COM 203 minipaper
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COM203_Week11Session1_Fall20171.pptxCOM 203: Introduction to Communication
Week 11, Day 1
Agenda
Discuss persuasion, attitudes, beliefs and values
Cognitive dissonance theory
Review for Quiz 3
Reminders:
Quiz 3 and Paper 3 due on 11/16
Options for paper are Weeks 8-10, Ch. 10, 11, 12
WHAT IS PERSUASION?
Persuasion is communication specifically intended to shape, reinforce, or change the responses of others (Miller, 1980).
WHAT IS PERSUASION?
Response shaping occurs when we encounter new information, requiring some judgment or evaluation.
Response reinforcing occurs when communication deepens our commitment to already held attitudes or behaviors.
Response changing occurs when communication moves our attitudes or behaviors from an existing or established position to another.
Persuasion and Interpersonal Communication
Persuasion is essential to interpersonal communication and the building and maintenance of relationships.
EXAMPLES
Convincing your partner to marry you
Persuading your boss to give you a raise
Convincing your patients to stay on their medications
Persuading your child to make good choices
Persuasion and Social Institutions
Persuasion is essential to the conduct and maintenance of our social institutions. In a democracy, it is the people who decide.
EXAMPLES
A politician must persuade voters
Health organizations persuade people to eat healthy
The Armed Forces persuade people to enlist
Media outlets persuade viewers through their narratives
VALUES, BELIEFS,
BEHAVIORS, AND ATTITUTES
Values: Deeply held judgments about what’s important.
Beliefs: A proposition about something. There are three types:
Descriptive, Prescriptive, Evaluative
Attitudes: Beliefs around a situation or object that causes one to respond in a preferable way.
Behavior: A concrete, observable action.
Thoughts about attitudes and behaviors…..
Has there ever been a time where you DID something you did NOT believe in?
Have you ever made a bad decision that you wish you could take back?
Have you ever been split between two things in making a decision?
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Created by Leon Festinger (1957)
Basic premise: we do not like dissonance in our lives
Tried to explain what happens when our actions don’t match our beliefs and how we try to avoid this
In order to prevent it from occurring we will selectively tune out opposing information, change our beliefs to match our actions, or seek reassurance following a difficult decision.
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Major Assumptions
1) Human beings desire consistency in their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors
2) Dissonance is caused by logical
inconsistencies
3) Dissonance is an unwanted state
--distressing mental state caused by inconsistency between a person’s two beliefs or a belief and an action
4) Dissonance causes us to perform efforts to achieve consonance and reduce dissonance
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Core Concepts (cont.)
Beliefs
Attitudes
Behavior
In order to best understand – theory supposes that beliefs constitute our attitudes, and attitudes lead to our behaviors
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Core Concepts (cont.)
When these do not align, then dissonance occurs.
Humans have developed ways to prevent dissonance from occurring as well as strategies to reduce it once it has occurred.
Preventing Dissonance
People avoid information that has the potential to create dissonance
Selective exposure: the tendency people have to avoid information that would create cognitive dissonance because it’s incompatible with their current beliefs
So if you are Republican, you only watch Fox News
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Dissonance reduction (post-decision dissonance)
Dissonance cannot always be avoided and often arises out of a difficult decision that we have had to make (“buyers remorse”).
Within post-decision dissonance, there are three factors which can increase the amount of dissonance experienced
1) issue importance
2) length in making the decision
3) decision reversibility
Close-call decisions can generate huge amounts of internal tension after the decision has been made
Post-decision dissonance – strong doubts experienced after making an important, close-call decision that is difficult to reverse
Heightened by – the more important the issue, the longer an individual delays in making a decision between two equally attractive options, the greater the difficulty involved in reversing the decision once it’s been made
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Dissonance reduction (minimal justification hypothesis)
Defined: A claim that the best way to stimulate an attitude change in others is to offer just enough incentive to elicit counter-attitudinal behavior
So, from attitude behavior
TO
behavior attitude
In instances where individuals cannot reduce dissonance by one of the previous strategies, then they will alter their attitudes and beliefs to coincide with their behaviors
Therefore if I am going to truly persuade you… I just need to get you to change your behavior and you will adjust the rest.
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Would you lie for a $1?
Famous experiment by Festinger
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kmVy1QPXn0
What would be minimal justification for you to lie to a friend???
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Review for Quiz 3
Questions??
Next time…
Discuss persuasion, attitudes, beliefs and values
Quiz 3 and Paper 3 due
Reminders:
Please read Ch. 13
