ATTITUDE CHANGE
Attitudes are more than opinions. Attitude is not only a certain behavior; it has emotional and thinking components to. We often seem to be maladjusted with people having different attitudes than ours.
- Attitude change is the strategy used by advertisers, producers, politicians, trainers, educators, etc. Attitudes can change congruently – positive attitude becomes more positive and vice- versa or incongruently – positive attitude becomes negative and vice –versa. The target is the person whose attitude is to be changed, attitude object is the topic towards which the target’s attitude is to be changed. While attitude may change under learning, your group norms, conditioning, here are the 3 strategies of how you can change an attitude as given by psychologists -
1. The POX triangle aka Concept of Balance by Fritz Heider
To explain in simple words, one might change their attitude given their relationship with another person, example – You and your father are in an affectionate relationship, your father has a habit of smoking but you utterly dislike smoking and can’t stand the smell, so when you express your constant dislike for smoking in your relationship with your father via conversations or disregard for him , he may change his attitude against smoking .
Here P is your father – the target , O is you – another person and X is smoking – the attitude object .
The Positive relationship between P and O led to the eventual negative attitude towards X by P.
2 . The Cognitive dissonance by Leon Festinger
Cognitive or thinking components of an attitude must be consonant or in alignment with each other, if they aren’t, then it triggers stress and anxiety, cognitive discomfort. For example –
Thought 1 – Playing video games for long hours can affect my eyes.
Thought 2 – I love playing video games
When you have both these thoughts together in your mind, you may become less favorable towards video games as you worry about your eyes . You experience incongruent attitude change.
3 . Two- Step Concept by S.M. Mohsin
We often see people change their attitudes after witnessing an attitude change in their role models or celebrities whom they follow. This is the core of two- step concept.
Step 1 :-
The Target whose attitude is to be changed first develops liking or positive feelings towards the source, s/he copies them and is influenced by them. The source also shows empathy and regard for the target.
Step 2:-
The source, himself/ herself shows an attitude change and by observing the source, the target also changes his/her attitude.
This is just like how we often copy the hairstyles of famous actors or try to copy the batting or bowling styles of cricketers, and avoid engaging in such activities which our beloved stars avoid.
If you study closely you will observe how all of us have some or the other time in our life experienced attitude change via these ways, psychology thus comprehensively explains the changes we experience in our behavior, emotions, and thoughts.