Cognitive Dissonance

Which domains in life produce the greatest potential for regret, and what features of those life domains explain why? Using archival and laboratory evidence, the authors show that greater perceived opportunity within life domains evokes more intense regret. This pattern is consistent with previous publications demonstrating greater regret stemming from high rather than low opportunity or choice. A meta-analysis of 11 regret ranking studies revealed that the top six biggest regrets in life center on (in descending order) education, career, romance, parenting, the self, and leisure. Study Set 2 provided new laboratory evidence that directly linked the regret ranking to perceived opportunity. Study Set 3 ruled out an alternative interpretation involving framing effects. Overall, these findings show that people's biggest regrets are a reflection of where in life they see their largest opportunities; that is, where they see tangible prospects for change, growth, and renewal.

Clinical psychology has developed into many theories enhancing different parts or dynamics of the psyche. The common link is that these theories are all dealing with intrapsychic conflict (IPC). Yet in psychotherapy, patients may have multiple levels of conflicts which do not all refer to the same structure. Analyzing patients in the limits of one theory may be a hindrance to the patient's development. Festinger's Theory of Cognitive Dissonance appears as a means to concentrate on the conflict itself, when it is actual, rather than only on the personality, or personalities, within an individual. It allows the exploration, not only of multiple levels within the personality, but of the multiple levels included in a conflict, such as relational, psycho-sociological, cultural, intellectual, philosophical, spiritual, relative to survival, emotions, interactions, drives, and thus addresses conflicts that arise from daily life.

A substantial minority of patients with terminal illness hold unrealistically hopeful beliefs about the severity of their disease or the nature of its treatment, considering therapy as curative rather than palliative. We propose that this attitude may be understood as selfdeception, following the current psychological theories about this topic. In this article we suggest that the reason these patients deceive themselves is to preserve their belief systems. According to some philosophical accounts, the human belief system (HBS) is constituted as a web with a few stable central nodes -deep-seated beliefs -intimately related with the self. We hypothesize that the mind may possess defensive mechanisms, mostly non-conscious, that reject certain sensory inputs (e.g., a fatal diagnosis) that may undermine deep-seated beliefs. This interpretation is in line with the theory of cognitive dissonance. Following this reasoning, we also propose that HBS-related self-deception would entail a lower cognitive load than that associated with confronting the truth: whereas the latter would engage a myriad of high cognitive functions to re-configure crucial aspects of the self, including the setting of plans, goals, or even a behavioral output, the former would be mostly non-conscious. Overall, we believe that our research supports the hypothesis that in cases of terminal illness, (self-)deceiving requires less effort than accepting the truth.

The costs of defects and quality issues in construction can be significant for stakeholders and can include societal consequences. The aim is to address how failures and defects are produced and handled in the social practices of construction projects and specially to scrutinize the unintended consequences of both structured and chaotic problem solving. The argument is based on a longitudinal ethnographic study of a dwelling project, encompassing just over 100 days of fieldwork. Structuration theory was applied to understand the interrelations between project actors and structures in the handling and redressing of quality issues and to elucidate unintended consequences of the practices. The analytical strategy was abductive, allowing theory and empirical material to inform each other. Two cases were selected; the well-structured process of erecting concrete panels and the chaotic processes of building a penthouse. The results show how routine and experience are helpful, but also how they maintain an "acceptable" level of defects, which should change the widespread appreciation of experience as being positive for building quality. The unintended consequences of routinized practices are corroborated by the lack of knowledge sharing beyond the project. Both reactive and proactive problem-solving practices are important, but the reactive tend to dominate.

Building on the work of Lavy and van den Hout (Lavy, E. H., & van den Hout, M. A. (1994a). Cognitive avoidance and attentional bias: Causal relationships. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 18 (2) 179-191; Lavy, E. H., & van den Hout, M. A. (1994b). Cognitive avoidance and attentional bias: Causal relationships. Behavior Therapy, 24, 645-657), the purpose of the present study was to examine a functional relationship between thought suppression and attentional bias for snake-related thoughts. It was hypothesized that thought suppression is causally involved in the emergence of attentional bias. An experiment was conducted with 71 snake-fearful and non-snake-fearful participants to investigate whether instructions for suppression were sufficient to induce an attentional bias toward snake-related words.

Using Cognitive Dissonance to Encourage Water Conservation] ... CHRIS ANN DICKERSON Graduate School of Public Policy University of California at Berkeley ... RUTH THIBODEAU, ELLIOT ARONSON,' AND DAYNA MILLER University of California at Santa Cruz

Thirty-four female patients who underwent rhinoplasty were followed through assessment of postsurgical satisfaction (pss), perception of subjective improvement, objective improvement (surgeon's ratings), and objective post-surgical nasal deformity. Assessments of pss and subjective improvement were obtained on 3 occasions: TI, 1 week after surgery, on cast removal; T2, 1 month after cast removal; and T3, 3 months after cast removal. The investigation was aimed at examination of the relationship of patients' subjective post-surgical appraisals of the operation with objective indices of outcome of rhinoplasty. Results indicated that at Tj, pss is totally dissociated from objective outcome or its appraisal by the patient. At T2 an association between objective outcome and pss and subjective appraisal of outcome is evident, but seems to reflect the total reliance of the patients' judgment on surgeons' appraisals. At T3 a paradoxical trend is indicated: slim objective favorable outcomes correlate with high pss, while a considerable share of patients with whom a highly favorable outcome has been attained express relatively low pss. This paradoxical trend may be well understood when applying Cognitive Dissonance Theory. The whole pattern of results point again at highly complex and powerful psychological processes, some of them seemingly irrational, operating within patients when relating to rhinoplasty, a simple superficial surgical procedure.

This article provides an early account to document Swedens strategy to the COVID-19 pandemic and critically examines the countrys crisis response during the first six months of 2020. Sweden stood out internationally with a hands-off approach that gained much attention. Schools remained open, no lock-downs were underaken, no face masks reccommended, even in care homes, and testing-tracing-isolation was very limited. Although Swedens death rate per million was among the seven highest in the world during the period, there was no change in strategy. The article employs concepts to analyse and understand this peculiar approach and the secutity culture and political culture underpinning it. It uncovers deeper systemic defects and a breakdown in the state functions accom-panyied by secrecy and cover-ups, as well as a totalitarian element in the political culture.

Stimuli that resemble humans, but are not perfectly human-like, are disliked compared to distinctly human and non-human stimuli. Accounts of this "Uncanny Valley" effect often focus on how changes in human resemblance can evoke different emotional responses. We present an alternate account based on the novel hypothesis that the Uncanny Valley is not directly related to 'human-likeness' per se, but instead reflects a more general form of stimulus devaluation that occurs when inhibition is triggered to resolve conflict between competing stimulus-related representations. We consider existing support for this inhibitory-devaluation hypothesis and further assess its feasibility through tests of two corresponding predictions that arise from the link between conflict-resolving inhibition and aversive response: (1) that the pronounced disliking of Uncanny-type stimuli will occur for any image that strongly activates multiple competing stimulus representations, even in the ...

The consonance constraint-satisfaction model, which has simulated the major paradigms of classical cognitive dissonance theory, is here extended to deal with more contemporary findings concerning self-affirmation phenomena in dissonance reduction. The key addition to the model, which has also figured in recent simulations of arousal phenomena, is to lessen activity level within the neural network model in selfaffirmation conditions. These and other simulations continue to show that dissonance phenomena can be explained in terms of constraint satisfaction.

In diesem Aufsatz wird untersucht, wie Tiernutzung und Fleischkonsum zu einer umstrittenen Praxis werden konnten. Erst eine Analyse der Genese dieser moralischen Problematisierung ermöglicht ein Verständnis der komplexen soziokulturellen Hintergründe jener Dissonanz, die in der Sozialpsychologie unter dem Schlagwort des »Fleischparadoxes« untersucht wird. Die Geschichte dieser Problematisierung wird in vier Schritten nachvollzogen: 1) Zunächst wird argumentiert, dass das Auftreten des Paradoxes vor dem Hintergrund von Spannungen und Verschiebungen innerhalb des spezifisch modernen Diskurses über die Mensch-Tier-Differenz verstanden werden muss. Im Anschluss an Philippe Descola wird gezeigt, dass das Fleischparadox keinen grundsätzlichen ontologischen Bruch anzeigt, sondern mit sich verschärfenden Konflikten innerhalb der modernen naturalistischen Weltsicht einhergeht. Ergänzt wird dies durch Argumente Gesa Lindemanns, die auf den konstitutiven wie umkämpften Stellenwert der Tier-Mensch-Grenze für die Konzeption sowohl des modernen Individuums als auch der modernen Rechts-, Moral- und Gewaltordnung verweist. 2) In einem zweiten Schritt werden die zunehmenden Spannungen an der Tier-Mensch-Grenze mit Norbert Eliasʼ Theorie des Zivilisationsprozesses verknüpft. Eine solche Verknüpfung hat den Vorteil, dass die Veränderungen im Mensch-Tier-Verhältnis auf ein breites Spektrum historischer makro- und mikrosozialer Transformationen zurückgeführt werden können. Mit Elias lässt sich die wachsende affektive Aversion gegenüber Gewalt im Allgemeinen, aber auch die Verlagerung der Fleischproduktion »hinter die Kulissen« verstehen. Zugleich kann durch die Verortung der Zivilisationsdynamik in einem spezifischen sozialontologischen Rahmen der im Hinblick auf Elias vorgebrachte Ethnozentrismusvorwurf umgangen werden. 3) In einem dritten Schritt werden Transformationen der Wirtschaftsstruktur und die mit ihnen verbundenen Veränderungen der Kontaktmuster zwischen Menschen und Tieren betrachtet. Im Zuge von Urbanisierung und Industrialisierung ging der Kontakt zu Nutz- und Wildtieren für viele Menschen deutlich zurück, während sich parallel die Heimtierhaltung verbreitete. Im Verein mit einem generellen Wandel des Naturverhältnisses ermöglichte dieser Prozess eine zuvor ungekannte Sensibilisierung gegenüber Tierleid. 4) Das Aufkommen der Tierschutz-, später auch der Tierrechtsbewegung, sowie von vegetarischen und veganen Lebensstilen kann schließlich als ein Ausdruck der ontologischen Spannungen und der wachsenden Sensibilisierung gegenüber Gewalt und Tierleid interpretiert werden, der jedoch nur durch Vorstellungen gesellschaftlicher Veränderbarkeit und politischer Gestaltbarkeit sowie durch die Entstehung demokratischer Öffentlichkeiten möglich wurde. Nach ihrer Konstituierung und organisationalen Verankerung konnten diese Protest- und Lebensstilbewegungen dann selbst Motor einer weiteren Sensibilisierung und Problematisierung von Tierleid und Fleischkonsum werden.

During the past 20 years, increasing numbers of academic studies, industry studies, and public opinion polls have assessed relative levels of public learning from news media and public perceptions of U.S. news media's accuracy, believability, credibility, bias, honesty, and other characteristics. From the early 1980s, if not earlier, until the mid-to late 1990s, local television outscored newspapers. Newspapers are now gaining because of decreasing quality in local television news, even if the public believes newspapers are getting better. The article suggests that cognitive dissonance and low media literacy were largely responsible for the intervening overrating of television.

En el marco de la Pasantía en Escuelas Especiales del área, docentes y estudiantes atendemos niños, niñas y adolescentes derivados por la institución educativa. Se busca que los estudiantes tengan un acercamiento a la psicopatología que presenta esta población, en el marco de una práctica supervisada. Por otra parte los docentes, atendemos aquellos niños que por diferentes motivos no han tenido una atención regular y para los cuales la Institución requiere una orientación por parte de los técnicos. Muchas veces la derivación se produce a punto de partida de la percepción por parte del maestro o director de que estos niños “no son para esta escuela”, sensación que suele ser compartida por los estudiantes al inicio de las pasantías. Presentamos este caso clínico con el objetivo de ilustrar el trabajo que realizamos en este marco y reflexionar sobre las complejidades propias de la clínica con niños en instituciones hoy.

Nos invitamos a pensar la pregunta ¿Qué es lo que desconcierta en estos niños que no parece encontrar un lugar en las instituciones educativas?, ¿qué surge del encuentro en el campo clínico con cuadros que desbordan las categorías psicopatológicas clásicas y requieren de abordajes e intervenciones más integrales que den cuenta de la complejidad del sujeto que viene (o es enviado) a nuestro encuentro?

Palabras Clave:
Discapacidad Intelectual – Escuelas Especiales – Psicopatología infantil

According to system justification theory, people are motivated to preserve the belief that existing social arrangements are fair, legitimate, justifiable, and necessary. The strongest form of this hypothesis, which draws on the logic of cognitive dissonance theory, holds that people who are most disadvantaged by the status quo would have the greatest psychological need to reduce ideological dissonance and would therefore be most likely to support, defend, and justify existing social systems, authorities, and outcomes. Variations on this hypothesis were tested in five US national survey studies. We found that (a) low-income respondents and African Americans were more likely than others to support limitations on the rights of citizens and media representatives to criticize the government; (b) low-income Latinos were more likely to trust in US government officials and to believe that 'the government is run for the benefit of all' than were high-income Latinos; (c) low-income respondents were more likely than high-income respondents to believe that large differences in pay are necessary to foster motivation and effort; (d) Southerners in the USA were more likely to endorse meritocratic belief systems than were Northerners and poor and Southern African Americans were more likely to subscribe to meritocratic ideologies than were African Americans who were more affluent and from the North; (e) low-income respondents and African Americans were more likely than others to believe that economic inequality is legitimate and necessary; and (f) stronger endorsement of meritocratic ideology was associated with greater satisfaction with one's own economic situation. Taken together, these findings are consistent with the dissonance-based argument that people who suffer the most from a given state of affairs are paradoxically the least likely to question, challenge, reject, or change it. Implications for theories of system justification, cognitive dissonance, and social change are also discussed.

Aim:  To estimate the prevalence of tobacco smoking among physiotherapy and nursing students at the University of the Balearic Islands in Spain and to describe their perceptions, attitude and behaviour towards smoking and towards the Spanish Smoking Prevention Act.Background:  Active smoking is the first avoidable cause of death in the world while passive smoking is the third. The tobacco epidemic kills 5.4 million people a year from lung cancer, heart disease and other related illnesses. In Europe, around one-third of the Community population are smokers, with about 650 000 smoking-related deaths per year in the Community. In Spain, 56 000 people a year are estimated to die from tobacco-related illnesses.Method:  An observational, cross-sectional, descriptive study, with a sample of 345 out of 645 students (53.5% participation rate) who completed an anonymous, self-administered, standardized survey devised by the World Health Organization.Findings:  The study revealed a 26.1% prevalence of tobacco smoking (26.9% among women and 22.6% among men), which is similar to percentages of students at other Spanish universities. Smokers and non-smokers reported many differences in attitude and behaviour, some of which have potential repercussions in their career, such as in estimating the harmful effects of tobacco smoke or the status of health professionals as role models in the society they serve.Conclusion:  The results of this study will contribute to develop an anti-smoking programme at the university and to establish smoking-prevention campaigns.

ObjectiveNegative body image, a common problem among college-age women in the United States, strongly correlates with low self-esteem, disturbed eating behavior, and eating disorders. Psychoeducational programs have inconsistently shown improvement in body image, thin-ideal internalization, eating behaviors, psychosocial functioning, and self-esteem.Negative body image, a common problem among college-age women in the United States, strongly correlates with low self-esteem, disturbed eating behavior, and eating disorders. Psychoeducational programs have inconsistently shown improvement in body image, thin-ideal internalization, eating behaviors, psychosocial functioning, and self-esteem.MethodIn the current study, college women with body image concerns (N = 84) were randomly assigned to a cognitive dissonance-based, thin-ideal internalization, single-session workshop (DTI; n = 26); a psychoeducational, healthy behavior, single-session workshop (HB; n = 24); or a wait-list control (WL; n = 34).In the current study, college women with body image concerns (N = 84) were randomly assigned to a cognitive dissonance-based, thin-ideal internalization, single-session workshop (DTI; n = 26); a psychoeducational, healthy behavior, single-session workshop (HB; n = 24); or a wait-list control (WL; n = 34).ResultsComparing baseline data with 4-week follow-up data, results indicated that both DTI and HB participants reported improvement in body image, thin-ideal internalization, and eating behaviors.Comparing baseline data with 4-week follow-up data, results indicated that both DTI and HB participants reported improvement in body image, thin-ideal internalization, and eating behaviors.DiscussionResults provide evidence that both interventions effectively reduce risk factors for eating pathology. © 2004 by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Eat Disord 36: 376–388, 2004.Results provide evidence that both interventions effectively reduce risk factors for eating pathology. © 2004 by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Eat Disord 36: 376–388, 2004.

With age and the onset of the elderly, people are more prone to mental disorders including feeling of loneliness, anxiety, and depression, due to numerous losses such as loss of spouse, relatives, friends, occupation, social and economic status, beliefs, etc., as well as due to the reduction of physiological functions and mobility. Accordingly, this study aims to compare the effectiveness of metacognitive therapy and spiritual therapy on cognitive dissonance and feeling loneliness in the elderly living in nursing homes. This was a quasi-experimental study with pretest-posttest follow-up (PPF) and control group design. The statistical population consisted of all the elderly, aged from 60 to 75 years living in nursing homes of Tehran, Iran, among which Kahrizak nursing home was selected using convenience sampling method. In this way, 30 aged people (three groups of 10) with an average age of 60-75 years were selected using convenience sampling along with inclusion and exclusion criteria, and were randomly assigned into two experimental and one control groups. Participants were exposed to eight 90minute sessions (2 sessions a week) of Wells' metacognitive therapy and Boalhari's spirituality therapy. The follow-up step was conducted one month after the posttest step. Utilized to collect data were Harmon-Jones dissonance arousal reducing questioner and Dehshiri et al.'s loneliness questionnaires. Data were analyzed using univariate analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) and Bonferroni post-hoc test in SPSS-22. The results demonstrated that both metacognitive therapy and spiritual therapy groups had a significant difference with control group in terms of the components of cognitive dissonance and feeling of loneliness in posttest and follow-up steps (P<0.05). However, there was no significant difference between two groups of metacognitive therapy and spiritual therapy in terms of the components of cognitive dissonance and loneliness (P>0.05). Given the findings of this study, metacognitive therapy and spiritual therapy can be effective in reducing cognitive dissonance and loneliness in the elderly.

Issu de la dissonance cognitive, le paradigme de l'hypocrisie induite illustre le principe suivant : dire une chose et en faire une autre, et vice-versa. L'écart perçu entre la norme et ses comportements passés contrenormatifs éveille un état de dissonance, que l'individu réduira. Nous avons testé dans ce cadre l'hypothèse originale de Festinger : le travail de réduction en fonction du seuil de tolérance à la dissonance opérationnalisé à partir de la fréquence des transgressions passées déclarée par chaque participant. Les participants exposés à la procédure d'hypocrisie avaient la possibilité de réduire leur dissonance par la trivialisation. Conformément à nos attentes, plus les participants déclaraient une fréquence de transgression faible plus ils réduisaient leur dissonance en trivialisant.

Настоящото изследване цели да проследи връзката между когнитивния и емоционален подходи, позиционирайки ги в контекста на социалната психология с посока промяна на нагласите. Теоретичното представяне има за задача да инструментализира „потока на съзнанието“ като литературен подход за репрезентация на актуалните преживявания на личността спрямо неговото развитие, интелект и социални потребности. Приемайки, че съществуващите нагласи към дадени група отдалечават индивида от Другия, който е принадлежащ към нея. От друга страна реализирането на общуване не винаги е възможно, било то заради двустранна безинициативност заради съществуващи нагласи, било то заради невъзможността /интелектуална, социална, патологична/ на субекта, принадлежащ към дадена група. Поставянето на нагласите в условията на когнитивен дисонанс дава възможността за преформулирането на отношението към конкретен субект, който се възприема като относим към дадена категория /група/. Предното ни дава основание да допуснем, че промяната на нагласите към самия субект може да доведе до индуктивно заключение, ако не за цялата, то поне за част от групата. Фундаменталните теории за развитието позволяват да допуснем вероятното актуално възприятие по отношение на действителността на субекти в условия на невъзможност за самопрезентиране, а „потокът на съзнанието“ формула, посредством която априори по отношение на субекта реципиент, да бъдат представени възприятията му за действителността, които са постериорни за инициатора на комуникацията, но не биват активни преди и в момента на реализиране комуникацията. Посоченото дава основание да определим „потока на съзнанието“ като модел на интеракция при междуличностната комуникация.
This study aims to trace the relationship between cognitive and emotional approaches, positioning them in the context of social psychology with a change of attitude. The theoretical presentation has the task of instrumentalizing the "stream of consciousness" as a literary approach to representing the actual experiences of the person towards his development, intellect and social needs. Assuming that, existing attitudes to a particular group move away the individual from the Other that belongs to it. On the other hand, the realization of communication is not always possible, either because of the two-sided lack of initiative because of existing attitudes, or because of the impossibility (intellectual, social, pathological) of the subject belonging to a group. Setting the attitudes in cognitive dissonance gives the opportunity to reformulate the attitude towards a particular subject that is perceived as relevant to a particular category/group. The foregoing gives us a reason to assume that changing attitudes to the subject itself can lead to an inductive conclusion, if not for the whole, at least part of the group. Fundamental developmental theories allows us to talk about the current perception of the reality of subjects in a state of impossibility of self-presentation, and the "stream of consciousness" formula by which apriori to the subject recipient is represented by its perceptions of reality posteriori for the initiator of communication, but are not active before and at the time of communication. That gives us a reason to define the "stream of consciousness" as a model of interaction in interpersonal communication.

This study was designed as an initial test of whether an experiential learning intervention, based on cognitive dissonance theory, would increase college-student smokers' intentions to quit smoking. One hundred forty-four college smokers were asked to prepare educational videos about (1) the risks of smoking or (2) the feasibility of quitting (in a 2 Â 2 factorial design). Main effects for the experimental manipulations were not found. However, an interaction suggested that intentions to quit smoking were increased by either manipulation, but that the effects were not additive. In addition, risk perceptions were increased by the health-risk manipulation alone, but not when quitting feasibility was also targeted. As predicted, smoking history and smoking-related expectancies were both correlated with magnitude of dissonance. Moreover, dissonance magnitude was associated with the reported use of dissonance-reducing strategies, including intending to quit smoking and believing that tobacco use was out of their control due to nicotine addiction. The findings from this initial analogue study suggest that attitudes and intentions to quit smoking can be influenced by a brief experiential intervention.

In a field experiment on water conservation, we aroused dissonance in patrons of the campus recreation facility by making them feel hypocritical about their showering habits. Using a 2 × 2 factorial design, we manipulated subjects “‘mindfulness” that they had sometimes wasted water while showering, and then varied whether they made a “public commitment” urging other people to take shorter showers. The “hypocrisy” condition-in which subjects made the public commitment after being reminded of their past behavior-was expected to be dissonance-arousing, thereby motivating subjects to increase their efforts to conserve water. The results were consistent with this reasoning. Compared to controls, subjects in the hypocrisy condition took significantly shorter showers. Subjects who were merely reminded that they had wasted water, or who only made the public commitment, did not take shorter showers than control subjects. The findings have implications for using cognitive dissonance as means of changing behavior in applied settings, especially those in which people already support the desired goal, but their behavior is not consistent with those beliefs.

Cognitive dissonance has been definitively shown to alter beliefs or perceptions of an individual. The present experiment was designed to test the effects of cognitive dissonance on interpersonal perception and reassertion. Using an induced compliance paradigm, participants were asked to compose essays in favor of handicapped spending in either high or low choice conditions. Participants then read essays for or against handicapped spending and were administered questionnaires designed to obtain opinions toward the author of the essay, measuring likeability. A questionnaire on feelings toward the essay itself, measuring reassertion, was also administered. The questionnaires were hypothesized to act as dissonance reducers. Results indicate but don't confirm that individuals who suffer from dissonance arousal may have altered perceptions of others.

People are often more confident than accurate. Past accounts of this overconfidence effect have focused on social-cognitive mechanisms, such as the biasing effects of judgmental heuristics and the faulty integration of relevant information. The current studies tested the idea that overconfidence is also a product of dissonance reduction. Specifically, we argue that overconfidence can result from a desire to see the self as knowledgeable and competent. In two studies, the motive to view the self as an accurate perceiver elevated confidence, independent of its effect on accuracy. This effect was diminished by manipulations derived from cognitive dissonance theory. In Study 1, confidence ratings were debiased by an affirmation manipulation designed to boost feelings of self-worth. In Study 2, confidence ratings were debiased by a manipulation designed to lower the aversive implications of feeling uncertain. These findings argue for a motivational perspective on overconfidence.

What does it mean to be an American? In Europe and elsewhere, it has been the prolonged association between the populous and the land that has constructed national identities. In Scotland, there are Scots, in Poland, there are Poles, in Switzerland, there are the Swiss, and in India, there are Indians, but in the United States whose population is overwhelmingly descendants from other parts of the globe, the logic of geographic national identity does not quite suffice. So how then is identity constructed?

The monograph is divided into three distinct sections, with each building on the latter. The first section is a rudimentary but necessary examination of American History which focuses specifically on two supposedly quintessential aspects of American History: American Exceptionalism and the logic of Manifest Destiny. The central pages then attempt to unravel the source and nature of American National Identity by deconstructing the prior examination of American Exceptionalism and Manifest Destiny and through that deconstruction exposing America's intrinsic cultural dissonance. The final section deals with contemporary conflicts between American National Identity and the ongoing processes of Globalization, and how these social conflicts are further exasperating the cultural dissonance within the United States.

This monograph originated from an essay I wrote in college which several professors enjoyed, and expanded its central argument. The monograph deals with how the United States developed culturally and the development of its self-image as a nation and the consequences of that development. More specifically, the essay seeks to explain the dissonance between the egalitarian ideals, which the United States and its citizens openly profess, and the simultaneous subjugation, silencing, persecution, and the demonization of minority groups and philosophical rivals, which America and its citizens have routinely engaged in since long before the nation's founding.

The monograph utilizes several disciplines to achieve its central message, including, American history, social psychology (specifically the works of Ernst Becker and Erik Erikson), cultural studies (poststructuralism), global studies (globalization and terrorism), and sociology (anomie).

Human cognition is often biased, from judgments of the time of impact of approaching objects all the way through to estimations of social outcomes in the future. We propose these effects and a host of others may all be understood from an evolutionary psychological perspective. In this paper we elaborate error management theory . Error management theory predicts that if judgments are made under uncertainty, and the costs of false positive and false negative errors have been asymmetric over evolutionary history, selection should have favored a bias toward making the least costly error. This perspective integrates a diverse array of effects under a single explanatory umbrella and it yields new content-specific predictions. The Paranoid Optimist --3 The Paranoid Optimist: An Integrative Evolutionary Model of Cognitive Biases Better safe than sorry. (Folk Wisdom) Nothing ventured, nothing gained. (Contradictory Folk Wisdom)

Using data on individual perceptions of deserved pay for workers in six British local labour markets, this paper tests the implicit proposition of cognitive dissonance theory that workers who express themselves as being overpaid should exhibit lower job satisfaction than equitably paid workers. The regression results do not provide any evidence in support of the proposition.

Two experiments were conducted to disentangle reciprocal relationships between multichannel retailers' offline and online brand images. Results support the cross-channel effect of prior offline brand image on online brand beliefs (biased assimilation) and that of online performance on offline brand beliefs (impact). Consumers' online and offline brand attitudes were influenced by not only brand beliefs from the respective channel but also by beliefs from the other channel. But, strong prior offline brand image was found to mitigate the impact of online performance on offline brand beliefs in the presence of negative online performance (impact minimization) as a way to eliminate cognitive dissonance.

Previous studies have shown great disagreement and debate over the concept of attitude, in the attempts to define as well as measure it. There have been many theories proposed to explain attitude change process, a complex social, cognitive, behavioural process, whose ubiquity and usefulness is unimaginable – our attitudes are constantly being challenged. Research derived from attitude change has broad applicability in society from political propaganda, advertising to consumer purchase decisions. In order to improve and further the applicability, our focus must be on improving the methodological standards of studies and thus endowing greater predictive power to our theories. In this paper, some of the widely studied and accepted theories will be discussed: persuasion, reactance, mere exposure and cognitive dissonance.

While studies have consistently observed an association between pornography use and depressive symptoms, data limitations have precluded understanding the nature of this relationship. Drawing on data from a representative panel study of American adults, and building on insights from stress process theory, this article demonstrates that the connection between pornography use and depressive symptoms hinges on (1) the (in)congruence between Americans' moral beliefs about pornography and their viewing practices and (2) gender. Cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses reveal that American men (not women) who believe viewing pornography is always immoral but watch it anyway are more likely to experience depressive symptoms compared to others who do not report this incongruence. Results also suggest the connection between viewing pornography and depressive symptoms is bi-directional, contingent on men's moral evaluation of its use. For male porn users who morally reject it, pornography use predicts depressive symptoms at low frequencies, likely stemming from cognitive stress or dissonance. For those who do not morally reject porn, however, only viewing it at the highest frequencies is associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms, which suggests reverse causation―depressed men likely view higher levels of pornography as a coping aid, especially they do not view it as immoral.

Denial of responsibility as a mode of dissonance reduction and the conditions under which it is likely to occur were explored in 3 experiments. Two experiments tested and supported the hypothesis that following a counterattitudinal behavior, participants prefer the mode of reduction made available to them first, regardless of whether it is attitude change, trivialization, or denial of responsibility. The 3rd experiment tested and supported the hypothesis that denial of responsibility reduces the negative affective state induced by dissonance. The mechanism of denial of responsibility in dissonance reduction is discussed.

This essay is slated to appear in the festschrift for Alan Culpepper in Brill's Biblical Interpretation Series (2018), Anatomies of the Gospels and Beyond, edited by Mikeal Parsons, Elizabeth Stuthers Malbon, and myself. This essay applies Cognitive-Critical Biblical Analysis to the human development of material behind the texts of Paul's writings as a complement to those who have worked on the material in front of biblical texts, as Alan Culpepper has done with Gospel traditions.

This is the Draft Table of Contents for my forthcoming book (Lexington--hopefully December 2016): Eco-Nihilism: The Philosophical Geopolitics of the Climate Change Apocalypse.

I post it here to give my readers--for whom I'm tremendously grateful--a preview of the book's themes and argument.

Clinical psychology has developed into many theories enhancing different parts or dynamics of the psyche. The common link is that these theories are all dealing with intrapsychic conflict (IPC). Yet in psychotherapy, patients may have multiple levels of conflicts which do not all refer to the same structure. Analyzing patients in the limits of one theory may be a hindrance to the patient’s development. Festinger’s Theory of Cognitive Dissonance appears as a means to concentrate on the conflict itself, when it is actual, rather than only on the personality, or personalities, within an individual. It allows the exploration, not only of multiple levels within the personality, but of the multiple levels included in a conflict, such as relational, psycho-sociological, cultural, intellectual, philosophical, spiritual, relative to survival, emotions, interactions, drives, and thus addresses conflicts that arise from daily life.

This article discusses the implementation of a media literacy program in a college classroom in the form of an extended critique and analysis of Disney's The Little Mermaid. Students' decoding of Disney's messages and their resistance to critique of the film are analyzed using four areas of research: audience research, media literacy, critical pedagogy, and psychology's cognitive dissonance theory.

Internet pornography use (IPU) remains a controversial topic within sexual behavior research fields. Whereas some people report feeling dysregulated in their use of pornography, mental health and medical communities are divided as to whether or not IPU can be addictive. The present review seeks to examine this issue more closely, with a focus on how variables other than pornography use, such as moral disapproval and moral incongruence (i.e., feeling as if one’s behaviors and one’s values about those behaviors are misaligned) might specifically contribute to self-perceived problems around pornography use. Through an examination of recent literature, the present work reviews evidence that moral incongruence about IPU is a common phenomenon and that it is associated with outcomes relevant to current debates about pornography addiction. Specifically, moral incongruence regarding IPU appears to be associated with greater distress about IPU, greater psychological distress in general, greater reports of problems related to IPU, and greater reports of perceived addiction to IPU. The implications of this body of evidence for both clinical and research communities are discussed, and future directions for research are considered.

The purpose of this study is to discover the extent to which consumers are aware of air filling in food packaging, the extent to which deceptive packaging and slack filling – which often result from package downsizing – lead to cognitive dissonance, and the extent to which feelings of cognitive dissonance and being deceived lead consumers to engage in negative post purchase behaviours. The study analysed respondents’ reactions to a series of images of a specific product. The sample consisted of consumers of FMCG products in the UK. Five photographs served as the stimulus material. The first picture showed a well-known brand of premium chocolate in its packaging and then four further pictures each showed a plate with a different amount of chocolate on it, which represented different possible levels of package fill. Consumer expectations of pack fill were positively related to consumers’ post purchase dissonance, and higher dissonance was negatively related to repurchase intentions and positively related to both intended visible and non-visible negative post purchase behaviours, such as switching brand and telling friends to avoid the product. Furthermore, consumers with low product involvement were less likely to repurchase the brand and were more willing to engage in visible and non-visible negative behaviours. The key message from this research is that consumer post purchase dissonance is likely to damage the firm. Although firms may initially achieve increased sales through deceptive packaging and slack filling, these practices risk damaging a brand’s reputation and consumer loyalty to the brand. Firms need to strike a balance between packaging size and content, and as consumer expectations are likely to vary across different products, individual companies should engage in market research and substantive market testing.

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to study the relationship between impulse buying and post-purchase regret in the context of grocery products which requires low involvement. Design / Methodology/ Approach – Exploratory analysis using quantitative approach is employed. The sample is drawn from the individuals who visited Reliance Fresh and Big Baazar (two important retail chains in India). The instrument measures the constructs of post-purchase regret and the impulse buying. As grocery shopping differs from the other types of shopping, some particular variations are explored. Findings – The hypothesis tested shows that there is a positive relationship between post-purchase regret and impulse purchase. It also shows that post-purchase regret changes with the change in income. As per theory, it is expected that those individuals who are more impulsive will experience greater post-purchase regret after impulse purchase than the individuals who are less impulsive. Although the correlation coefficient between impulse buying and post-purchase regret (0.150) is significant, the magnitude is very less. The square of correlation coefficient will be less than 0.5 which indicates a weak relationship between the two. Hence this relationship may be taken as weak superseding significant correlation. Originality / Value – Grocery shopping will help us in understanding the causes and how the consumption behaviour of the population changes. This article shows that we cannot generalize consumer behaviour (without including the factors in that context) because decision making and the buying behaviour gets limited. This will show directions to make strategies for low involvement products. Also very few studies have shown how the post-purchase regret changes with the change in demographics (gender and income). Paper Type – Research Paper