Cognitive Dissonance And Its Effects On Our Lives

After reading chapter five I noticed cognitive dissonance throughout a large portion of the book. Cognitive dissonance was described in class as being a situation involving conflicting attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors. A good example of this was found on page 182 where the author writes about how we all tell our self that African Americans “deserve” all of this even though we know, but do not want to acknowledge that white Americans are less likely to be convicted of the same crime done by blacks. Cognitive dissonance applies here because we know that this mass incarceration is not fair or morally right to do, however, our behavior does not try to stop it from happening. Instead of doing what our beliefs say is right we try to convince ourselves that it is the African Americans fault that they are

If one is trying to pull a thought or feeling in closer, or push it away, they may be attempting to manipulate their cognitive dissonance. If one knows that they are not happy with their actions, they can dilute that feeling of cognitive dissonance by decreasing the negative or enhancing the positive attitudes about it (Smith & Mackie, n.d.). One might be a smoker for instance, and know that smoking is bad for them, but continue smoking anyway. A perception of a clash of unsuitable elements is a way to describe the way one feels when their actions and beliefs are at odds (McLeod, 2014). So, if one is unhappy about the things they do because they do not match what they think they should do, they will be said to be experiencing cognitive dissonance.

“The engine that drives self-justification, the energy that produces the need to justify our actions and decisions—especially the wrong ones—is an unpleasant feeling the Festinger called “cognitive dissonance.” Cognitive dissonance is a state of tension that occurs when ever a person holds two cognitions (ideas, attitudes, beliefs, opinions) that are psychologically inconsistent, such as “Smoking is a dumb thing to do because it could kill me” and “I smoke two packs a day.” Dissonance produces mental discomfort, ranging from minor pangs to deep anguish.” (p.13)

People can display themselves outwardly in a certain manner although on the inside be completely different. A person’s attitude and behavior can influence each other; a person’s surrounds will also have an impact on how the person is. An example of this can be seen in a person committing a crime such as shoplifting, the person knows this is illegal and not moral but in the right situation the person may forget his or her moral upbringing and commit the crime any way. Influences on the individual can be overpowering, causing the person to behave or act in an attitude different from the person’s normal action and behavior. People tend to suffer from

The cognitive dissonance theory has many possible scenarios and examples chosen throughout life. The theory will be either enhanced or decreased depending on a number of factors such as the person’s moral values, social upbringing, and social status at work, religious views, culture, and more. When a person makes a decision, such as calling into work sick when he or she are not sick may have a number of consequences. The first may be the person’s conscience and the possibility of getting caught in the act of a

What is cognitive dissonance? Give some examples of situations that might create dissonance in an individual. What does cognitive dissonance have to do with blocked need satisfaction? (3 points)

1. fundamental attribution error - a person that in a given situation evaluates another's person decision or action by some internal characteristics, not taking into consideration exceptional situations that might lead that person in such a decision or action. example: Alice, a driver, is about to pass through an intersection. Her light turns green and she begins to accelerate, but another car drives through the red light and crosses in front of her.

The show, ChoreoProject, was presented by sjDanceco and presented various types of dance performances from classical to contemporary works. The piece that I enjoyed from this show was Cognitive Dissonance. In this dance piece, Erwin Columbus both choreographed and was the dancer. Erwin Columbus used music from Kerry Muzzey for his piece. In Cognitive Dissonance, he told a story of himself having negative, inconsistent thoughts and his journey of fighting off those thoughts from his mind. With fast and dramatic movements along with intense music, Columbus was able to grasp my attention and teach me how it feels to have negative, inconsistent thoughts that can negatively control one's body.

There is something that troubles me. I have been influenced to trust that “not everything that can be invented has been invented”, yet I have already begun to believe that we are coming close to this limit of technological progress. The result of this most likely stems from my laziness. In other words, I am losing my hunger for challenges. My easygoing life has become so natural, that my craving for a fun and easy route in life continues to increases. Now, how this connects UC Berkeley’s MET program was actually quite predictable.

Cognitive dissonance impacts attitudes and behavior negatively in the workplace in a variety of ways depending on the position you are employed. Being in management as an administrator you are faced with many challenges and situations that cause cognitive dissonance. For example, if my director asks me to perform a task and the way in which he wants me to perform the task, goes against my beliefs, I am forced to decide whether to follow his directives or risk termination for insubordination. The stress factor is making the correct decision. I can remember an instructor sending a student to me for conduct issues and wanted the student terminated from her program. The documentation that she provided to me was not sufficient to suspend the student,

Cognitive dissonance is having a state of inconsistent thoughts and beliefs that towards decisions and attitudes that can constantly change. Many people tend to engage in cognitive dissonance but don’t realize there doing it. Correspondingly situation arose when someone hurts another feeling, or when temptation becomes a struggle with your beliefs. In the same way it can come in forms of making a decision or trying to achieve a goal that you find not worth the effort after accomplishing it. Given these points I would like to apply my real life examples of cognitive dissonance. My first personal example happened right before spring break. Me and my two best friends jess and Isaiah were sitting on the couch watching TV and making jokes. Isaiah then made a joke towards jess and we all found

“Your best friend is having a beer bash tonight. Everyone you talk to indicated their positive intentions of going to the best beer bash of the millennium. However, you have a Psyc 135 final next morning that you haven't studied for. Your midterm scores have been low going into the final, but everyone claims that the final is easy every semester. Should you stay home and study for the final or go to this millennium beer bash and merrily consume alcohol?”

An Example of cognitive dissonance is that at my house, my cats can sometimes be tough to see when you are walking, and thus people end up stepping on them or kicking them. The cognitive dissonance here would be that people often like to say “your cat walked into my path” or “your cat tried to trip me.” When this happens people are having two conflicting views at the same exact time, theory often suggests that the brain wants to eliminate dissonance whenever possible. The brain does this by changing the way you feel about or perceive certain things, or in other words, changing your attitudes and beliefs. So instead of just admitting they made a mistake in kicking the cat and feeling apologetic, people use cognitive dissonance to turn the situation into the cat’s fault for getting in their way, thus making them feel better about themselves.

Cognitive Dissonance Theory, or CDT for short, is an objective communication theory that was developed by Leon Festinger. Cognitive Dissonance is defined as “The distressing mental state caused by inconsistency between a person’s two beliefs or a belief and an action.” (Griffin, Ledbetter, et al). An example of cognitive dissonance would be a health conscious smoker, this person knows that smoking is bad for them, but they still smoke because they enjoy it. Their desire to be healthy conflicts with their smoking, this conflict places them in a distressing mental state, a state of cognitive dissonance. Festinger provides three hypotheses for CDT: 1.) Selective exposure prevents dissonance. 2.) Post decision dissonance creates need for reassurance. and 3.) Minimal justification for action induces attitude change.

action at any given point? These are all questions that I will attempt to answer