CHApTer 6
The Need to Justify Our Actions
5
tried to quit and failed managed to lower their perception of the dangers of smoking.
In this way, they could continue to smoke without feeling terrible about it (Gibbons,
Eggleston, & Benthin, 1997). A study of more than 360 adolescent smokers found the
same thing: the greater their dependence on smoking and the greater the trouble they
had quitting, the more justifications they came up with to keep smoking (Kleinjan,
van den Eijnden, & Engels, 2009).
Smokers can come up with some pretty creative justifications. Some convince them-
selves that the data linking cigarette smoking to cancer are inconclusive. Or they say
that smoking is worth the risk of cancer and emphysema because it is so enjoyable, and
besides it relaxes them and reduces nervous tension and in this way actually improves
their health. Some add a cognition that allows them to focus on the vivid exception:
“Look at my grandfather. He’s 87 years old, and he’s been smoking a pack a day since he
was 12. That proves it’s not always bad for you.” Another popular way of reducing dis-
sonance through adding a new cognition is self-affirmation, in which a person focuses
on one or more of his or her good qualities to lessen the dissonant sting caused by doing
something foolish: “Yeah, I feel pretty stupid to still be smoking, but boy am I a good
cook. In fact, let me tell you about this new recipe . . .” (Steele, 1988; Mc Connell &
Brown, 2010).
These justifications may sound silly to the nonsmoker, but that is our point. As the
smokers’ rationales show, people experiencing dissonance will often deny or distort
reality to reduce it. People who don’t want to give up scientifically discredited ideas, re-
fuse to practice safe sex, or receive bad news about their health can be equally “creative”
in denying evidence and reducing their discomfort (Aronson, 1997; Croyle & Jemmott,
1990; Kassarjian & Cohen, 1965; Leishman, 1988).
When you understand dissonance, you will see it in action all around you: in the
politician who opposes prostitution but is caught with a high-priced call girl (“oh, a
call girl isn’t really a prostitute”), in the people who predict the end of the world but
who, fortunately, turn out to be wrong (“our prediction was accurate; we just used
numbers from the wrong chapter of the Bible”). In one study, researchers wondered
how gay men who were strongly identified with their Christian church dealt with anti-
gay pronouncements from their ministers. One way to resolve dissonance would be to
change their behavior—that is, to change their church or even leave their religion. But
those who decide to stay in the church resolve dissonance by
focusing on the shortcomings of the minister; for example,
they say, “It’s not my religion that promotes this prejudice—
it’s the bigotry of this particular preacher” (Pitt, 2010).
Why We Overestimate the pain of Disappointment
Imagine that you have just interviewed for the job of your
dreams. You expect to be very disappointed if you don’t get
the job. Then, to your utter amazement, you don’t get the
job. How long do you think your disappointment will last?
The answer is: It depends on how successfully you reduce
the dissonance caused by not getting the job. When you first
get the bad news, you will be disappointed; however, more
than likely you will soon put a spin on it that makes you feel
better. It was a dead-end job anyway. And that interviewer
was a jerk.
Interestingly, people often do not anticipate how success-
fully they will reduce dissonance. When people think about
how they will react to future negative events, they show an
impact bias, whereby they overestimate the intensity and
duration of their negative emotional reactions. For example, people overestimate how
dreadful they will feel following a romantic breakup, loss of a job, or not getting into
the dorm they wanted (Dunn, Wilson, & Gilbert, 2003; Gilbert et al., 1998; Mellers &
McGraw, 2001; Wilson & Gilbert, 2005).
Given that people have successfully reduced dissonance in the past, why is it that
they are not aware that they will do so in the future? The answer is that the process
Self-Affirmation
In the context of dissonance the-
ory, a way of reducing dissonance
by reminding oneself of one or
more of one’s positive attributes.
Teenagers who smoke usually
justify their actions with such
cognitions as “Smoking is cool”;
“I want to be like my friends”; “in
movies, everyone smokes”; “I’m
healthy; nothing is going to happen
to me”; or “adults are always on
my back about stuff I do.”
impact Bias
The tendency to overestimate the
intensity and duration of one’s
emotional reactions to future
negative events.
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CHApTer 6
The Need to Justify Our Actions
of
reducing dissonance is largely unconscious. Indeed, dissonance reduction works better
that way (Gilbert et al., 1998). It is not very effective to hear ourselves say, “I’ll try to
make myself feel better by convincing myself that the person who just rejected me is an
idiot.” It is more effective if we unconsciously transform our view of the interviewer;
we feel better believing that anyone could see that he is an idiot (Bem & McConnell,
1970; Goethals & Reckman, 1973). Because the dissonance-reduction process is mostly
unconscious, we do not anticipate that it will save us from future anguish.
Self-esteem and Dissonance
Who do you think feels the greatest dissonance after
doing something cruel, foolish, or incompetent: a person with high self-esteem or low?
The answer is the former; people with the highest self-esteem experience the most dis-
sonance when they behave in ways that are contrary to their high opinion of themselves,
and they will work harder to reduce it than will those with average levels of self-esteem.
When people who have low self-esteem commit a stupid or immoral action, they do not
feel as much dissonance, because the cognition “I have done an awful thing” is conso-
nant with the cognition “I am a schlunk; I’m always doing awful things.”
In a classic experiment, researchers predicted that individuals who had been given
a boost to their self-esteem would be less likely to cheat, if given the opportunity to
do so, than individuals who had a lower opinion of themselves (Aronson & Mettee,
1968). After all, if you think of yourself as a decent person, cheating would be disso-
nant with that self-concept. However, people who have had a temporary blow to their
self-esteem, and thus are feeling low and worthless, might be more likely to cheat at
cards, kick their dog, or do any number of things consistent with having a low opinion
of themselves.
In this experiment, the self-esteem of college students was temporarily modified by
giving the subjects false information about their personalities. After taking a personality
test, one-third of the students were given positive feedback; they were told that the test
indicated that they were mature, interesting, deep, and so forth. Another third of the
students were given negative feedback; they were told that the test revealed that they
were relatively immature, uninteresting, shallow, and the like. The remaining one-third
of the students were not given any information about the results of the test. Immedi-
ately afterward, the students were scheduled to participate in an experiment conducted
by a different psychologist who had no apparent relation to the personality inventory.
As part of this second experiment, the participants played a game of cards against some
of their fellow students. They were allowed to bet money and keep whatever they won.
In the course of the game, they were given a few opportunities to cheat and thereby win
a sizable sum of cash. The findings confirmed the prediction of dissonance theory: The
students who had gotten the positive feedback were least likely to take the opportunity
to cheat; the students who had gotten the negative feedback were most likely to cheat;
and the control group fell in between.
If high self-esteem can serve as a buffer against dishonest or self-defeating behav-
ior because people strive to keep their self-concepts consonant with their actions, this
research has wide-ranging applications. For example, many African American children
believe that they “don’t have what it takes” to succeed academically, so they don’t work
hard, so they don’t do as well as they might—all of this perfectly, if tragically, conso-
nant. A team of social psychologists conducted a simple intervention, which they repli-
cated three times with three different classrooms (Cohen et al., 2009). They bolstered
African American children’s self-esteem by having them do structured, self-affirming
writing assignments. The children had to focus their attention on their good qualities
in areas outside of academics and their most important values (e.g., religion, music,
or love for their family). This self-affirmation raised their general self-esteem, which
in turn reduced their academic anxiety, resulting in better performance. The lowest-
achieving black students benefitted the most, and the benefits persisted in a follow-up
study two years later. Thus, changing the students’ negative self-perceptions had long-
term benefits both on self-esteem and performance on objective exams.
Do these results sound too good to be true? They are not. Still, we must be cautious
in generalizing from them. Bolstering self-esteem can’t be done in an artificial way. To
be effective, this kind of intervention must be grounded in reality (Kernis, 2001). If a
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