Attitude: an evaluation a person makes about an object, person, group, event or issue.
Think of an attitude for each of people, objects and experiences.
‘Remember the Titans’ – What attitudes were present in the movie? Race, gender, sexual orientation
Attitudes are formed from direct contact, interaction, child rearing, group membership, media and chance conditioning.
Direct contact: personal experience with the object of the attitude – such as opposing pollution when a nearby factory blackens and ruins your favourite white shirt hanging on your clothesline.
Interaction: discussion with people holding a particular attitude – talking with friends about their volunteer work for an environmental organisation will probably make you favour ‘green’ attitudes too.
Child rearing: parental values, beliefs and practices applied while caring for a child – if both parents belong to the same political party, chances are two out of three that their children will belong to that party as adults.
Group membership: our association with the people with whom we share common characteristics - being a
Melbourne resident will most likely cause you to view Melbourne as a better place to live than any other Australian city.
Media: providers of information, such as magazines, television and radio that reach large audiences – frequent tv viewers tend to mistrust others and overestimate their chances of being harmed.
Chance conditioning: learning that takes place by chance or coincidence – based on one or two good or bad experiences.
There are three components to every attitude: Affective
Behavioural
Feelings
Actions
Cognitive Beliefs
Affective component: the emotional component of the attitude, how you feel about people, objects, places, events or ideas. Feelings can be good, bad or neutral.
Behavioural component: the action component. It refers to how you might behave in a certain situation.
Cognitive component: the mental component , the beliefs or thoughts you have about people, objects, places
,events or ideas. Thoughts can be good, bad or neutral.
 Activity 5.1 – Part B (Nelson workbook)
 Activity 5.2 (Nelson workbook)
 Activity 5.3 (Nelson workbook)
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Contradictory or clashing thoughts. A condition of conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistency between one’s beliefs and one’s actions.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory states that contradicting or clashing thoughts cause discomfort- that is, we have a need for consistency in our thoughts, perceptions and images of ourselves.
According to cognitive dissonance theory, we also tend to reject new information that contradicts ideas we already hold, convince ourselves that we have done the right thing, and experience dissonance after we cause an event that we wish had not taken place.
Stereotype: a commonly held idea about a person or group which is based on observed behaviours, or the person’s appearance.
A stereotype includes a set of ideas or beliefs that we hold about the members of certain groups, and these ideas may or may not be true.
Prejudice: the negative judgement that is made about a person, purely because they belong to a particular group.
Pre-judged – negative feelings.
Prejudice usually occurs when you judge someone or make up an idea about them before you actually know anything about them, sometimes you are not even aware that you are making this judgement.
 Student Activity Manual: Activity 5.6 and 5.7
Unequal treatment of people who should have the same rights as others.
Three common types of discrimination: racism, ageism, sexism
Sexism: an attitude that is a mixture of negative thoughts, feelings of fear, envy or hostility, and actions of discrimination based on gender.
Racism: an attitude that is a mixture of negative thoughts, feelings of fear, envy or hostility, and actions of discrimination based on race.
Ageism: an attitude that is a mixture of negative thoughts, feelings of fear, envy or hostility, and actions of discrimination based on age.
Stereotype – thoughts (cognitive component)
Prejudice – feelings (affective component)
Discrimination – actions (behavioural component)
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4.
5.
1. Inter-group Contact
To reduce prejudice there needs to be an increase in direct contact between groups.
Not just being in the same room, must be working together
The work must be meaningful to both parties
2. Sustained Contact
The more time you spend with someone, the less likely you are to hold a prejudiced view of them.
3. Mutual Interdependence
In order to reduce prejudice among groups, the two groups must sometimes be dependent on one another.
The groups need something from one another
Equality
To reduce prejudice there must be equal status between the two groups.
Cognitive Interventions
Teaching people about the way they think about prejudice, with hope that it can be reduced.
Think about other people’s perspective
Types of interventions: individuating information, just-world belief, self-fulfilling prophecy, social competition, commonalites, cultural awareness
Individuating information: knowledge that helps us see a person as an individual, rather than as a member of a group.
Just-world belief: belief that people generally get what they deserve
Self-fulfilling prophecy: an expectation that prompts people to act in ways that make the expectation come true.
Social competition: rivalry among groups, each of which regards itself as superior to others.
Commonalities: things people share or have in common, increasing cooperation with others and sharing joys and suffering.
Cultural awareness: awareness of cultural backgrounds different to your own.
6. Super-ordinate Goals
The co-operation of both groups is required to complete a task that bears equal importance to each group and cannot be completed without both groups.
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Scapegoating: blaming a person or a group for the actions of others of for conditions not of their making.
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Direct experience: being in contact with a particular group of people in a negative way will create a dislike for the group.
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Personal and group prejudice: occurs when members of a group are perceived as a threat to one’s individual interests(personal), or when a person conforms to group views(group).
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Prejudiced personality: people who have an authoritative personality (being rigid, inhibited and likely to oversimplify things) are more likely to be prejudiced.
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