ATTITUDE Presented by Dr.Daleep Parimoo

An attitude is a stable and enduring disposition to evaluate an object or entity (a person, place or thing), in a particular way. “I like working on this project” and “I do not like working after office hours” are examples of attitudes because they express a persons general feeling, either favorable or unfavorable toward something.

Attitudes An attitude is a predisposition to act or feel a certain way towards a person or thing.

Attitude Has an emotional charge can not be measured directly self reporting or inference Is not temporary - more or less enduring

Definitions There are many different definitions ( Allport; Fishbein & Ajzen). Examples: "Attitudes are associations between objects and evaluations of those objects" "Attitudes are lasting evaluations of various aspects of the social world--evaluations that are stored in memory" "An attitude is a mental and neural state of readiness organized through experience exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon the individual's response to all objects and situations with which it is related." "A learned predisposition to respond in a consistently favorable or unfavorable manner with respect to a given object."

Attitudes have been considered along with two other elements – beliefs and behaviors. Beliefs represent what we have learned or come to know through experience. As such, they are either true or represent what we think is true (for example, that working on a challenging project would bring recognition in the organization or that working after office hours would affect health and personal life). Behaviors (for example, whether one completes the project successfully or leaves the office at 6PM in the evening) represent the actions we take with regard to a particular object or entity.

Attitude formation Attitudes are acquired through:  Social learning  Social comparison  Genetic factors (not all agree on this) Attitude formation: Learning Classical Conditioning Operant or Instrumental Conditioning Observational Learning or Modeling

HOW ATTITUDES ARE FORMED Attitudes may be learned from the experiences we have. These include mostly mundane events such as being praised by our parents or major life and world events.  The basic processes through which we learn attitudes remain the same throughout life, though as we grow older the attitudes we learn may be more complex, and the ones we already hold may become more resistant to change. The processes through which our experiences create attitudes are all related to “learning” which is a basic human process All our attitudes are learned from our experience of the social context around us. The influence of the family, schooling, and peer groups waxes and wanes as we grow into adolescence and adulthood.  Thus, the primary sources of our attitudes change as we mature. A final source of attitudes is the culture in which a child grows up. Culturally prevalent prejudices are generally reflected in prejudiced attitudes. HOW ATTITUDES ARE FORMED

Beliefs, Attitudes, and Behaviors May Be Formed in Two Ways: Direct formation is when a belief, attitude, or behavior is created without either of the other states occurring first. Hierarchy of effects occurs after a belief, attitude, or behavior is formed directly, there is a tendency for the states to build upon each other to create hierarchies

Direct Formation of Beliefs, Attitudes, & Behaviors Direct belief formation corresponds to the decision-making perspective and cognitive learning. The direct formation of attitudes is linked to the experiential perspective. The direct formation of behavior is linked to the behavioral influence perspective. Operant conditioning and modeling.

Forming Attitudes Directly Classical conditioning/associative learning--positive affect is attached to object Mere exposure--frequent exposure to stimulus increases liking for it. Moods--mood at the time of exposure to object influences feelings about object.

Forming Behavior Directly Strong environmental forces can directly influence behavior, such as from the design of the physical environment. Operant conditioning can influence behavior without the formation of beliefs or attitudes. Forming Behavior Directly

Why are attitudes important? Attitudes serve as one way to organize our relationship with our world. They make our interactions more predictable affording us a degree of control. For example, the attitude “I like working for this company” is very useful in guiding our behavior towards the company’s work.   Attitudes also enable us to reduce the vast amount of information that we possess into manageable units. All the beliefs we have about our company could be summarized as “I like my company”, and thus our attitude represents the combination of many bits of information for us.   We can use others attitudes to make judgments about them.   It has been found consistently that the more similar our attitudes are to those of others, the more we like them. Finally, people’s attitudes can sometimes be useful in predicting behavior, such as how they will vote in an election or which brand of car they will buy.  

Components of Attitudes Attitudes consist of three basic components: emotional, informational, and behavioral.  The emotional component involves the person’s feelings, or affect- positive, neutral, or negative- about an object. Thus, emotion is given the greatest attention in the organizational behavior literature in relation to job-satisfaction.  In addition, the expression of emotions either positive, like a customer service representative; negative, like a bill collector or a police officer; or neutral, like an academic administrator or public servant- is also important to work behavior.  

The informational component consists of the beliefs and information the individual has about the object. A supervisor may believe that two weeks of training is necessary before a worker can operate a particular piece of equipment.  In reality, the average worker may be able to operate the machine after only four days of training. Yet the information the supervisor is using (that two weeks is necessary) is the key to his attitude about training.   The behavioral component consists of a person’s tendencies to behave in a particular way toward an object. For example the supervisor in the above paragraph may assign two weeks of machine training to all his new people.

Attitudes don't always determine behavior (LaPiere, 1934) When do attitudes influence behavior? Attitudes don't always determine behavior (LaPiere, 1934) He went on tour with a Chinese couple in southwest. Chinese were very much discriminated against in those days. Asked hotel proprietors (in person) whether the Chinese couple (a) could stay there (99% said yes) and (b) could eat there (100% said yes). Then, sent same proprietors a letter asking same questions (a) (9% said yes) and (b) (8% said yes). Conclusion: Attitudes do not predict actual behavior.

The Functions of Attitudes Utilitarian Function: use to obtain rewards and avoid punishments. Ego-Defensive Function: self-protection, e.g., smokers Knowledge Function: simplifies decisions, e.g., brand loyalty Value-Expressive Function: express identify to others. e.g., t-shirts.

Hierarchies of Beliefs, Attitudes, and Behaviors Decision-Making Hierarchies Experiential Hierarchy Behavioral Influence Hierarchy

Decision making hierarchies High involvement: beliefs attitudes behavior Low involvement: beliefs behavior attitudes Experiential Affect behavior beliefs Behavioral influence hierarchy Behavior beliefs affect

Attitudes are learned + Formation of a + attitude In the absence of existing attitude we are open to suggestion Something (object of attitude) Positive result Goal achievement + Formation of a + attitude

Tricomponent Attitude Model (ABC) Affect (How I feel about it)plus Behavioural tendency (Conative), plus Cognitions (what I think or know) about likely consequences of behaviour Behaviour CONATIVE AFFECTIVE (Feeling) COGNITIVE Knowledge

Measurement Observation - difficult & time consuming Qualitative pinpoint important attributes & issues provide direction for further research Self reporting scales Likert - degree of agreement with a statement Semantic differential - opposite adjectives Rank order scale Constant sum scale

Multiattribute model This college has great facilities Disagree |__|__|__|__|__|__|__| Agree strongly 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 strongly Teachers at this college are highly professional strongly 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 strongly Courses are recognised by employers strongly 1 2 4 5 6 7 strongly College is easy to get to Strongly 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 strongly

Fishbein type models SUM of Score X Importance on all attributes Snake diagrams Fishbein type models SUM of Score X Importance on all attributes

Attitude change strategies Changing the Basic Motivational Function Associating the Product With an Admired Group or Event Resolving Two Conflicting Attitudes Altering Components of the Multiattribute Model Changing Beliefs About Competitors’ Brands Attitude change strategies

Associate with a special group, event or cause eg. famous people who attended TAFE associate with Football, Olympics, etc. Relating two conflicting attitudes eg Do you want a status course or a job Attitudes.ppt May 05