Dissonance theory, self-perception and the bogus pipeline

✍ Scribed by Paul D. Guild; Lloyd H. Strickland; John C. Barefoot

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1977
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 709 KB
• Volume: 7
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0046-2772
• DOI: 10.1002/ejsp.2420070405

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Studied attitude change following counter‐attitudinal advocacy where there was little incentive for subject compliance in an attempt to compare dissonance and self‐perception theory predictions. The extent of attitude change was determined either by self‐report or by having subjects predict their own true attitudes purportedly monitored by the experimenter using a ‘bogus pipeline’. Forty‐eight male and female subjects, students from an introductory Psychology course, were invited to take part in a study of Current Campus Issues. They wrote a short statement that argued against an issue for which they had previously held a positive attitude. Results indicate that there was a significant attitude change in both conditions (p < .003). Attitude change under these circumstances is more successfully explained by the self‐perception theory than dissonance theory.