19.8: Chapter Exercises

Chapter Exercises

What role do you think that cognitive dissonance and attempts to reduce it play in the following cases?

1. Many Jews in Germany and other European countries saw signs of terrible danger as the Nazis came to power. But many of them made little effort to leave.
2. Many of the people who worked in the concentration camps saw themselves as good, decent human beings, even after the war was over. How could this be?
3. Suppose you were a heavy smoker when the Surgeon General’s report about the dangers of cigarettes came out in 1964. How would you react? List several ways that a smoker might try to reduce dissonance when learning about the report.
4. Recall the different perceptions students had of the Princeton-Dartmouth football game. How might dissonance reduction be involved in the very different interpretations they had of this game?
5. The more difficult it is to become a member of a group (e.g., because it costs a lot of money, because of harsh hazing practices), the more people who do become members tend to value it. Give an example of this. How does dissonance enter the picture?
6. Suppose you are strongly tempted to cheat on the final for this course. Once you have decided what to do, you will probably experience some dissonance. Why? How might you reduce it?
7. If people change their attitudes more when they do things for small rewards, what effects might punishment have on attitude change?
8. Suppose that some person or group has already invested a lot in something (money to keep an aging car running, lives lost in a war). There is some tendency to think that justifies further investment. Could dissonance theory be relevant here?
9. In his excellent discussion of dissonance theory, Elliot Aronson says that a modern Machiavelli might well advise a ruler:
   1. If you want someone to form more positive attitudes toward an object, get them to commit themselves to owning that object.
   2. If you want someone to soften their moral attitude toward some misdeed, tempt them so that they perform that deed. Conversely, if you want someone to harden their moral attitudes toward a misdeed, tempt them—but not enough to induce them to commit the deed.

What do you think about this advice?

10. Wilbur is struggling to decide between buying a house and renewing the lease on his apartment. There are positive and negative factors on each side. If he buys the house, he will have a tax deduction on his mortgage, and he will be building up equity in something that he owns. But he will have to care for the lawn, and he is financially responsible for things that break. On the other hand, if he renews his apartment lease, someone else cares for the lawn and fixes things when they break. But he won’t be getting a tax write-off or building up any equity. After considerable agonizing, Wilbur decides to buy the house. How is Wilbur likely to reason, and feel, after he makes his decision?
11. We’ve examined the role that cognitive dissonance might play in leading us to ignore disconfirming evidence or to attack those who present it. First explain how this works. Then explain how the reduction of such dissonance is related to the straw man fallacy, the ad hominem fallacy, and confirmation bias.

Answers to Selected Exercises

1. Many Jews in Germany and other European countries saw signs of terrible danger as the Nazis came to power. But many of them made little effort to leave. It would be very hard to get out of the country, and it is difficult to reconcile your worst fears with many other beliefs you have. And once you have decided to stay, post-decision dissonance reduction is likely.
2. Many of the people who worked in the concentration camps saw themselves as good, decent human beings, even after the war was over. How could this be? One common finding is that those who worked in the camps came to see their victims as less than human. When you treat someone badly, there is a tendency to derogate them, to think “well, they deserved it.” How could this reduce dissonance?
3. Suppose you were a heavy smoker when the Surgeon General’s report about the dangers of cigarettes came out in 1964. How would you react? The report was careful and thorough, a good authority. But you might be inclined to disbelieve it (otherwise you would face the dissonant thoughts: I care about my health; smoking is bad for me; I smoke.) A study done at the time showed that only 10% of nonsmokers doubted the report. 40% of heavy smokers did.
4. Recall the different perceptions students had of the Princeton-Dartmouth football game. How might dissonance reduction be involved in the very different interpretations they had of this game? Our beliefs and values influence what we focus on and how we interpret it. Seeing things in ways that fit with our views is one way to reduce (or prevent) dissonance.
5. The more difficult it is to become a member of a group (e.g., because it costs a lot of money, because of harsh hazing practices), the more people who do become members tend to value it. “I went through hell to get into this group. It must be worth belonging to.”
6. Suppose you are strongly tempted to cheat on the final for this course. Once you have decided what to do, you will probably experience some dissonance. Why? How might you reduce it? Judson Mills did a study of cheating with sixth graders that helps answer this question.
   1. Those students who had succumbed to the temptation developed a more lenient attitude toward cheating.
   2. Those students who had resisted the temptation developed a more negative view about cheating. (Why?)
7. If people change their attitudes more when they do things for small rewards, what effects might punishment have on attitude change? Aronson and his coworkers found that mild threats of punishment were more effective in changing attitudes than harsh threats.
   1. They hypothesize that if a person does something solely because they fear a severe punishment, they don’t come to change their attitudes about it. They do it because the punishment would be severe, not because of the attitudes that they happened to have.
   2. If they do something when there is only a mild threat of punishment, they can’t so easily explain their behavior by the present of a strong external inducement.