Rachel E. Crook and Dr. Robert D. Ridge, Psychology

Personality and situational forces can affect the self-awareness necessary for cognitive dissonance to occur. Festinger’s cognitive dissonance theory assumes that people are motivated to maintain a consistency between their thoughts and their actions1. For example, if a person is not in favor of a tuition increase and chooses to write an essay against raising tuition, then, according to dissonance theory, she would experience consonance, because her attitude and behavior are consistent.

However, if she does not like the idea of raising tuition, but she is induced to write an essay in favor of a tuition increase, then she would experience dissonance6a discrepancy between her attitude and behavior. When a person’s cognitive element, such as an attitude about a tuition increase, is inconsistent with his or her behavior, such as writing an essay in favor of raising tuition, an unpleasant feeling or dissonance arises. According to dissonance theory, one of the ways we can reduce dissonance is by changing our attitude, thereby regaining a consistency between our cognitions and behavior. Thus, according to dissonance theory, people will adopt a more favorable attitude toward raising tuition after writing a counterattitudinal essay to maintain consistency between their behavior and cognitions.

For dissonance to occur not only must there be an inconsistency between attitude and behavior, but there must also be an awareness of the inconsistency 2. This need for awareness in dissonance reduction poses some interesting questions. Are dissonant effects the same for all people6or are there some moderating influences that affect the awareness of attitude/behavior inconsistencies necessary for dissonance reduction? Are some people more aware of inconsistencies because of a certain personality characteristic? Can environmental forces affect the participant’s self-awareness?

Previous research has investigated dispositions and situational influences on selfawareness. Research shows that a personality construct, such as self-monitoring, and a situational construct, such as manipulated states of self-awareness, produce differences in awareness and attitude change. The personality construct of self-monitoring relates to the ability and motivation people have to monitor their social presentation 3. High self-monitors are adept at social presentation and adapting to different situations while low self-monitors rely more on their personal values.

The situational construct of self-awareness refers to the focus of a person’s attention. People can be situationally induced to focus inwardly (private self-awareness) through the use of a mirror or outwardly (public self-awareness) through the use of a video camera4. Although researchers have investigated the interaction between both constructs simultaneously, a study investigating the combined influences of selfmonitoring and manipulated states of self-awareness on attitude change has not been conducted. The purpose of this research project was to investigate the combined influences of these factors on attitude change in a dissonance paradigm.

In this study, 79 undergraduate students were classified as high or low self-monitors. Prior to writing a counterattitudinal essay, participants’ attitudes toward a tuition increase issue were assessed. The average attitude was against a tuition increase. In a forced compliance paradigm, participants were then randomly assigned to compose counterattitudinal essays in front of a mirror (inducing private self-awareness) or a video camera (inducing public self-awareness). The participants were induced to write essays in favor of a tuition increase, although their initial attitudes were against raising tuition.

After writing essays, attitudes were assessed again and change scores were obtained from pre and post attitude measurements. Results showed no difference in change scores as a function of self-monitoring or situationally induced self-awareness. Effect size analyses indicated that the magnitude of the effect due to differences in selfawareness was inconsistent with previous research. I concluded that there was no effect on attitude change due to manipulated states of self-awareness. However, effect size analyses with respect to self-monitoring were consistent with that found in previous research. I concluded that I lacked sufficient statistical power in this study to detect an effect due to self-monitoring. The low power could be due to a number of factors including a small sample size and a weak statistical instrument. More research needs to be done to investigate the combined influences of self-monitoring and selfawareness on attitude change.

References

1. Festinger, L. (I 957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
2. Cooper, J., & Fazio, R.H. (1984). A new look at dissonance theory. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 17, pp.229-266). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
3. Snyder, M. (1974). Self-monitoring of expressive behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 30(4), 526-537.
4. Scheier, M.F., & Carver, C.S. (1980). Private and public self-attention, resistance to change, and dissonance reduction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 390-405.