The vicissitudes of attitudes and similar representational constructs in twentieth century psychology

Abstract

'Attitudes' has been the central concept of social psychology in three differentAttitude has been the dominant social psychology concept in three different periods, exercising hegemony over the discipline's imagination for more accrued time than any other concept, even 'groups'. Early commentators as disparate as sociologists Thomas and Znaniecki (1918) and behaviourist J. B. Watson (1925) considered the concept so central that they defined social psychology as the study of attitudes, and Kurt Goldstein (1934/1939) even equated being human with the capacity to form and use attitudes. Although always an important focus of social psychological research, attitudes' dominance within the discipline has fluctuated considerably over the decades so that during the twentieth century it has emerged as the cutting edge of social psychology at three separate periods, each time centred

Socio-psychological implications for an occupying society: The case of Israel

“…Social-psychological research has demonstrated that societies are capable of creating common belief systems and imparting them to their members (Fraser & Gaskell, 1990;McDougall, 1920;McGuire, 1986;Moscovici, 1988). Furthermore, additional lines of research indicate that societal beliefs and ideologies may be employed in order to justify a group's advantage over others and portray it as legitimate (Jost, Banaji & Nosek, 2004;Sidanius & Pratto, 1999).…”

CREATIVE HYPOTHESIS GENERATING IN PSYCHOLOGY: Some Useful Heuristics

“…One can also list and analyze conceptual distinctions that have been drawn by different researchers, e.g. McGuire's (1986) analysis of six quite varied characteristics that have been proposed to determine when social cognition or social representations are indeed social.…”

The Estrangement of Social Constructionism and Experimental Social Psychology: History of the Rift and Prospects for Reconciliation

“…These writers anticipated the socially constituted nature of historical reality and were among the first to address the nature of the relationship between the individual and society, especially the ways in which individual representations and collective representations are dialecti-. cally intertwined (e.g., Gergen, 1998;McGuire, 1986;Moscovici, 1988). In this sense, then, the intellectual origins of experimental social psychology and social constructionism are essentially the same.…”

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