From repetition to conviction: Attitude accessibility as a determinant of attitude certainty

The present experiment investigated the influence of attitude accessibility on several meta-attitudinal strength measures. It was predicted that certainty and perceived likelihood of change, i.e., commitment-related attributes of attitude strength, are influenced by changes in attitude accessibility, while no effects were expected for importance and perceived centrality to values and the self, i.e., centrality-related attributes. Accessibility was manipulated by having participants express their attitudes either repeatedly or only once. As hypothesized, accessibility and measures of commitment were enhanced after repeated expression compared to single expression. Furthermore, mediation analyses supported the idea that subjective commitment may be inferred from the ease of attitude retrieval. Centrality-related attributes were found to be unaffected by the accessibility manipulation. The results are discussed in the light of a multi-dimensional structure of attitude strength and antecedent processes of meta-cognitive attributes of strength.     

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.     

Memory-based versus on-line processing: Implications for attitude strength

Three experiments tested whether the manner in which attitudes are created—through on-line or memory-based processing—can impact the resultant strength of those attitudes. In each study, participants were presented with 20 behavioral statements about a person named Marie. Whereas some participants were asked to continually evaluate Marie based upon each sentence and then report their overall evaluation (on-line processing), others were asked to focus on the sentence structure and to evaluate Marie only after they had read all the sentences (memory-based processing). Even when controlling for attitude accessibility, attitudes created through on-line processing were stronger than attitudes created through memory-based processing: Experiment 1 showed that participants in the on-line condition felt more certain of their attitudes, Experiment 2 showed that on-line attitudes were better predictors of participants’ evaluative preferences, while Experiment 3 showed that on-line attitudes manifested stronger attitude-behavioral intention correspondence.     

Entitativity and prejudice: Examining their relationship and the moderating effect of attitude certainty

Previous research suggests that perceived entitativity, which represents the degree to which groups are perceived to possess unity, coherence, and organization, predicts intergroup stereotyping and bias. The present research yielded complementary evidence that prejudice (toward Muslims in Study 1 and toward South Asians in Study 2) can also predict groups’ perceived entitativity. In particular, Study 1 found that the relationships of two predictors, intergroup contact and social dominance orientation, with perceived entitativity were mediated by prejudice. Study 2 demonstrated, as predicted, that this set of relationships occurred primarily for intergroup attitudes of relatively high certainty. Neither study found support for models in which entitativity mediated the relationships of the predictors with prejudice. Conceptual and analytical factors that may account for evidence of the potential bi-directionality of the bias-entitativity relationship are considered.     

Populism vs. elitism: social consensus and social status as bases of attitude certainty

This study examined the effects of social consensus and social status on attitude certainty that is conceptualized multi-dimensionally as perceived clarity and correctness of one's attitude. In a mock opinion exchange about a social issue, participants were either supported (high consensus) or opposed (low consensus) by most of the confederates. They were informed that their opinion (high status) or their opponents' opinion (low status) had the alleged psychological significance indicative of future success. Post-experimental attitude clarity was significantly greater when attitudinal position was associated with high rather than low status. Attitude correctness was interactively affected by social status and social consensus. Supporting the compensatory effect hypothesis, attitude correctness was comparable across the levels of social consensus as long as they were associated with high status, and across the levels of social status as long as they were associated with high social consensus.     

Personality and strength-related attitude dimensions: Between and within-person relationships

Examined personality variables as predictors and moderators of strength-related attitude dimensions (SRAD) using multilevel modeling. Results revealed significant person-level variation in attitude importance, extremity, and ambivalence across attitude objects. Study 1 found the personality variable of need to evaluate (NE) predicted extremity across attitude objects, and finding meaning in life (ML) was predictive of importance across objects. Study 2 revealed that neuroticism and state anxiety were significant predictors of ambivalence across attitude objects. Finally, the NE, the Need for Cognition, and Openness to Experience each moderated the within-person relationship between extremity and ambivalence across objects, with higher values on the individual difference variables being related to stronger within-person relationships. Implications for research on attitude strength and the relationships between personality variables and attitudes are discussed.     

Social network composition and attitude strength: Exploring the dynamics within newly formed social networks

Recent evidence suggests that people who are embedded within attitudinally congruent social networks have stronger attitudes than those embedded in attitudinally diverse networks. The current research examines the causal processes responsible for this relation. Two studies capitalized on naturally occurring experiments whereby college students are quasi-randomly assigned to social contexts containing varying levels of attitudinal diversity. Replicating past research, individuals in attitudinally diverse social networks exhibited less resistance to attitude change and less attitude stability than those in more attitudinally congruent networks. Although there was evidence of attitude projection and selective network construction, neither of these processes could account for the relation between social network composition and attitude strength. These findings corroborate and extend previous results, reinforcing the notion that the social context in which people are embedded has important implications for the durability of their attitudes.     

Beyond attitude consensus: The social context of persuasion and resistance

The current research presents a new type of social context effect on attitude certainty. It is proposed that when people receive persuasive messages, they appraise their attitudes not only in terms of whether they are shared or not shared by others, but also in terms of whether they are based on similar or dissimilar assessments of the information presented. In two experiments, participants were presented with persuasive messages. In Experiment 1, they were induced to perceive that they responded favorably (persuasion) or unfavorably (resistance) to the message arguments. In Experiment 2, they were allowed to vary in their actual message responses. In both experiments, message response similarity—the degree to which people perceived that their evaluations of persuasive arguments were shared or unshared by others—moderated the classic effect of attitude similarity on attitude certainty. In particular, attitude similarity only affected attitude certainty under conditions of message response similarity. When message responses were believed to be dissimilar, attitude similarity had no effect on attitude certainty.     

Toward a Dignity Architecture: The Critical Challenges of Stigmatized‐Identity Cues for Consumer Psychology

As Chaney, Sanchez, and Maimon (2019—this issue) detail, the prevalence of anti‐stigmatization cues may encourage us to believe that a more inclusive marketplace is on the horizon. This commentary argues that, unfortunately, three barriers have limited the effectiveness of these cues, and that each constitutes a call to serious inquiry for a wide range of consumer researchers. First, marketers have done little to reach out to the most severely stigmatized groups, limiting the degree to which inclusive marketing can effect real societal change. Second, researchers have not systematically articulated reasons that anti‐stigmatization cues may fall flat or even backfire, leaving practitioners little guidance in designing effective cues. Finally, studying stigmatization presents methodological challenges, and may feel like a minefield to researchers not well‐versed in complex issues of sexuality, race and ethnicity. If we are willing to address such barriers, however, I argue that we can build a framework for a “dignity architecture.” Like choice architecture, this framework highlights the nonneutrality of marketing actions in experience design, ultimately offering guidance for affirming consumer worth.     

Exploring the Valence‐Framing Effect: Negative Framing Enhances Attitude Strength

In his now‐classic research on inoculation theory, McGuire (1964 ) demonstrated that exposing people to an initial weak counterattitudinal message could lead to enhanced resistance to a subsequent stronger counterattitudinal message. More recently, research on the valence‐framing effect ( Bizer & Petty, 2005 ) demonstrated an alternative way to make attitudes more resistant. Simply framing a person's attitude negatively (i.e., in terms of a rejected position such as anti‐Democrat) led to more resistance to an attack on that attitude than did framing the same attitude positively (i.e., in terms of a preferred position such as pro‐Republican). Using an election context, the current research tested whether valence framing influences attitude resistance specifically or attitude strength more generally, providing insight into the effect's mechanism and generalizability. In two experiments, attitude valence was manipulated by framing a position either negatively or positively. Experiment 1 showed that negatively framed attitudes were held with more certainty than were positively framed attitudes. In Experiment 2, conducted among a representative sample of residents of two U.S. states during political campaigns, negatively framed attitudes demonstrated higher levels of attitude certainty and attitude‐consistent behavioral intentions than did attitudes that were framed positively. Furthermore, the effect of valence framing on behavioral intentions was mediated by attitude certainty. Valence framing thus appears to be a relatively low‐effort way to impact multiple features associated with strong attitudes.     

Perceived certainty based on verbal probability phrases: Effect of directionality and its dependence on method

Verbal probability phrases (e.g. "possible" or "doubtful") have a feature called "directionality" ( Teigen & Brun, 1995 ), which focuses listeners on event occurrence or nonoccurrence. We conducted an experiment about certainty estimations based on verbal probabilities in order to examine the effect of directionality on perceived certainty. In measuring perceived certainty, we used scale-based method involving responses with a scale (e.g. 101 points' scale, 0 = unlikely to 100 = likely) and numerical method involving responses such as "50%." We found that, although the effect of directionality on perceived certainty was observed in using the scale-based method, the effect disappeared when the numerical method was used. We discuss these results from two types of information processing (intuitive, associative processing and deliberate, rule-based processing).     

Casualties of war and sunk costs: Implications for attitude change and persuasion

The purpose of the present research was to gain greater insight into how people's support for an ongoing war might be influenced by providing information about recent casualties of war. On intuitive grounds, one might expect that such information might often decrease support for the war, especially when the war in question is relatively unpopular. However, research and theory on the “sunk cost effect” suggests, somewhat paradoxically, that highlighting such losses could actually increase, not decrease, support for the war, as driven by the goal to avoid wasting valuable resources. Across two experiments (one focusing on the war in Iraq, another focusing on the war in Afghanistan), we found that the effects of the war casualty information on attitudes were moderated by a recent use and activation of the relevant “don't waste” goal, which had been previously primed in a non-political context. The implications of our findings for theory and research on attitude change, as well as the judgment and decision making area, are discussed.     

Cultural differences in attitude toward and effects of self‐doubt

It has been argued that the high achievement of Confucian Asian students is at the cost of their psychological well‐being, since high self‐doubt consistently accompanies their high achievement. However, other researchers cautioned that the attitude toward self‐doubt could be different in Asian versus Western cultures. This study examined the debate with a survey of both American and Chinese college students that measured level of self‐doubt, attitude toward self‐doubt, beliefs about ability, and psychological well‐being outcomes. As hypothesized, Chinese students showed a more positive attitude toward self‐doubt than American students, despite having higher level of self‐doubt. Furthermore, self‐doubt engendered less negative consequences on Chinese students' psychological well‐being, relative to American students. Implications for theories and research on cultural differences in the effects of self‐constructs are discussed.     

Consumer recycling: An ethical decision‐making process

Although recycling is often experienced as a moral dilemma, studies that systematically approach this issue from an ethical perspective are scarce. Moreover, previous studies have explored recycling by mainly using single ethical constructs, such as moral norms, values or obligations, rarely approaching it as an ethical decision‐making process. Our study takes a more holistic approach and integrates the recycling literature with business ethics theory in order to develop a conceptual model of ethical decision making involved in recycling. The model is based on Jones' issue‐contingent model and its key concept, that is, moral intensity, which we extend by adding altruism as an important personality trait that influences pro‐social behaviour. The data were collected from a sample of 367 adult consumers, representative of the Slovenian population by gender and age. The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modelling. The results of our study confirmed the relationships between three key facets of ethical decision making: moral recognition, moral judgment and moral intention. Higher levels of moral recognition were found to lead to more positive moral judgments, which in turn positively influenced the formation of intentions to recycle. Moreover, moral intensity was found to be a significant predictor of moral recognition and moral judgment, while altruism was found to be a significant predictor of moral recognition. These findings hold important implications for public policy makers and social marketers who have to consider not only the consumer characteristics but also the issue characteristics in seeking to understand and influence consumer recycling. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The puzzle of Freud's puzzle analogy: Reviving a struggle with doubt and conviction in Freud's Moses and monotheism

In this paper the author points to a puzzle raised by Freud's contradictory use of an analogy of a jigsaw puzzle. She shows how, through the attempt to resolve this puzzle, meanings and implications of Freud's difficult struggle with his search for truth in Moses and monotheism come alive, both in Freud's writing and in the author herself. Central to this struggle is an encounter with the sources of doubt and conviction that ultimately allows one to embrace ideas experienced as true, although they are not demonstrable evidentially. The paper sheds light on the importance of Moses and monotheism as a theoretical text that reflects on developments in Freud's thinking on truth, and the possibility, dangers and inherent difficulties of grasping it.     

The role of faith in intuition, need for cognition and method of attitude formation in implicit–explicit brand attitude relationship strength

We tested the hypothesis that Faith in Intuition (FI) would moderate implicit–explicit attitude relationship strength for attitudes formed via associative processes, but not propositional processes. Experiments 1 and 2 demonstrated that FI moderated I–E relationship strength for attitudes formed via evaluative conditioning. High FI people had stronger I–E correlations. Experiment 2 showed that FI did not moderate I–E relationship strength for attitudes formed via propositional reasoning. Those low in Need for Cognition (NC), however, showed stronger I–E correlations than those high in NC. The importance of considering trait variables in combination with the method of attitude formation is discussed.     

An affirmed self and an open mind: Self-affirmation and sensitivity to argument strength

Self-affirmation seems to enable an individual to objectively evaluate information that would otherwise evoke a defensive reaction. If this objectivity reflects freedom from self-evaluative concerns, affirmation should sensitize people to central cues of a persuasive message, like argument strength. If affirmation simply induces agreeableness or trivializes the issue, affirmed participants should not particularly heed argument strength. Affirmed and non-affirmed participants rated the persuasiveness of pro- and counterattitudinal arguments that varied in strength. Among participants who rated their attitudes as personally important, self-affirmation decreased bias and increased sensitivity to argument strength, as predicted by self-affirmation theory.     

The Need for Synergy in Academic Policies: An Introduction to the Dialogue on Pre‐registration

There has been much debate on the need for preregistering experimental studies. Opinions differ with some people believing that “pre‐registration should be required—for us to believe the results of papers,” and others believing that “pre‐registration makes no difference to science and just adds work.” This research dialogue brings differing viewpoints together, in an open academic dialogue. Two target articles and two commentaries discuss what pre‐registration does for replicability of studies, and what cost it adds on authors and reviewers. Additionally, in my introduction to the research dialogue, I deliberate on the need for synergy between our journals, review teams, authors, and institutions, in order for any new policies on pre‐registration to be successfully adopted.