Cognitive dissonance, double forced compliance, and commitment

Abstract

Double forced compliance situations are studied to analyse how attitudes change after the performance of two behaviours, rather than just one as in standard forced (or induced) compliance situations. In the present experiment, subjects were asked to execute two successive counterattitudinal behaviours: writing an essay in favour of selective admission to the third year of university (first behaviour) and giving a convincing speech in favour of selective admission (second behaviour). The first behaviour was always performed in a high-commitment context (free choice, publicness, and consequences), whereas the second was performed in a high-commitment context as well as in a lowcommitment context (free choice, anonymity, and no consequences). The following hypotheses were tested. (1) If the second behaviour is performed in a high-commitment context, it will increase the dissonance induced by the first. (2) If the second behaviour is performed in a low-commitment context, it will decrease the dissonance induced by the first. The results confirmed both hypotheses, which comply with the radical version of dissonance theory (Beauvois & Joule, 1996, 1999. As a whole, these results are incompatible with competing theories of Festinger's theory of dissonance (1957), and in particular with self-perception and impression-management theories. Copyright # 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.The double forced (or induced) compliance paradigm is the most famous paradigm in Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance (1957). Research on forced compliance focuses on the attitude change that follows the execution of one behaviour (such as writing a counterattitudinal essay), whereas research on double forced compliance (for a summary, see Beauvois & Joule, 1996, 1999 focuses on the attitude change that follows the execution of two behaviours. Consider a subject who executes two behaviours: the first one is labelled B1 (writing an essay in favour of selective admission to the third year of study), and the second one is labelled B2 (recording a speech in favour of selective admission). Both are in contradiction with private attitude A (I am against selective admission). One might think that a subject who executed both counterattitudinal behaviours B1 and B2 would have more dissonance to reduce than one who executed only one behaviour. The dissonance aroused by the first and second behaviours should add up and thereby increase the attitude change.

Attitudes and Persuasion

“…One of the most long-lived expressions of this approach is dissonance theory, advanced by Festinger (1957), who undoubtedly would be astonished to find controversy still attending his classic study with Carlsmith (Festinger & Carlsmith 1959, Harmon-Jones 2000b, and active research on free choice (Kitayama et al 2004), postdecision regret (Brownstein et al 2004), and even selective exposure to (in)consistent data (Jonas et al 2001). Joule & Azdia (2003) have supported their "radical model," which argues for a return to the original version of dissonance theory, and rejects the many alternatives that have developed over the years (also see Beauvois & Joule 1999). Harmon-Jones et al's (2003) action-oriented model, which posits that cognitive discrepancies generate dissonance because they interfere with efficient belief-consistent actions, also is compatible with the fundamental premises of dissonance, as is recent research that demonstrates vicarious dissonance arousal (Monin et al 2004, Norton et al 2003.…”

Consumer decision in the context of a food hazard: the effect of commitment

“…Since the committing action is very similar to a habitual choice, the effect of commitment may have been weakened. In this regard, to be noted is that Joule and Azdia (2003) proved that additional commitment actions do not always produce a further increase of attitude.…”

“…Whenever people publicly take a stance, they also feel a need to maintain their initial choice in order to appear consistent (Cialdini 1993). If people have perceived the initial choice as their own, they feel more compelled to be coherent with their acts (Kiesler and Sakumura 1966;Joule and Azdia 2003). Also the importance and the number of the acts performed by the person influence the level of commitment; but even trivial choices performed only once may create a commitment, as shown by the previous examples.…”

Hope to be right: Biased information seeking following arbitrary and informed predictions

“…2 Whereas defense motivation could be compelling as an account for non-arbitrary predictions, what about entirely arbitrary predictions? Cognitive dissonance theory and various empirical findings suggest that when a strong external justification for a dissonanceprovoking action is available, the justification is readily used to diffuse or avoid such dissonance (e.g., Festinger & Carlsmith, 1959;Joule & Azdia, 2003). Therefore, a defense motivation account might suggest an absence of selective exposure after arbitrary predictions.…”