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Sociology 143
probably become the most discussed and researched topic among social psy-
chologists of the last decade. Actually, the literature has grown so vast that no
one complete summary exists. At least half a dozen of the contributions to the
new Handbook of Social Psychology devote space to it, often quoting the same
20 ‘classic experiments’ in different contexts. For readers somewhat acquainted
with the topic, a review by McGuire is helpful.z12 For newcomers, Chapter IV
(p. 72-1 14) of Malewski is probably the best introdu~tion.~~3
The sociologist has long been acquainted with the problem of dissonance.
His literature abounds in notions like role conflict, cross-pressure, normative
inconsistency, etc. The social psychologist analyses how the individual behaves
in a dissonant situation. But be it remembered the idea permeated macrosociol-
ogy literature a long time ago. Macrosociologists have interpreted the French
revolution in the light of the discrepancy felt by the bourgeoisie between econo-
mic and political power. German fascist movements after the First World War
were explained by the contrast between the former status and the post-war
experience of the aristocracy and army.
The most useful classification of recent work on dissonance comes from
Zajonczr4 who suggests four sources of cognitive dissonance, the first of which
is labelled post decisional eflects. Any choice increases dissonance. If it is a
choice between two objects, the rejection of one alternative leaves a residue of
regret. If an overriding consideration forces us to make an undesirable choice,
the dissonance is clear. What do we do to overcome this? In one experiment,
subjects rated products according to personal preferences. They were then per-
mitted to choose between two gifts. In some cases, the alternatives were very
close on the rating list; in others, there was a considerable distance between
them. Later, all the original products were again rated. The following results
provide typical corroborative evidence of an individual’s efforts to adjust this
attitude to the action he has taken:
a. the chosen alternative increased in attractiveness following the choice;
b. the rejected alternative decreased in attractiveness following the choice;
e. both these changes became more pronounced when subjects chose between
products close on the preference-rating scales, rather than between products
farther apart;
d. in a control group, where no choices for gifts had to be made, no changes in
attractiveness of the received products occurred upon repetition of the
ratings.
It has often been surmised that people read advertisements intensively after
they have made a purchase. Experiments have supplied concrete evidence for
this and have added interesting modifications on the theme of dissonance.
A second type of Zajonc might be called enforced compliance. Experimentally,
it is possible to induce people to act against their own convictions. This, too,
would induce dissonance; a systematic discussion leads to surprising predic-
tions, corroborated by another experiment. Subjects were first asked to perform
a tedious task and then paid to recruit new subjects for the job by telling them
that it was really quite interesting. Subsequently the ‘liars’ were interviewed to
see how they remembered the original experiment. Those who were paid a high