Table Of ContentThe Science of Attitudes
The Science of Attitudes is the first book to integrate classic and modern research in
the field of attitudes at a scholarly level. Designed primarily for advanced under-
graduates and graduate students, the presentation of research will also be useful for
current scholars in all disciplines who are interested in how attitudes are formed
and changed. The treatment of attitudes is both thorough and unique, taking a his-
torical approach while simultaneously highlighting contemporary views and con-
troversies. The book traces attitude research from the inception of scientific study
following World War II to the issues and methods of research that are prominent
features of today’s research.
Researchers in the field of attitudes will be particularly interested in classic and
modern research on the organization, structure, strength, and function of attitudes.
Researchers in the field of persuasion will be particularly interested in work on atti-
tude change focusing on propositional and associative learning, metacognition and
dynamic theories of dissonance, balance and reactance. The book is designed to
present the integration of the properties of the attitude with the dynamic consider-
ations of attitude change. The Science of Attitudes is also the first book on attitudes to
devote entire chapters to work on implicit measurements, resistance to persuasion,
and social neuroscience.
Joel Cooper has been on the Psychology faculty at Princeton University since
obtaining his Ph.D. from Duke University. He is past editor of the Journal of Exper-
imental Social Psychology, is the author of several books, and co-editor of a major
handbook in social psychology.
Shane F. Blackman received his bachelor’s degree in psychology at the University
of Chicago and his Ph.D. from Princeton University in psychology and public pol-
icy. His scholarship has focused on attitudes, naïve realism, and social policy.
Kyle T. Keller received his Ph.D. in psychology from Princeton University and his
bachelor’s degree at the University of Arizona. He contributed to research in cogni-
tive dissonance, choice, and choice behaviors. Kyle was selected as a Fellow of the
Princeton Energy and Climate Scholars.
This page intentionally left blank
The Science of
Attitudes
Joel Cooper
Shane F. Blackman
Kyle T. Keller
First published 2016
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2016 Taylor & Francis
The right of Joel Cooper, Shane F. Blackman, and Kyle T. Keller to
be identified as authors of this work has been asserted by them in
accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cooper, Joel.
The science of attitudes / Joel Cooper, Shane Blackman, Kyle Keller.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Attitude (Psychology) 2. Attitude change. I. Blackman, Shane
J. II. Keller, Kyle. III. Title.
BF327.C665 2016
152.4—dc23
2015007593
ISBN: 978-1-138-82078-4 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-82079-1 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-71731-9 (ebk)
Typeset in Stone Serif
by Apex CoVantage
CONTENTS
Preface vi
CHAPTER 1 The Meaning and Measurement of Attitudes 1
CHAPTER 2 Attitude Strength and Structure 23
CHAPTER 3 The Functions of Attitudes 58
CHAPTER 4 Persuasion: Classic Approaches 83
CHAPTER 5 Dual-Process Theories of Attitude Change 114
CHAPTER 6 Predicting Behavior from Attitudes 145
CHAPTER 7 Predicting Attitudes from Behaviors 169
CHAPTER 8 Resistance to Persuasion 199
CHAPTER 9 Implicit Measurement of Attitudes 226
CHAPTER 10 New Frontiers in Attitude Research:
Accessing and Modeling the Brain 258
References 283
Author Index 329
Subject Index 341
v
PREFACE
This book is about attitudes. Everyone has them. We have attitudes about important
world issues, about the mundane objects in our everyday life, and about the people
who comprise our social world. The attitude concept has been the most studied con-
cept in the history of social psychology. It is a topic covered in psychology courses,
from the basic introductory class to the graduate level. Yet, with all the attention
paid to attitudes, the current book was born of a teaching need. We found it difficult
to teach a responsible course on the social psychology of attitudes without compil-
ing a unique curriculum of ideas, references and concepts. This volume is designed
to provide students, teachers and scholars with the overarching framework that uni-
fies the exciting field of attitudes and persuasion and also brings to life the scientific
approach to the discipline.
When psychologists first began to study the attitude, they could only imagine
that some day researchers would be combining people’s verbal judgments with
information gathered from implicit measures and from brain activity. Now, modern
attitude research uses a panoply of traditional and innovative methods to form a
more complete picture of how people form and change attitudes. From its incep-
tion, the study of attitudes in psychology meant applying the scientific research
method. This book begins with an analysis of how attitudes first came to be studied
and shows the changing perspectives that occurred over the course of time. We
use a historical approach to trace the changing methods, theories and assumptions
that guided research in attitudes and attitude change. The book gives the reader a
foundation in the classic approaches that prepares the way for an appreciation of
current issues and cutting edge methodologies. We show the reader how contem-
porary issues complement classic approaches and how newer implicit measures and
fMRI technology complement more traditional measures in the field of attitudes.
No book can be written without the help of numerous people. We wish to
acknowledge and thank the many people who by reading, criticizing, commenting,
typing, taking photos and otherwise offering their assistance to allow us to com-
plete this book. We specifically acknowledge Paul Bree, Matthew Kugler, Christine
McCoy, Allison Fleming and Barbara Cooper for their valuable assistance. We also
could not have completed the book without the helpful criticisms and suggestions
offered by Russell Fazio, Michael Olson and other anonymous reviewers.
vi
CHAPTER 1
The Meaning and Measurement
of Attitudes
Ay oung girl walked off her school bus, fearful that her school would close. She
was twelve years old, and nothing had been more important in her young life
than her education. Her hopes and dreams were threatened by an edict from the Tal-
iban militia: All schools serving girls must be shut and boarded by January of 2009.
As a child growing up in the Swat Valley of Pakistan, Malala Yousafzai’s schooling
had been frequently interrupted by the militias, hostile to the belief that girls might
receive a formal education. “How dare the Taliban take away my basic right to edu-
cation?” she had said to a public meeting of reporters when she was 11 years old.
Malala’s attitude toward education would cause her both trauma and triumph.
Trauma occurred on October 9, 2012, when Taliban gunmen boarded her school bus
and shot her with a single bullet to the head. They made clear that she had been
targeted for her outspoken commitment to girls’ education. But Malala survived
and, following a difficult recovery, emerged to a triumphant standing ovation at
the General Assembly of the United Nations. She concluded her remarks by saying,
Dear brothers and sisters, we want schools and education for every child’s bright
future . . . we must not forget that millions of people are suffering from poverty,
injustice and ignorance. We must not forget that millions of children are out of
schools. We must not forget that our sisters and brothers are waiting for a bright
peaceful future. So let us wage a global struggle against illiteracy, poverty and ter-
rorism and let us pick up our books and pens. They are our most powerful weapons.
One child, one teacher, one pen and one book can change the world. Education is
the only solution. Education First.
(NY Times, July 12, 2013)
Malala Yousafzai was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014.
Attitudes matter. Throughout the history of the world, people have taken
extraordinary steps to support a set of attitudes and beliefs to bring about a better
world. Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King Jr. led societies to new views
1
2 The Meaning and MeasureMenT of aTTiTudes
of human freedom and dignity by their written words and their behavior. Every day,
people take action to advocate for social justice. They persuade and organize in the
service of bringing about a world that is closer to the paragon in which they believe.
Attitudes matter in our daily lives as well. The way we think of our world is
largely determined by our attitudes. From the major political issues of the day to the
mundane evaluations of the food on our breakfast tables, it is difficult to envision
a world without them. They are reflections of our likes and dislikes, our preferences
and our evaluations. It seems virtually impossible to describe our social lives with-
out considering our attitudes. This book is devoted to organizing in a coherent fash-
ion the main tenets of what the science of psychology has learned about attitudes.
We will examine how our attitudes are structured, how they are measured and the
functions they serve. We will consider the effectiveness of ways to change attitudes
in the form of persuasion, and also the ways that allow people to resist persuasion.
We will consider the relationship of our attitudes to our behaviors, both as causes
and consequences of behavior, and finally discuss the emerging knowledge relating
attitudes to electrochemical changes in our brains.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE STUDY OF ATTITUDES
The scientific study of the attitude has a long and storied history. Although the
science of social psychology is only a little more than a century old, Thomas and
Znaniecki wrote in 1918 that social psychology was essentially the study of the
attitude. It was not always so. The first usage of the word attitude in the English
language was recorded in the 17th century, when it was adapted from the French.
Its meaning was not at all what psychologists describe today. If you referred to a
person’s attitude, you would be referring to their posture rather than a psycho-
logical concept. The first known link to psychology entered the language in 1725,
when attitude referred to a posture of the body that reflected a mental state. It was
not until 1837 that etymologists found a use of the word to refer to an opinion or a
feeling about an object. Advance the clock only 80 years and Thomas and Znaniecki
(1918) could declare the study of the attitude to be the essence of the fledgling sci-
ence of social psychology.
Although the term attitude to describe people’s mental states toward an object
or issue is relatively newly minted, the art of persuading people to change those
mental states is as old as civilization. It was the profession of the Sophists in ancient
Greece to teach citizens how to argue and persuade. Aristotle considered persuasion
in great detail in Rhetoric. The Roman forums relied on debate and persuasion in the
running of the empire. It is not that scholars were unaware that people held opin-
ions but, as art gave way to science, they needed a more precise way to conceptual-
ize people’s opinions and so the relatively new term, attitude, rose to prominence.
The Meaning and MeasureMenT of aTTiTudes 3
The scientific study of attitudes was facilitated by the development of meth-
ods to assess them. L. L. Thurstone, Rensis Likert, Louis Guttman and Charles
Osgood provided increased sophistication to the scales used to study attitudes.
With the publication of attitude measurement techniques, the volume of empirical
research in attitudes exploded. By 1935, Gordon Allport declared the attitude to be
“the most distinctive and indispensable concept in contemporary American social
psychology” (Allport, 1935, p. 198). From the perspective of the 21st century, it is
clear that Allport’s assessment remains true, with the caveat that the qualifying term
“American” is no longer required. A literature search using “attitude” as the search
term yields more than 65,000 articles, chapters, books and dissertations.
Attitudes express our evaluations, influence our perceptions and guide our
behavior. A matter of practical and theoretical concern is how to alter them. Polit-
ical candidates know that people’s attitudes toward them, and possibly the issues
they represent, predict their voting behavior. Commercial marketers know that peo-
ple’s attitudes toward a product predict their purchasing behavior. Leaders of mass
movements know that people will sacrifice a great deal in support of attitudes they
find powerful and important. Finding the principles that govern the creation and
change of attitudes has been the focus of a healthy proportion of those 65,000
entries in the psychological literature.
A Tale of Two Traditions: Attitudes and Attitude Change
Persuasion is both an art and a science. As an art form, it relies on intuition. Many
political candidates, political consultants and advertising agencies are adept at con-
vincing their audiences without being able to articulate the principles that underlie
the persuasion. Just as artists paint a picture that can be striking for its beauty, some
persuasive communicators effectively convince their audience with the subtlety of
their words or the beauty of their images. When a young man named Volney Palmer
opened the very first advertising agency in Philadelphia in 1843, instinct and intui-
tion were the tools of his trade (Pratkanis & Aronson, 2001). The science of persua-
sion had not yet begun.
The science of persuasion, in contrast to the intuition of persuasion, relies on
the systematic investigation of underlying principles that lead to attitude change. The
first programmatic effort to examine attitude change systematically was conducted
by a group of investigators at Yale University in the 1940s. The group was con-
vened by the United States government, responding to what it perceived to be a
dilemma of public opinion. Toward the end of WWII, after the surrender of the
European Axis powers, the government was concerned about persuading its citizens
that the war in the Pacific theater of operations would be both lengthy and difficult.
Worried that people would believe that a successful end to the war was inevitable,
the government was determined to persuade them that sacrifice remained essential.
