings were integrated using a formula that assessed the extent to which both positive and negative elements were (a) extreme and (b) equally extreme -If extremely favourable and extreamly unfavourable - large ambivalent attitude -Calc - Positive and negative attitudes and how similar they are to each other
question
Also measured behaviour
answer
-One month later, measured actual compliance with eating a low fat diet, e.g.: -I have eaten a low fat diet in the last month. Strongly Disagree - Strongly Agree On average, how many portions of fruit do you eat per day? [0 - 10] Results -Attitudes predicted behaviour better when ambivalence was low rather than high: Attitude-behaviour correlations: Low ambivalence group: .36 Intermediate ambivalence group: .25 High ambivalence group: .14 -Divided sample to extremely abivalants and moderatly ambivelent and not ambiveleent - Look at over all attitude and behaviour
