Editing Cognitive dissonance (section)

== Alternative paradigms ==
[[File:Honoré Daumier 018.jpg|thumb|150px|Dissonant self-perception: A lawyer can experience cognitive dissonance if he must defend as innocent a client he thinks is guilty. From the perspective of ''The Theory of Cognitive Dissonance: A Current Perspective'' (1969), the lawyer might experience cognitive dissonance if his false statement about his guilty client contradicts his identity as a lawyer and an honest man.]]

=== Self-perception theory===
In ''Self-perception: An alternative interpretation of cognitive dissonance phenomena'' (1967), the social psychologist [[Daryl Bem]] proposed the [[self-perception theory]] whereby people do not think much about their attitudes, even when engaged in a conflict with another person. The Theory of Self-perception proposes that people develop attitudes by observing their own behaviour, and concludes that their attitudes caused the behaviour observed by self-perception; especially true when internal cues either are ambiguous or weak. Therefore, the person is in the same position as an observer who must rely upon external cues to infer their inner state of mind. Self-perception theory proposes that people adopt attitudes without access to their states of mood and cognition.<ref name="Bem, D. 1967"/>

As such, the experimental subjects of the Festinger and Carlsmith study (''Cognitive Consequences of Forced Compliance'', 1959) inferred their mental attitudes from their own behaviour. When the subject-participants were asked: "Did you find the task interesting?", the participants decided that they must have found the task interesting, because that is what they told the questioner. Their replies suggested that the participants who were paid twenty dollars had an external incentive to adopt that positive attitude, and likely perceived the twenty dollars as the reason for saying the task was interesting, rather than saying the task actually was interesting.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Bem DJ | year = 1965 | title = An Experimental Analysis of Self-persuasion|doi = 10.1016/0022-1031(65)90026-0 | journal = Journal of Experimental Social Psychology | volume = 1 | issue = 3| pages = 199–218 }}</ref><ref name="Bem, D. 1967">{{cite journal | vauthors = Bem DJ | title = Self-perception: An alternative interpretation of cognitive dissonance phenomena | journal = Psychological Review | volume = 74 | issue = 3 | pages = 183–200 | date = May 1967 | pmid = 5342882 | doi = 10.1037/h0024835 | citeseerx = 10.1.1.323.833 }}</ref>

The theory of self-perception (Bem) and the theory of cognitive dissonance (Festinger) make identical predictions, but only the theory of cognitive dissonance predicts the presence of unpleasant [[arousal]], of psychological distress, which were verified in laboratory experiments.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Zanna MP, Cooper J | title = Dissonance and the pill: an attribution approach to studying the arousal properties of dissonance | journal = Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | volume = 29 | issue = 5 | pages = 703–709 | date = May 1974 | pmid = 4833431 | doi = 10.1037/h0036651 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Kiesler CA, Pallak MS | title = Arousal properties of dissonance manipulations | journal = Psychological Bulletin | volume = 83 | issue = 6 | pages = 1014–1025 | date = November 1976 | pmid = 996211 | doi = 10.1037/0033-2909.83.6.1014 }}</ref>

In ''The Theory of Cognitive Dissonance: A Current Perspective''<ref name="Aronson, E. 1969 pp. 1–34"/> (Aronson, Berkowitz, 1969), [[Elliot Aronson]] linked cognitive dissonance to the [[self-concept]]: That mental stress arises when the conflicts among cognitions threatens the person's positive self-image. This reinterpretation of the original Festinger and Carlsmith study, using the induced-compliance paradigm, proposed that the dissonance was between the cognitions "I am an honest person." and "I lied about finding the task interesting."<ref name="Aronson, E. 1969 pp. 1–34">{{cite book|doi=10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60075-1|chapter=The Theory of Cognitive Dissonance: A Current Perspective|title=Advances in Experimental Social Psychology|volume=4|pages=1–34|year=1969| vauthors = Aronson E |isbn=9780120152049|publisher=Academic Press| veditors = Berkowitz L }}</ref>

The study ''Cognitive Dissonance: Private Ratiocination or Public Spectacle?''<ref name= TedeschiSchlenker1971/> (Tedeschi, Schlenker, etc. 1971) reported that maintaining cognitive consistency, rather than protecting a private self-concept, is how a person protects their public [[self-image]].<ref name= TedeschiSchlenker1971>{{cite journal | vauthors = Tedeschi JT, Schlenker BR, Bonoma TB | year = 1971 | title = Cognitive Dissonance: Private Ratiocination or Public Spectacle? | journal = American Psychologist | volume = 26 | issue = 8| pages = 685–695 | doi = 10.1037/h0032110 }}</ref> Moreover, the results reported in the study ''I'm No Longer Torn After Choice: How Explicit Choices Implicitly Shape Preferences of Odors'' (2010) contradict such an explanation, by showing the occurrence of revaluation of material items, after the person chose and decided, even after having forgotten the choice.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Coppin G, Delplanque S, Cayeux I, Porcherot C, Sander D | title = I'm no longer torn after choice: how explicit choices implicitly shape preferences of odors | journal = Psychological Science | volume = 21 | issue = 4 | pages = 489–493 | date = April 2010 | pmid = 20424088 | doi = 10.1177/0956797610364115 | s2cid = 28612885 }}</ref>

=== Balance theory===
{{main|Balance theory}}
[[Fritz Heider]] proposed a motivational theory of attitudinal change that derives from the idea that humans are driven to establish and maintain psychological balance. The driving force for this balance is known as the ''consistency motive'', which is an urge to maintain one's values and beliefs consistent over time. Heider's conception of psychological balance has been used in theoretical models measuring cognitive dissonance.<ref name="Wagner, D. A. 2014">{{cite thesis |id={{ProQuest|1906281562}} | vauthors = Wagner DA |year=2014 |title=The Marketing of Global Warming: A Repeated Measures Examination of the Effects of Cognitive Dissonance, Endorsement, and Information on Beliefs in a Social Cause }}</ref>

According to balance theory, there are three interacting elements: (1) the self (P), (2) another person (O), and (3) an element (X). These are each positioned at one vertex of a triangle and share two relations:<ref>{{Cite book |volume=8|title=Nebraska Symposium on Motivation |date=1960 |publisher=University of Nebraska Press |isbn=978-0-8032-0601-4 |location=Lincoln |language=en |oclc=10678550 | veditors = Jones MR | vauthors = Heider F |chapter=The Gestalt Theory of Motivation|pages=145–172}}</ref>

:''Unit relations'' – things and people that belong together based on similarity, proximity, fate, etc.
:''Sentiment relations'' – evaluations of people and things (liking, disliking)

Under balance theory, human beings seek a balanced state of relations among the three positions. This can take the form of three positives or two negatives and one positive:

:''P = you''
:''O = your child''
:''X = picture your child drew''
::"I love my child"
::"She drew me this picture"
::"I love this picture"

People also avoid unbalanced states of relations, such as three negatives or two positives and one negative:

:''P = you''
:''O = John''
:''X = John's dog''
::"I don't like John"
::"John has a dog"
::"I don't like the dog either"

===Cost–benefit analysis===
In the study ''On the Measurement of the Utility of Public Works'' (1969),<ref name=Dupuit1969/> [[Jules Dupuit]] reported that behaviors and cognitions can be understood from an economic perspective, wherein people engage in the systematic process of comparing the costs and benefits of a decision. The psychological process of cost-benefit comparisons helps the person to assess and justify the feasibility (spending money) of an economic decision, and is the basis for determining if the benefit outweighs the cost, and to what extent. Moreover, although the method of cost-benefit analysis functions in economic circumstances, men and women remain psychologically inefficient at comparing the costs against the benefits of their economic decision.<ref name=Dupuit1969>Dupuit, J. (1969). "[http://competitionandappropriation.com/history-of-economic-thought/1870s-marginal-revolution/pre-margianalist/dupuit/on-the-measurement-of-public-works/ On the Measurement of the Utility of Public Works] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191017170953/http://competitionandappropriation.com/history-of-economic-thought/1870s-marginal-revolution/pre-margianalist/dupuit/on-the-measurement-of-public-works/ |date=2019-10-17 }}", ''Readings in Welfare''</ref>

===Self-discrepancy theory===

[[E. Tory Higgins]] proposed that people have three selves, to which they compare themselves:

# ''Actual self'' – representation of the attributes the person believes themself to possess (basic self-concept)
# ''Ideal self'' – ideal attributes the person would like to possess (hopes, aspiration, motivations to change)
# ''Ought self'' – ideal attributes the person believes they should possess (duties, obligations, responsibilities)

When these self-guides are contradictory psychological distress (cognitive dissonance) results. People are motivated to reduce [[self-discrepancy theory|self-discrepancy]] (the gap between two self-guides).<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Higgins ET | title = Self-discrepancy: a theory relating self and affect | journal = Psychological Review | volume = 94 | issue = 3 | pages = 319–340 | date = July 1987 | pmid = 3615707 | doi = 10.1037/0033-295X.94.3.319 | citeseerx = 10.1.1.586.1458 }}</ref>

===Averse consequences vs. inconsistency===
In the 1980s, Cooper and Fazio argued that dissonance was caused by aversive consequences, rather than inconsistency. According to this interpretation, the belief that lying is wrong and hurtful, not the inconsistency between cognitions, is what makes people feel bad.<ref>{{cite book |doi=10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60121-5 |chapter=A New Look at Dissonance Theory |title=Advances in Experimental Social Psychology Volume 17 |year=1984 | vauthors = Cooper J, Fazio RH |volume=17 |pages=229–266 |isbn=978-0-12-015217-9 }}</ref> Subsequent research, however, found that people experience dissonance even when they believe they have not done anything wrong. For example, Harmon-Jones and colleagues showed that people experience dissonance even when the consequences of their statements are beneficial—as when they convince sexually active students to use condoms, when they, themselves are not using condoms.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Harmon-Jones E, Brehm JW, Greenberg J, Simon L, Nelson DE | year = 1996 | title = Evidence that the production of aversive consequences is not necessary to create cognitive dissonance | url = http://www.socialemotiveneuroscience.org/pubs/hj_etal96.pdf | journal = Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | volume = 70 | issue = 1 | pages = 5–16 | doi = 10.1037/0022-3514.70.1.5 | access-date = 2010-02-08 | archive-date = 2017-08-08 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170808144015/http://www.socialemotiveneuroscience.org/pubs/hj_etal96.pdf | url-status = dead }}</ref>

===Criticism of the free-choice paradigm===
In the study ''How Choice Affects and Reflects Preferences: Revisiting the Free-choice Paradigm''<ref name= "ChenRisen2010">{{cite journal | vauthors = Chen MK, Risen JL | title = How choice affects and reflects preferences: revisiting the free-choice paradigm | journal = Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | volume = 99 | issue = 4 | pages = 573–594 | date = October 2010 | pmid = 20658837 | doi = 10.1037/a0020217 | s2cid = 13829505 | citeseerx = 10.1.1.519.808 }}</ref> (Chen, Risen, 2010) the researchers criticized the free-choice paradigm as invalid, because the rank-choice-rank method is inaccurate for the study of cognitive dissonance.<ref name= "ChenRisen2010"/> That the designing of research-models relies upon the assumption that, if the experimental subject rates options differently in the second survey, then the attitudes of the subject towards the options have changed. That there are other reasons why an experimental subject might achieve different rankings in the second survey; perhaps the subjects were indifferent between choices.

Although the results of some follow-up studies (e.g. ''Do Choices Affect Preferences? Some Doubts and New Evidence'', 2013) presented evidence of the unreliability of the rank-choice-rank method,<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1111/j.1559-1816.2012.00983.x|title=Do Choices Affect Preferences? Some Doubts and New Evidence|journal=Journal of Applied Social Psychology|volume=43|pages=83–94|year=2013| vauthors = Holden S |url=http://folk.uio.no/sholden/publikasjoner/cog-dis-article-jasp.pdf|hdl=10419/30503|s2cid=142543205}}</ref> the results of studies such as ''Neural Correlates of Cognitive Dissonance and Choice-induced Preference Change'' (2010) have not found the Choice-Rank-Choice method to be invalid, and indicate that making a choice can change the preferences of a person.<ref name="Egan et al."/><ref name="Izuma et al.">{{cite journal | vauthors = Izuma K, Matsumoto M, Murayama K, Samejima K, Sadato N, Matsumoto K | title = Neural correlates of cognitive dissonance and choice-induced preference change | journal = Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America | volume = 107 | issue = 51 | pages = 22014–22019 | date = December 2010 | pmid = 21135218 | pmc = 3009797 | doi = 10.1073/pnas.1011879108 | doi-access = free | bibcode = 2010PNAS..10722014I }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Sharot T, Velasquez CM, Dolan RJ | title = Do decisions shape preference? Evidence from blind choice | journal = Psychological Science | volume = 21 | issue = 9 | pages = 1231–1235 | date = September 2010 | pmid = 20679522 | pmc = 3196841 | doi = 10.1177/0956797610379235 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Risen JL, Chen MK |title=How to Study Choice-Induced Attitude Change: Strategies for Fixing the Free-Choice Paradigm: Fixing the Free-Choice Paradigm |journal=Social and Personality Psychology Compass |date=December 2010 |volume=4 |issue=12 |pages=1151–1164 |doi=10.1111/j.1751-9004.2010.00323.x }}</ref>

===Action–motivation model===
Festinger's original theory did not seek to explain how dissonance works. Why is inconsistency so aversive?<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Harmon-Jones E, Harmon-Jones C |title=Cognitive Dissonance Theory After 50 Years of Development |journal=Zeitschrift für Sozialpsychologie |date=January 2007 |volume=38 |issue=1 |pages=7–16 |doi=10.1024/0044-3514.38.1.7 |citeseerx=10.1.1.569.8667 }}</ref>  The action–motivation model seeks to answer this question. It proposes that inconsistencies in a person's cognition cause mental stress because psychological inconsistency interferes with the person's functioning in the [[Reality|real world]]. Among techniques for coping, the person may choose to exercise a behavior that is inconsistent with their current attitude (a belief, an ideal, a value system), but later try to alter that belief to make it consistent with a current behavior; the cognitive dissonance occurs when the person's cognition does not match the action taken. If the person changes the current attitude, after the dissonance occurs, they are then obligated to commit to that course of behavior.

Cognitive dissonance produces a state of [[affect (psychology)|negative affect]], which motivates the person to reconsider the causative behavior in order to resolve the psychological inconsistency that caused the mental stress.<ref name = human/><ref name="Harmon-Jones, E. 1999. pp. 71" /><ref name =dissonance/><ref>Jones, E. E., Gerard, H. B., 1967. Foundations of Social Psychology. New York: Wiley.{{page needed|date=November 2021}}</ref><ref name="McGregor et al 1999">{{cite book |doi=10.1037/10318-013 |chapter='Remembering' dissonance: Simultaneous accessibility of inconsistent cognitive elements moderates epistemic discomfort |title=Cognitive dissonance: Progress on a pivotal theory in social psychology |year=1999 | vauthors = McGregor I, Newby-Clark IR, Zanna MP  |pages=325–353 |isbn=1-55798-565-0 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Newby-Clark IR, McGregor I, Zanna MP | title = Thinking and caring about cognitive inconsistency: when and for whom does attitudinal ambivalence feel uncomfortable? | journal = Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | volume = 82 | issue = 2 | pages = 157–166 | date = February 2002 | pmid = 11831406 | doi = 10.1037/0022-3514.82.2.157 }}</ref> As the affected person works towards a behavioral commitment, the motivational process then is activated in the left [[frontal cortex]] of the brain.<ref name =human>{{cite journal | vauthors = Beckmann J, Kuhl J |title=Altering information to gain action control: Functional aspects of human information processing in decision making |journal=Journal of Research in Personality |date=June 1984 |volume=18 |issue=2 |pages=224–237 |doi=10.1016/0092-6566(84)90031-x }}</ref><ref name="Harmon-Jones, E. 1999. pp. 71">{{cite book |doi=10.1037/10318-004 |chapter=Toward an understanding of the motivation underlying dissonance effects: Is the production of aversive consequences necessary? |title=Cognitive dissonance: Progress on a pivotal theory in social psychology |year=1999 | vauthors = Harmon-Jones E |pages=71–99 |isbn=1-55798-565-0 }}</ref><ref name =dissonance>{{cite journal | vauthors = Harmon-Jones E | s2cid = 2024700 | year = 2000a | title = Cognitive Dissonance and Experienced Negative Affect: Evidence that Dissonance Increases Experienced Negative Affect even in the Absence of Aversive Consequences | journal = Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin | volume = 26 | issue = 12| pages = 1490–1501 | doi=10.1177/01461672002612004}}</ref><ref>Jones, E. E., Gerard, H. B., 1967. Foundations of Social Psychology. New York: Wiley.{{page needed|date=November 2021}}</ref><ref name="McGregor et al 1999"/>

===Predictive dissonance model===
The predictive dissonance model proposes that cognitive dissonance is fundamentally related to the [[predictive coding]] (or predictive processing) model of cognition.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Kaaronen RO | title = A Theory of Predictive Dissonance: Predictive Processing Presents a New Take on Cognitive Dissonance | journal = Frontiers in Psychology | volume = 9 | issue = 12 | pages = 2218 | year = 2018 | pmid = 30524333 | pmc = 6262368 | doi = 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02218 | doi-access = free }}</ref> A predictive processing account of the mind proposes that perception actively involves the use of a [[Bayesian inference|Bayesian]] hierarchy of acquired prior knowledge, which primarily serves the role of predicting incoming [[proprioception|proprioceptive]], [[interoception|interoceptive]] and [[exteroception|exteroceptive]] sensory inputs. Therefore, the brain is an inference machine that attempts to actively predict and explain its sensations. Crucial to this inference is the minimization of [[predictive coding|prediction error]]. The predictive dissonance account proposes that the motivation for cognitive dissonance reduction is related to an organism's active drive for reducing prediction error. Moreover, it proposes that human (and perhaps other animal) brains have evolved to selectively ignore contradictory information (as proposed by dissonance theory) to prevent the [[overfitting]] of their predictive cognitive models to local and thus non-generalizing conditions. The predictive dissonance account is highly compatible with the action-motivation model since, in practice, prediction error can arise from unsuccessful behavior.