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without attitudes. One would go about daily life without the ability to think in the terms of
‘good’ and ‘bad’, ‘desirable’ and undesirable’, or ‘approach’ and ‘avoid’. There would be no
activation of positivity or approach tendencies upon encountering objects that would engender
positive outcomes, but, perhaps more severely, there would also be no mental faculty for
According to Allport (1935), “A mental and neural state of readiness, organized through
experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence on the individual’s response to all objects
Attitude is used to describe potential action toward the object with regard only to the
question whether the potential action will be favorable or unfavorable toward the object.
There are two types of attitude, A Positive Attitude those who maintain a positive
attitude are often referred to as optimists. The old saying “Every cloud has a silver lining” is
their motto. Because of their positive position toward all aspects of life, the optimists are
generally successful in their undertakings, because they refuse to let failure stop them. Failure is
seen as simply another step in the process of succeeding. A Negative Attitude those who have
negative attitudes are pessimists. Their attitude towards learning, relationships, and work build
up barriers to positive events. Pessimists allow even small issues to reinforce their negative
attitude. (Roberts, n.d). This negativity is an obstacle to success. Only by consciously making
the decision to change one’s attitude, and taking steps to make that change happen, can this
According to Fabrigar, Macdonald, and Wegener, (n.d). Although the term attitude
structure is ever-present in the literature, precise definitions are less common. The concept of
structure must begin with one’s conceptualization of attitude. It makes sense to view the attitude
negative fashion that includes the three elements of affect, cognitions, and behavior (the
“ABCs” of attitudes). (Breckler, 1984; Eagly and Chaiken, 1998; Zimbardo and Leippe, 1991).
And how do a person know what people’s attitude are? How they act, and a person can attempt
The affective component consists of the person’s emotions and affect toward the
how the person tends to act regarding the stimulus. The cognitive component consists of the
thoughts the person has about that particular attitude object, including facts, knowledge, and
ranging following;
should approach, and costly or punishing objects or situations we should avoid. (Gilovich,
Keltner, Nisbett, 2005). Utilitarianism is a form of consequentialism, which advocates that those
actions are right which bring about the best overall. (Bentham, n.d.).
function, protecting people from awareness of unpleasant facts, including knowledge of their
own unseemly attributes and impulsive. People develop certain attitudes, this reasoning holds,
to maintain cherished beliefs about their selves. The influential ego-defensive account of select
attitudes is the terror management theory. This theory argue that to ward off the anxiety we feel
when contemplating our own demise, we cling to cultural worldview and strongly held values
out of a belief that by doing so part of us will survive death. To ward off the anxiety we feel
when contemplating our own demise, we adopt death-denying attitude, motivated by the belief
usually in groups in which they can be supported and reinforced. We typically choose to express
our social and political attitude in groups, and this is an important factor in motivating us to
identify with different groups. These are our reference groups that is, groups whose opinions
matter to us and that affect our opinions and beliefs. For example people who are deeply
committed to having low prejudice are more likely to associate with groups that promote those
attitudes, and they feel shame and guilt when their actions contrast their attitudes toward mental
A fourth and final function of attitudes is the knowledge function, by which attitude help
organize our understanding of the world. Our attitudes guides how we attend to, store, and
retrieve information, making us more efficient, and on occasion more biased, social perceivers.
Most typically, we pay attention to and recall information that is consistent with our preexisting
Several theories are helpful for understanding how attitude formed and how they can be
changed. The learning approach regards attitudes as habit, like anything else that is learned.
Principles that apply to other forms of learning also determine the formation of attitudes.
Motivational approaches based on the principle of cognitive consistency assert that we seek
consistency among our attitudes fit into our overall cognitive structure. Expectancy-value
approaches to attitudes maintain that we adopt attitudes that maximize our gains. Each side of
an issue has cost and benefits; expectancy-value approaches maintain that an individual will
adopt the side on which the net gains are greater. And finally, cognitive response theory
considers the condition that leads us to argue against or passively accept a persuasive
communication designed to change our attitudes. These approaches are not necessarily
The assumption behind this approach is that attitudes are required in much the same way
as other habit. People learn information and facts about different attitudes objects, and they also
Thus, basic learning processes should apply to the formation of attitudes. We acquire
information and feelings by the process of association. Learning can also occur through
reinforcement, punishment and imitation. People imitate others, especially when those others
are strong, important people. Consequently, major source of basic political and social attitude in
The earliest consistency theory is balance theory. Balance theory considers the
consistency among the effects and beliefs held by a person and are usually described in terms of
a person, another person, and an attitude object. Thus, there are three relevant evaluations: (1)
the first person’s evaluation of the other person, (2) the first person’s evaluation of the attitude
objet, and (3) the other person’s evaluation of the attitude object. (Taylor, Peplau, Sears, 2006).
by Leon Festinger (1957). Like other cognitive consistency theories, cognitive dissonance
theory assumes that there is a pressure to be consistent. Dissonance theory deals especial in
Dissonance is defined as an aversive motivational state that results when some behavior
aroused when the attitude and the behavior that are dissonant are important to the self (Aronson,
1968; Stone and Cooper, 2001). Dissonance created psychological tension and negative affect
(Harmon- Jones, 2000), and consequently, people feel pressure to reduce or remove it.
Reducing it means restoring consistency, or consonance. There are three ways of achieving this
consonance. One way is revoke or changes our behavior in some way, although often this is not
feasible. Some time individuals trivialize the dissonance so that they do not have to change their
aptitude (Simon, GreenBerg, and Brehm, 1995). Most often, however, people resolve
dissonance between their attitude and their behavior by changing their attitude.
attitude change, and for a number of years, it provided the only theoretical self-perception
theory. Bem argued that often we do not really know what our attitudes and simply infer them
from our behavior and the circumstances in which this behavior occurs. (Taylor, Peplau, Sears,
2006).
Most psychologists now assume that aspects of both dissonance theory and self-
perception theory are correct. When people have had few experiences with respect to the
attitude or when the attitudes involve vague, uninvolving, minor, or novel issues, they may infer
their attitude from their self-perceptions of their behavior (Albarracin and Wyer, 2000), as self-
perceptions theory predicts. When more controversial, engaging, and enduring issues are
involved, dissonance teory is more likely to explain their attitudes and behavior. (Taylor,
People often respond to persuasive communications in terms of incentives, that is, the
costs or benefits associated with particular attitude positions. According to this theory, attitude
formation and change is a process of weighing the pros and cons of various possible attitudes
and then adopting the best alternative. This approach is best illustrated in expectancy-value
Expectancy-value theory assumes that people adopt a position based on their thoughtful
assessment of its pros and cons, that is, on the values they place on its possible effects. They
tend to adopt positions that will most likely lead to good effects and reject positions that will
Cognitive response theory predicts that attitude change depends on how much and what
kind of counter arguing a message triggers. If the messages stimulates strong and effective
counter arguing, resistance to change will follow. Conversely, persuasion can be produced by
interference with the counter arguing process. If a person cannot think of any good counter
arguments and is distracted from thinking about them while listening to a message, he or she is