Attitude

Definition of Attitudes in Psychology

Think about someone you know who generally has a really good attitude about life. Holding positive attitudes can make you more popular and increase your chances of success in the workplace. Those who go through really hard things in life sometimes say that their positive attitude helped them get through all the hard things.

A negative attitude can cause problems in our relationships or job. We tend to avoid other people who have a bad or negative attitude. Attitudes have an enormous impact on our lives!

Attitudes generally inform how we treat other people and react to situations in our lives. If we have a positive attitude toward dogs, we will generally be happy when we see a dog. If we hold a negative attitude toward dogs, like the attitude that dogs are dangerous, we will try to avoid dogs whenever possible!

Attitudes are primarily feelings, but they impact our thoughts and actions as well. It can be hard to separate the feeling part of an attitude from the thinking and doing parts. Our behaviors and reactions, in turn, can also impact our attitudes. Our attitudes are often based on our beliefs, but how do we develop those beliefs?

Fig. 1 Attitudes are predisposed feelings, pixabay.com

Types of Attitudes in Psychology

We hold so many different attitudes about people, places, and things. We might hold a positive attitude toward going to the gym, but dread going to work because of a negative attitude. Having a positive attitude means we feel favorably toward something. We usually like to engage in that thing. Someone with a positive attitude toward chess is likely to play a few games with friends or compete in tournaments.

Having a negative attitude means we feel upset, scared, or disapproving toward something.

We usually dislike or disagree with that thing. Someone with a negative attitude toward sports will likely avoid playing or watching games and discourage others from doing so.

Would you believe that there are times when having a positive attitude is a bad thing? Having a negative attitude is sometimes a good thing! Let's take a look at some examples of good and bad positive and negative attitudes.

Fig. 2 Good and Bad Attitudes, pixabay.com

These examples involve different attitudes about members of a particular group and how they are treated. Negative or positive attitudes that unfairly discriminate against others are prejudiced attitudes. Prejudice is an unjustified negative attitude toward an individual or group based solely on ethnicity, race, culture, gender, or another characteristic.

Prejudicial attitudes can lead to acts of discrimination. If a prejudicial attitude towards someone else causes you to treat them poorly or unfairly, those actions are considered discrimination. Michelle's prejudicial attitude against people of different skin colors leads to her support of discriminatory hiring practices in the workplace.

Sometimes we are unaware of our feelings or thoughts about certain things. Other times we know exactly how we feel. We love chocolate. We hate mushrooms. We adore cats. These are our conscious attitudes. We are fully conscious and aware of our feelings toward a certain object. Unconscious attitudes are the thoughts and beliefs that exist at the unconscious level. More of our attitudes are actually unconscious and operate automatically!

Components of Attitudes in Psychology

Attitudes are made up of three parts: affective, behavioral, and cognitive. These parts are sometimes referred to as the ABC model of attitudes. Any attitude can include these three parts, but not all attitudes include all three of them. These parts help us identify our attitudes and the ways they influence us.

Affective Component

The affective component of attitude encompasses our emotional response to the object of our attitude. If we believe dogs are dangerous, we will experience anxiety or fear when we see a dog. We might even feel afraid just thinking about dogs or seeing a picture of one! An attitude that is built largely on the affective component is called an affective-based attitude. Strong attitudes toward religion or sexual orientation are often affective-based.

Behavioral Component

The behavioral component of attitude encompasses the way we act toward the object of our attitude. Crossing the street to avoid a dog is the behavioral component of a negative or fearful attitude toward dogs. Our behavior is not always secondary to our attitudes. Sometimes we may not even have an immediate sense of how we feel about something until we examine our behavior. Maybe you are unsure about your feelings about tomatoes, but you eat them often. When someone asks you if you like tomatoes, you reply "yes" based on your behavior. An attitude that is built largely on the behavioral component is called a behavior-based attitude.

Cognitive Component

The cognitive component of attitude encompasses our beliefs and thoughts about the object of our attitude. It includes our knowledge about a particular thing or topic. Often, these cognitive components can be based on overgeneralized assumptions like "All drugs are bad." An attitude that is built largely on the cognitive component is called a cognitive-based attitude.

Attitudes are fairly stable, but they are NOT good predictors of how someone will behave. A lot of people think of themselves as good or fair, but they still cheat on their spouses or support selfish or prejudicial policies.

Examples of Attitude Formation in Psychology

There are so many things that contribute to the formation of our attitudes, like our family, friends, culture, media, personality, conditioning, and social learning. The things we are exposed to help shape our attitudes. In fact, this process has a name: the mere exposure effect.

Our families play a significant role in shaping our attitudes through exposure. Our first experiences with attitudes come through our families. Our parents reinforce or deter certain behaviors and ideas. If we grow up with parents who are strongly against drinking alcohol, we are more likely to adopt that same attitude.

Belonging to a particular culture also shapes our attitudes. Culture is made up of the shared ideas, traditions, attitudes, and behaviors of a group of people. Our attitudes are shaped through exposure to our culture's customs and beliefs. We generally adopt our culture's beliefs and preferences unconsciously! If you grew up in the United States you might not think twice about sporting a tank top in the summer heat. If you grew up in East Asia, you are more likely to think that tank tops are scandalous and disrespectful.

Mass media can influence our attitudes toward people or products. The elaboration likelihood model is a two-part model of persuasion. The first part, the central route of persuasion, is how mass media influences our attitudes through facts and figures. The peripheral route is how mass media seeks to gain our approval by using our favorite celebrities in advertising. Do you really like a particular clothing brand? Is it because an actress you admire is the face of their brand?