Question

Sarah has always strongly believed that it is wrong to steal, but after she steals a bottle of nail polish from the drug store, her attitude toward stealing becomes significantly less harsh. Which theory best accounts for her shift in attitude?

Answer 1

Answer: Cognitive dissonance

Explanation:

In social psychology, cognitive dissonance can be defined as the conflict or disharmony between personal beliefs that a person has and the new information they receive. That is a person who has a concept about something and then receives different information about what he knew may have an internal conflict. An example of cognitive dissonance is the case of Sarah. Sarah knows that stealing is not right and after she does it begins to have a less hard concept about what it is to steal. Sarah Sarah's beliefs are clashing with her behaviors.

When cognitive dissonance is present, the person looks for ways to set aside one of the two ideas to reduce mental conflict. In Sarah's case, she decided to have a less harsh opinion about stealing, where she may have sought causes to justify the theft and thus feel less guilt.

When people commit actions that go against their principles and beliefs, they tend to change their perception after the act and look for reasons to not feel the full weight of having done something that they did not consider appropriate in the first place.

Cognitive dissonance is something that we have experienced at some point in our lives and in some cases, there is no reason to feel bad. People have a belief system that was formed based on the behaviors they saw and developed and from there they developed ideas about what they consider right or wrong. With the passage of time and the opportunity to live various experiences, the person may feel a shock and see how their perceptions change.