The Role of Attitudes in Social Cognition

               

                                

                          
 Attitudes are evaluative judgments people make about objects, people, or events. They can be positive, negative, or neutral, influencing our thoughts, feelings, and behaviours. Social cognition is the area of social psychology that examines how people perceive and think about their social world. This includes how we form attitudes, how they change, and how they influence our behaviour.

 The Role of Attitudes in Social Cognition

There are many different theories about how attitudes are formed. One of the most influential theories is the social learning theory, which states that attitudes are learned through observation and experience. For example, if we see someone we admire express a positive attitude towards something, we are more likely to develop a positive attitude towards that thing ourselves.

Another important theory of attitude formation is the cognitive dissonance theory, which states that people are motivated to reduce any inconsistencies between their attitudes and their behaviour. For example, if we have a positive attitude towards smoking but know that smoking harms our health, we may experience cognitive dissonance. We may then try to reduce this dissonance by changing our attitude towards smoking or by changing our behaviour and quitting smoking.

Once attitudes are formed, they can change over time. One way that attitudes change is through persuasion. Persuasion is the process of trying to change someone's attitude through the use of argument, logic, and emotional appeals. Another way that attitudes change is through contact. Contact with people who hold different attitudes can lead to a more positive attitude towards those people and their beliefs.

Attitudes can also change as a result of new information. If we learn new information that contradicts our existing attitude, we may be motivated to change our attitude to be consistent with the new information.

Attitudes play an important role in our lives. They influence the way we think about ourselves and others, the way we make decisions, and the way we behave. By understanding how attitudes are formed and changed, we can better understand ourselves and the people around us.

Attitude Formation

The processes and conditions of learning may be different, resulting in varying attitudes among people.

 • Learning attitudes by association: You might have seen that students often develop a liking for a particular subject because of the teacher. This is because they see many positive qualities in that teacher; these positive qualities get linked to the subject that s/he teaches, and ultimately get expressed in the form of liking for the subject. In other words, a positive attitude towards the subject is learned through the positive association between a teacher and a student.

• Learning attitudes by being rewarded or punished: If an individual is praised for showing a particular attitude, chances are high that s/he will develop that attitude further. For example, if a teenager does yoga asanas regularly and gets the honour of being ‘Miss Good Health’ in her school, she may develop a positive attitude towards yoga and health in general. Similarly, if a child constantly falls ill because s/he eats junk food instead of proper meals, then the child is likely to develop a negative attitude towards junk food and also a positive attitude towards eating healthy food.
• Learning attitudes through modelling (observing others) : Often it is not through association, or through reward and punishment, that we learn attitudes. Instead, we learn them by observing others being rewarded or punished for expressing thoughts, or showing behaviour of a particular kind towards the attitude object. For example, children may form a respectful attitude towards elders, by observing that their parents show respect for elders, and are appreciated for it.
• Learning attitudes through group or cultural norms : Very often, we learn attitudes through the norms of our group or culture. Norms are unwritten rules about behaviour that everyone is supposed to show under specific circumstances. Over time, these norms may become part of our social cognition, in the form of attitudes. Learning attitudes through group or cultural norms may actually be an example of all three forms of learning described above — learning through association, reward or punishment, and modelling. For example, offering money, sweets, fruit and flowers in a place of worship is a normative behaviour in some religions.
• Learning through exposure to information : Many attitudes are learned in a social context, but not necessarily in the physical presence of others. Today, with the huge amount of information that is being pr ovided through various media, both positive and negative attitudes are being formed. By reading the biographies of selfactualised persons, an individual may develop a positive attitude towards hard work and other aspects as the means of achieving success in life.

The Country Ratings Poll was conducted by GlobeScan/PPC among 18,000 people in 19 countries between December 2016 and April 2017. It asked respondents to rate 16 countries and the EU on whether their influence in the world is “mostly positive” or “mostly negative.”

Negative views of US influence in the world have increased in the majority of countries surveyed in the latest global country poll for the BBC World Service. Compared to 2014, when the poll was last conducted, double-digit increases in negative views of the US, rising to majorities, are now found in several of its NATO allies, including the UK (up from 42 to 64%), Spain (44 to 67%), France (41 to 56%), and Turkey (36 to 64%). Negative opinion has also sharply risen in Latin American nations Mexico (up from 41 to 59%), and Peru (29 to 49%). In Russia, negative views of the US have also increased, from 55 to 64 percent.

Attitudes towards the perceived world influence of other rated countries reflect recent geopolitical tensions. Views of Russia continue to be quite negative, sustaining a sharp decline that began in 2013. On average, across the 17 tracking countries, 49 per cent hold negative views of Russia. Russian opinion aside, the only country with a majority leaning favourably towards Russia is China, where positive ratings have gone up from 55 to 74 per cent. Public opinion towards North Korea is also at its lowest since tracking began, with 59 per cent across the tracking countries expressing an unfavourable view towards the Pyongyang regime (up 3 points since 2014, and swamping positive feelings at 17%). Yet, Iran continues to be the least-favourably viewed nation, with 61 per cent rating its influence negatively across the tracking countries.