Exam 6: The Need to Justify Our Actions

Lisa is a car salesperson. She has just gotten you to agree to a deal on a new car and to write out a check for the down payment. She takes this to her manager and comes back a while later saying that, because of taxes and fees, the price of the car will actually come out to $600 over what you agreed upon. According to the research on lowballing, which of the following is most likely to occur?

Too late, your neighbor discovered that he couldn't flush his toilet. He has asked you to come help him unstop his plugged toilet. It's not a task that you look forward to, but you come over to help. Based on the psychology of insufficient justification, you'd be most likely to change your attitudes about fixing broken plumbing if you helped

According to dissonance theorists, what is the problem with severe punishment to control behaviors? Severe punishment

The new governor hires you to devise a plan to stop bullying in the schools. Based on the principle of insufficient punishment, what might be a good way to punish bullies?

Who is most likely to convince him- or herself that he or she believes in the behavior he or she is performing?

Emile just ditched a friend at a party to spend time with a pretty woman. Emile feels uncomfortable but he tells himself it's because the woman is so hot and not because he treated his friend badly. The way he's feeling is dissonance, but he tells himself it's sexual attraction. This describes which of the following?

Michael and Pam are friends, but have never dated. Michael wants to ask Pam out on a date, with the hope that she will think of him as more than just a friend. Based on research on external justification and dissonance theory, under which of the following conditions will Pam like Michael the most?

Petar and Nikolas love the house that they just toured. It is a short sale for $180,000, which is a great price. They are very excited and want to put in an offer. After they begin the paperwork, their realtor tells them that the price does not include the fixtures or the appliances. Those will likely cost an extra $20,000. What tactic is the realtor using?

Ken participates in a psychology study where he has to make statements that are contrary to his thoughts and values. Then, the researchers reminded him of this inconsistency. Ken has participated in which of the following?

A mother is trying to get her child to behave in the store and to stop running around, yelling, and grabbing things off the shelves. According to cognitive dissonance theory, if she wants to stop the child's behavior immediately for the time being, she should use a ________, but if she wants to more permanently change the behavior she should use a ________.

According to the authors of your text, what is one major danger of engaging in self-justification strategies?

Cognitive dissonance always

Researchers have found evidence of cognitive dissonance in the form of postdecision dissonance in which of the following animals?

Imagine you are about to take a very important exam that could impact your future. A friend asks you how disappointed you think you would be if you found out you did not perform very well on the exam. According to the idea of impact bias, how would your prediction likely match up with your actual reaction?

Engaging in self-justification strategies as a response to dissonance is a process that can have negative consequences. Explain how self-justification can be negative, and what one could do to better learn from one's mistakes.

As mentioned in the text, a Yale researcher (Cohen, 1962) paid some students relatively little and others relatively more to write an essay that contradicted their true beliefs about the local police. Results of his experiment demonstrated that

The authors of your text explain that people tend to overestimate how bad they will feel if a negative event were to happen to them. This tendency is called

According to cognitive dissonance theory, soldiers may reduce their guilt about killing innocent civilians during wartime by

In a study presented in the text (Peterson, Haynes, & Olson, 2008), smokers were asked to create an antismoking video to be shown to high school students, invoking dissonance in the smokers. These smokers, who particularly felt like hypocrites, were most likely to

Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy once wrote, "We do not love people so much for the good they have done us as for the good we have done them." This quote is most closely related to the concept of