Predicting Voting Choice from Within- versus Across-Subject Attitudes

The relationship of attitudes to both intentions and behavior was investigated in the context of the 1984 presidential election. Davidson and Morrison's (1983) within-subject approach (where an individual's attitudes toward alternative intentions and behaviors are the predictors) was compared to the more typical across-subject approach (where extremity of attitude across subjects is the predictor). Prior to the election, 45 American, undergraduate, registered voters indicated their attitudes and voting intentions toward the presidential candidates. Following the elections voting behavior was assessed. Phi coefficients indicated that an expectancy-value index of attitudes was more closely related to both behavioral intentions and voting behavior with a within- rather than an across-subject analysis (Phi coefficients of .59 & .73 versus .45 & .45 respectively).     

Investigating the social-adjustive and value-expressive functions of well-grounded attitudes: Implications for change and for subsequent behavior

Recent demonstrations of the plausibility of functional theories of persuasion have occurred within advertising contexts or have targeted potentially nebulous or uninvolving attitudes, and may thus have demonstrated the utility of functional explanations of attitude formation rather than attitude change. In the present study, attitudes that participants have acted on and consider important (i.e., the criteria they use to select dating partners) were the targets of persuasion. High and low self-monitoring individuals, who hold different dating attitudes that serve different functions, were exposed to functionally relevant or functionally irrelevant messages that reached either proattitudinal or counterattitudinal conclusions. As anticipated by functional theory, (a) low self-monitoring individuals changed their dating attitudes only after hearing a counterattitudinal message that addressed thevalue-expressive functions their dating attitudes served, whereas (b) high self-monitoring individuals changed their opinions only after hearing a counterattitudinal message that addressed thesocial-adjustive functions served by their dating attitudes. Although the data revealed that important attitudes can be changed via a functionally relevant appeal, only the low self-monitoring individuals subsequently used their changed attitudes to guide their behavior in a subsequent couple-matching task. Implications of these results for functional theories of persuasion and for variations in attitude/behavior consistency were discussed. This research is based on a Master’s thesis conducted by the first author under the direction of the second author.     

Predicting attitudes toward operation Iraqi freedom

98 male and female college students ranging in age from 17 to 22 years (M= 19.2, SD= 1.1) were administered a questionnaire that contained Altemeyer's 20-item Right-Wing Authoritarianism Scale (RWA), questions about the legitimacy of the 2000 presidential election, Mayton's Physical Nonviolence Subscale, and a scale designed to measure attitudes toward Operation Iraqi Freedom. RWA scores, perceptions of the legitimacy of the 2000 presidential election, and scores on the Physical Nonviolence subscale were independent predictors of attitudes toward Operation Iraqi Freedom. In addition, those who had higher RWA scores were more likely to perceive the 2000 presidential election as legitimate. There was no significant correlation between RWA scores and attitudes toward physical nonviolence.     

Attitude accessibility,attitude-behavior consistency,and the strength of the object-evaluation association

Two experiments were conducted in order to examine the accessibility of attitudes from memory as a function of the manner of attitude formation. The findings of the first experiment indicated that subjects could respond more quickly in a response-time task to inquiries about their attitudes when the attitudes were based upon direct behavioral experience with the attitude objects than when they were based upon nonbehavioral experience. It was suggested that, relative to indirect experience, behavioral experience may facilitate the attitude formation process and increase attitude accessibility once the attitude is formed. A second experiment found support for both of these notions. Two additional experiments indicated that repeated association of the attitude object and the attitudinal evaluation enhanced both attitude accessibility and attitude-behavior consistency. It was suggested that the strength of the object-evaluation association is a critical determinant of accessibility, which, in turn, acts as a central factor in the process by which attitudes affect later behavior. It was further suggested that the manner of attitude formation affects attitude-behavior consistency because direct experience produces a stronger object-evaluation association and, hence, a more accessible attitude than does indirect experience.     

Using Attitude Strength to Predict Registration and Voting Behavior in the 2004 U.S. Presidential Elections

This study examined attitude strength in the context of the 2004 U.S. presidential election. Surveys of 299 undergraduates assessed attitudes and attitude strength constructs toward Bush/Kerry. The results suggest that (a) attitude strength constructs, especially importance and value-relevance, predict political behavior, (b) indicators of attitude strength may represent two underlying factors, and (c) attitude strength moderates the attitude-candidate choice relationship. Additional results offered some support for the validity of two new attitude strength constructs: higher order attitudes (participants' attitudes about their attitudes) and polarization of candidate attitudes (the absolute value of the difference in attitudes toward Bush and Kerry).     

On the consistency between attitudes and behavior: Look to the method of attitude formation

A field study and a laboratory experiment were conducted to test the hypothesis that the method by which an attitude was formed is a crucial variable affecting attitude-behavior consistency. It was predicted that people who form their attitudes on the basis of direct behavioral interaction with the attitude object will demonstrate significantly greater attitude-behavior consistency than individuals whose attitudes were formed by other means. In the field study, students with direct prior experience with a housing crisis demonstrated greater consistency between their attitudes and behavioral attempts to alleviate the crisis than did students with similar attitudes but without prior direct experience. In the laboratory experiment, subjects who indicated their attitude toward a variety of puzzle types after working examples of each demonstrated greater consistency between these attitudes and subsequent behavior in a free play situation than subjects with similar attitudes formed on the basis of information given by the experimenter. It was suggested that direct behavioral experience produces an attitude which is more clearly, confidently, and stably maintained than an attitude formed through more indirect means.     

Perceiving stability as a means to attitude certainty: The role of implicit theories of attitudes

This research introduces the concept of implicit theories of attitude stability. Across three studies, individuals are shown to vary both naturally and situationally in their lay theories about the stability of attitudes. Furthermore, these general theories are shown to impact people's certainty in their specific attitudes by shaping their perceptions of the stability of the attitude under consideration. By affecting attitude certainty, implicit theories of attitude stability also influence the extent to which people rely on their attitude when committing to future attitude-relevant behavior. Moreover, following exposure to a persuasive attack, implicit theories are shown to interact with situational perceptions of attitude stability to determine attitude certainty. Collectively, these findings suggest that implicit theories of attitude stability have an important influence on people's attitude certainty, subsequent behavioral intentions, and resistance to persuasive messages. Future directions concerning the potential impact of these theories for other attitudinal phenomena are discussed.     

Political polarization projection: social projection of partisan attitude extremity and attitudinal processes

What influences perceptions of political polarization? The authors examine the polarization of people's own political attitudes as a source of perceived polarization: Individuals with more extreme partisan attitudes perceive greater polarization than individuals with less extreme partisan attitudes. This "polarization projection" was demonstrated in 3 studies in which people estimated the distribution of others' political attitudes: one study with a nationally representative sample concerning the 2008 presidential election, and 2 studies concerning university students evaluating a policy regarding scarce resource allocation. These studies demonstrate that polarization projection occurs simultaneously with and independently of simple projection, the tendency to assume that others share one's partisan political attitudes. Polarization projection may occur partly because people assume that others engage in similar attitudinal processes as the self, such as extensive thought and emotional arousal. The projection of various attitudinal processes was demonstrated in a study concerning health care reform policies. Further supporting this explanation, polarization projection increased when people introspected about their own attitudinal processes, which increased the accessibility of those processes. Implications for perceptions of partisanship, social judgment, and civic behavior are discussed.     

Predicting the Vote: Implicit Attitudes as Predictors of the Future Behavior of Decided and Undecided Voters

Two studies assessed the predictive validity of implicit political attitudes in relation to voting behavior. In Study 1 , we demonstrated the validity of the adopted measure (i.e., the IAT; Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998 ) with a sample of voters who clearly sided with one of the opposing parties. In Study 2 , implicit political preferences were measured in a sample of undecided voters one month before the election, and actual voting behavior was assessed immediately after the election. Results demonstrated that implicit political attitudes were good predictors of future voting behaviors. These findings support the hypothesis of the presence of embryonic attitudes even in the case of those voters who at the explicit and conscious level deny any preference for one of the two opposing candidates.     

Implicit ambivalence from attitude change: an exploration of the PAST model

Traditional models of attitude change have assumed that when people appear to have changed their attitudes in response to new information, their old attitudes disappear and no longer have any impact. The present research suggests that when attitudes change, the old attitude can remain in memory and influence subsequent behavior. Four experiments are reported in which initial attitudes were created and then changed (or not) with new information. In each study, the authors demonstrate that when people undergo attitude change, their old and new attitudes can interact to produce evaluative responses consistent with a state of implicit ambivalence. In Study 1, individuals whose attitudes changed were more neutral on a measure of automatic evaluation. In Study 2, attitude change led people to show less confidence on an implicit but not an explicit measure. In Studies 3 and 4, people whose attitudes changed engaged in greater processing of attitude-relevant information than did individuals whose attitudes were not changed.     

Forming attitudes that predict future behavior: a meta-analysis of the attitude-behavior relation

A meta-analysis (k of conditions = 128; N = 4,598) examined the influence of factors present at the time an attitude is formed on the degree to which this attitude guides future behavior. The findings indicated that attitudes correlated with a future behavior more strongly when they were easy to recall (accessible) and stable over time. Because of increased accessibility, attitudes more strongly predicted future behavior when participants had direct experience with the attitude object and reported their attitudes frequently. Because of the resulting attitude stability, the attitude-behavior association was strongest when attitudes were confident, when participants formed their attitude on the basis of behavior-relevant information, and when they received or were induced to think about one- rather than two-sided information about the attitude object.     

The "drinking-buddy" scale as a measure of para-social behavior

Para-social behavior is a form of quasi-interpersonal behavior that results when audience members develop bonds with media personalities that can resemble interpersonal social interaction, but is not usually applied to political communication. This study tested whether the "Drinking-Buddy" Scale, a simple question frequently used in political communication, could be interpreted as a single-item measure of para-social behavior with respect to political candidates in terms of image judgments related to interpersonal attraction and perceived similarity to self. The participants were college students who had voted in the 2008 election. They rated the candidates, Obama or McCain, as drinking buddies and then rated the candidates' perceived similarity to themselves in attitude and background, and also the social and task attraction to the candidate. If the drinking-buddy rating serves as a proxy measure for para-social behavior, then it was expected that participants' ratings for all four kinds of similarity to and attraction toward a candidate would be higher for the candidate they chose as a drinking buddy. The directional hypotheses were supported for interpersonal attraction, but not for perceived similarity. These results indicate that the drinking-buddy scale predicts ratings of interpersonal attraction, while voters may view perceived similarity as an important but not essential factor in their candidate preference.     

Belief Importance in Expectancy-Value Models of Attitudes1

In this study, 312 respondents were asked to indicate their attitude toward smoking and their smoking behavior. Attitudes were assessed by a direct attitude measure (4 items) and a series of 15 belief statements about the possible consequences of smoking. Next, respondents were asked to select the 3 consequences they found most important. Attitude scores derived from these important beliefs were more predictive of behavior than those based on all 15 beliefs, and far superior to attitude scores based on the remaining 12 beliefs. Differences between the 2 groups (smokers vs. nonsmokers) were more pronounced when attitude scores were based on important beliefs, and disappeared for scores based on nonselected, less important beliefs. It is argued that incorporating belief importance in expectancy-value models helps to assess the structure of attitudes and could improve our insight in the determinants of behavioral preference.     

ON THE VALUE OF KNOWING ONE'S LIKES AND DISLIKES:

Abstract— On the basis of laboratory research indicating that accessible altitudes ease decision making we hypothesized that freshmen who enter college knowing their likes and dislikes regarding academically relevant issues may experience better health in this new life setting To test this hypothesis, we conducted a prospective study in which students completed self-report inventories of negative life events and mental and physical health at two points in time. The accessibility of attitudes toward academically relevant issues was assessed in the initial session Regression analyses revealed three-way interactions between attitude accessibility, stress (as indexed by the number of negative life events), and initial health status when initial health, the generally positive relation between stress and illness was buffered by the possession of accessible attitudes For students with relatively poor initial health, recovery Has generally greater among those experiencing less stress, especially as attitude accessibility increased.     

The Correlates of Antinuclear Activism: Attitudes, Subjective Norms, and Efficacy

Ajzen's (1988) theory of planned behavior was modified and used to examine antinuclear behavior. Subjects completed a questionnaire measuring their antinuclear attitudes, their perceptions of support for taking antinuclear action, and their perceptions of efficacy in this arena. Then, an antinuclear behavioral intentions questionnaire was presented, as well as several opportunities to engage in various antinuclear actions. Regression analyses indicated that Ajzen's model was supported to the extent that attitude emerged as a significant predictor of antinuclear intentions and behaviors. Subjective norms and efficacy were not significant predictors of either intentions or behaviors. Models incorporating behavior-specific attitude measures accounted for more variance than did models using more general attitude measures toward nuclear war/weapons.     

The Most Important Election of Our Lifetime: Focalism and Political Participation

This article argues that a psychological bias called “focalism” contributes to an overestimation of the differences between political candidates, which in turn increases participation and polarization. Focalism causes people to confuse the allocation of attention to things with the importance of those things. Because attention to politics typically centers on conflict, the result is an exaggeration of differences across the partisan divide. I test this intuition using an experimental design that provides all respondents with all the information they need to estimate how much Joe Biden and Donald Trump objectively disagreed on policy positions just before the 2020 election. I find that shifting attention—toward either those positions the candidates agreed or disagreed with each other on—influences beliefs about the differences between candidates. The effect exceeds that of identifying as a Democrat or as a Republican. Beyond those perceptions, focalism increases turnout intentions, perceptions of election importance, negative feelings towards the out-candidate, and affective polarization.     

Parallals between attitudes and traits as predictors of behavior

Both attitudes and traits have served as within-person constructs intended to permit the prediction of later behavior. Despite this similarity, research in the two domains has tended to progress in a relatively independent fashion. A number of parallels between the attitude and trait literature are noted with regard to definitions of the constructs and their utility as predictors of behavior. Parallels with respect to the identification of variables that moderate the attitude-behavior and trait-behavior relation are also discussed, as are similarities in the potential processes by which attitudes and traits guide behavior. It is concluded that the parallels are so extensive that research in each domain would benefit from an increased exchange of theory, methods, and findings.     

Attitudes toward Out‐groups and the perception of consensus: All feet do not wear one shoe

Although social perception research has been carried out across a number of diverse domains, to the best of our knowledge, studies have not directly assessed the relationship between attitudes toward the out‐group and perceptions of community support for those attitudes. In the present research, we report the findings of a study conducted in Western Australia using data collected from 653 participants from three different locations. The main thrust of our study was the accuracy of beliefs about consensus as it related to attitudes toward two marginalized groups: Indigenous Australians and asylum seekers. With respect to their attitudes toward these two groups, our respondents were placed in seven categories corresponding to their responses to our seven point attitude scales. Three main findings emerged. First, respondents at all seven levels overestimated community support for their views with respect to both Indigenous Australians and asylum seekers. Second, as respondents in both groups became more rejecting, their estimates of community support progressively increased in a linear fashion. Third, respondents in the more negative categories were significantly less accurate in their estimates than those in the more positive categories. How these findings might contribute to programmes designed to reduce prejudice is discussed. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Leader Who Sees the World as I Do: Voters Prefer Candidates Whose Statements Reveal Matching Social-Psychological Attitudes

Politicians are increasingly able to communicate their values, attitudes, and concerns directly to voters. Yet little is known about which of these signals resonate with voters and why. We employ a discrete choice experiment to investigate whether and which social-psychological attitudes predict how adult British voters respond to corresponding attitudinal signals communicated by candidates in hypothetical social media posts. For all attitudes studied, covering social feelings (trust, collective nostalgia), social perceptions (nationalism, populist sentiment), and social commitments (national identification, authoritarianism, egalitarianism), we find that participants are much more likely to vote for candidates who signal proximity to their own attitudinal position and less likely for candidates who signal opposing views. The strongest effects were observed for national identification, authoritarianism, and egalitarianism, indicating the importance of commitment to a shared group and to particular principles for distributing power and resources within and between groups. We further demonstrate that social-psychological attitudes are not acting as mere proxies for participants' past votes or left–right ideology. Our results extend adaptive followership theory to incorporate preferences concerning intragroup coordination and intergroup hierarchy, while highlighting the social-psychological dynamics of political communication that may transcend the concerns of particular election cycles.     

The Moderating Impact of Social Networks on the Relationships Among Core Values,Partisanship, and Candidate Evaluations

Social networks are increasingly becoming recognized as a source of influence on political attitudes and behavior. In this study, we examine the moderating impact of social networks on the relationship among several attitudes. We argue that those who regularly interact with individuals with different views from their own will be more likely to think of themselves in nonpartisan terms. It is therefore hypothesized that an individual's discussion network influences the relationship between one's support for various core values and one's partisanship. As a corollary, we argue that disagreement in discussion networks reduces individuals' reliance on partisanship when forming subsequent attitudes. To test these propositions, we employ data asking respondents to list individuals with whom they discuss politics on a regular basis and who such individuals supported in a recent election to create a measure of network disagreement. Empirical tests provide strong support for our hypotheses.