Attitudes Chapter 8 Pages 265-293 What is an ATTITUDE??? Attitude... • An evaluation a person makes about an object, person, group, event or issue. Your likes and dislikes. • Eg: Carlton is the best footy team!!!!! • Your attitude causes you to act in a positive or negative way towards people, objects, experiences and ideas...These are usually long lasting. • Can you give me some examples??? Where do attitudes come from? How do we form them?? • Attitudes don’t form over night. We don’t wake up and think.... “Today i am going to be interested in cars” We actually learn them through our individual life experiences. It is a judgment we make about something, it is a continual process that persists throughout our lives.. We can learn them through.. 1. Through direct instructions (eg. Parents tell you that animals are dirty and you grow up with that attitude towards animals) 2. Relationships with your peers (stronger when reinforced by others) Attitudes are formed when knowledge and experience interact with what we already think about something. • Does age affect your attitude? If so how? • ACTIVITY 8.4 Theories of Attitude. • The Tri-component theory is a popular theory used to explain the main features that make up our attitudes. All three components must be present before it can be considered an attitude. • It is know as the ABC model. A: (affective) B: (behavioural) C: (cognitive) ABC A:(affective) this is the emotional component of attitude. This is how you feel about things. Your feelings can be good, bad or neutral. “I feel really good when I’m at school” B:(behavioural) This is the action component. What you do or don’t do as an expression of your attitude. How you might behave in certain situations. “I work hard when I’m in class” C:(cognitive) this is the mental component. The beliefs or thoughts you have about the people, objects, places etc. “I think homework is fun” Cognitive Dissonance • This is a condition of conflict or anxiety due to an inconsistency between ones beliefs and ones actions. • Disagreement of thoughts. • Eg; Belief (cognitive): chocolate is bad for you. Action (behvioural): you eat a block of chocolate. • See how the behavioural and cognitive components don’t match. When this happens we can experience a state of psychological discomfort which is known as cognitive dissonance. HOW CAN THIS BE TREATED??? Pg 272 AFFECTIVE I am scared of spiders BEHAVIOURAL I always avoid spiders COGNITIVE I believe spiders will Hurt me if i go near them A CONSISTENT ATTITUDE AFFECTIVE I feel good when i do exercise BEHAVIOURAL I don’t often exercise COGNITIVE I believe exercise is good for me A INCONSISTENT ATTITUDE How does your attitude influence your interactions? • Forming attitudes about people and groups helps us categorise them so that way we can adjust our behaviours accordingly. • For example if you were in Japan you would need to be extra polite because they are very polite and change your behaviour because certain things you do can be considered rude (eye contact). • However categorising people according to our existing schemas (a mentally organised piece of structured information) can not always be accurate or appropriate. • This can lead to stereotyping, discrimination and prejudice. • When you think of a scientist what would you think of.. OR This idea is very stereotypical Stereotyping • A stereotype is a commonly held idea about a person or group which is based on observed behaviours or the person’s appearance. • A set of ideas or beliefs that we hold about members of a certain group and these ideas may or may not be true. They can be positive or negative. • What are some examples that you can think of? All Italians eat pizza... Discrimination • A BEHAVIOUR that is directed towards a particular group or an individual belonging to a specific group. • In Australia there are laws banning discrimination against a persons age, gender, race, colour, religion, political opinion, medical or criminal record, disability or sexual preference. PREJUDICE • The NEGATIVE judgement that is made about a person, purely because they belong to a particular group. There are 2 kinds.. 1) Old fashioned prejudice: deliberate form of open rejection towards an individual or group based on that persons membership/ affiliation with that group. 2) Modern Prejudice: a more subtle form of prejudice. Insinuates rejection whilst displaying acceptance. Quick recap.. Stereotyping is overgeneralizing statements with people with similar characteristics. IE...saying all hispanic women have many children. Discrimination is the ACT of doing something harmful to certain groups of people. IE...KKK setting a blacks woman house on fire Prejudice would be having a problem with certain people, but not actually doing anything to them. IE...saying asian women are ugly. CAN YOU THINK OF ANY WAYS THAT WE CAN REDUCE PREJUDICE IN OUR SOCIETY?? How can we stop people who THINK in a prejudiced way and ACT in a discriminatory manner? REDUCING PREJUDICE Inter-group contact: For prejudice amongst groups to be reduced there must be an increase in contact between those two groups. Contact must be meaningful to both parties. Must include the following conditions  Sustained Contact: the more time you spend with them the less likely you are to hold a prejudiced view of them.  Mutual Interdependence: the two groups must some how be dependent upon eachother. Two groups must work together.  Equality: be seen or treated equally, or fairly. One group can not be seen as being more powerful over another.  Super-Ordinate goals: when the co-operation of two groups/people is required to complete a task which cannot be completed alone. Cognitive Interventions • This involves teaching people about the way they think about prejudice, with hope that it can be reduced. • Appealing to people and asking them to think about other people’s perspectives. • Getting people to think about the impacts of prejudice and what they can do to stop it from occurring. Sherif’s Robbers Cave experiment read pages 288-289 • Sherif’s classic social psychology experiment named Robbers Cave Experiment dealt with in-group relations, out-group relations and intergroup relations. • The experiment focused heavily on the concept of a ‘group’ and what a perception of belonging to a group can actually do to the relationships of members within it and their relationships with people outside their group. • The same experiment also tried to observe conflicts or ‘friction’ between two groups and the process of cooperation or ‘integration’ of two previously conflicting groups. THREE PHASES OF THE EXPERIMENT 1) Formation of the in-group – this phase involves the experimental creation of ingroups through activities that will promote group identification. 2) Development of negative attitudes towards the out group– this phase involves bringing two experimentally formed groups into conflict with each other or forming intergroup tension. 3) Reduction of inter-group hostility, reduction of prejudice– this phase involves bringing the two previously conflicting groups into cooperation through the attainment of super-ordinate goals. OBSERVATIONS • Definite group structures and dynamics consisting of individual status and roles will be formed when a number of individuals without previously established interpersonal relations interact with one another under similar context and events. • During the Friction Phase, uneasy conflicts produce unfavourable stereotypes in relation to the out-group and its members placing the out-group at a certain social distance. • In an event that a number of conflicting groups are brought together with a common super-ordinate goal and the attainment of which cannot be achieved by the efforts of one group alone, the groups will tend to cooperate towards the achievement of the super-ordinate goal. RESULTS HOMEWORK • • • • • 8.4 All questions 8.9 All questions 8.11 All questions 8.17 questions 1 8.20 All questions POSTER ASSIGNMENT ON REMEMBER THE TITANS