Abstract
The self-consistency revision of cognitive dissonance theory predicts that people with low self-esteem are less likely to experience dissonance arousal compared to people with high self-esteem. Two experiments investigated how the accessibility of different self-standards in the context of a dissonant act activates the consistency role of self-esteem in the process of cognitive dissonance arousal. In Experiment 1, after participants wrote a counter-attitudinal essay, priming personal self-standards caused more attitude change for those with high compared to low self-esteem, whereas priming no standards or priming normative self-standards caused the same level of attitude change among both self-esteem groups. Experiment 2 showed that the self-consistency effect for low self-esteem participants only occurred among those who were high in self-certainty when personal self-standards were primed. The importance of self-standards for understanding the role of self-esteem in dissonance processes is discussed.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 846-858 |
Number of pages | 13 |
Journal | Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin |
Volume | 29 |
Issue number | 7 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jul 1 2003 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- Attitude change
- Cognitive dissonance
- Self-consistency
- Self-esteem
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Social Psychology