Psychology

Attitudes are normally defined as tendencies or dispositions either positive or negative projected towards certain things such as events, occasions, persons, objects, ideas or situations. Attitudes by large encamps a wide array of our beliefs and our opinions especially based on our experiences (Keith, 2000). However, attitudes are closely related to a larger extend to our interaction patterns with others and this kind of a relationship provides a link between social and cognitive psychology. Attitudes exist and they highly shape our behavior and approach towards different phenomenas.

 In education, training and instructions a greater percentage of the learning process is highly characterized by acquisition, change and transformation of attitudes. Unlike the human personality, in most cases attitudes are supposed to change as a function and product of experiences. Research studies carried out by different experts explain that to a greater extend, heredity may pose some challenges and affects attitudes either directly or indirectly (Geoffrey  Gregory, 2004). However, many have argued that there are other underlying factors which revolve around attitude formation and change. Therefore, various theories exist to explain this phenomenon.

For instance, the cognitive dissonance theory states that individuals have a tendency to geared towards finding consistency among their cognitions.  This notion implies that individuals struggle to maintain consistency in their thoughts and beliefs (Keith, 2000). This theory was first brought forward by L. Festinger who argued that if there exists any kind of inconsistency between behavior and attitudes, something must be done in order to change or eliminate any kind of dissonance and try to establish a balance of thoughts.

However, in case of any discrepancy between behavior and attitudes, most often attitudes change and they are transformed to accommodate the new behavior. Thus, two very crucial factors highly influence and affect the strength of dissonance (Markel, 2001). That is, the importance or strength attached to each individual belief and the number of cognitive dissonant beliefs. Festinger argued that there are two major ways of eliminating any forms of dissonance. First and foremost, reduction in the importance or significance attached to dissonant beliefs will consequently affect a persons disposition to what heshe believed about an object before (Geoffrey  Gregory, 2004). Additionally, in a different manner there can be an addition of more or extra consonant beliefs which would indeed outweigh and over rule the dissonant belief.

Another important theory in attitude formation and change is the self- perception theory, which was advanced by Daryl Bem. Unlike the cognitive dissonance theory, the self perception theory explains that individuals only assert that knowledge which is inherent of their own behavior and the impacts it can have on others (Keith, 2000).  Therefore, we tend to develop attitudes by observing and reflecting on our very own actions and behavior thus making conclusions based on what we think our attitudes might have caused on others.

To a greater extend, the self- perception theory sounds relatively different from the cognitive dissonance theory in that does not hold the principle that individuals experience a kind of a negative drive state known as dissonance which constantly seeks for relieve (Markel, 2001). But rather, individuals simply infer attitudes from deep within their behaviors just like in the same way an observer would watch from a different perspective. From this kind of reasoning it is believed that the self perception theory does borrow a lot and it combines the dissonance theory together with the attribution theory.