Do people experience cognitive dissonance because of a threat to their private self-image, to their public self-image, or both? Do you think it depends on the person, the situation, or the cognitions, or some other factor? How could you test or explore whether public or private self-concept matters more?
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Madison O’Brien
RE: Cognitive Dissonance and Self-Concept
COLLAPSE
After reviewing the concept of cognitive dissonance and comparing them to a few examples in my life, I have concluded that I believe that people experience cognitive dissonance because of a threat to to their public self-image. For the most part, people have an easier time justifying things to themselves rather than to others. In addition, most would rather be privately judged by themselves than judged by the public. For example, I believe that being late to a commitment is rude. When I am late to something I feel guilty but still find a way to justify it in my mind. In contrast it would be much more difficult to me to explain to something that it is okay for me to be late, but rude if someone else were to be. I believe that this depends on the person and the extent of the situation. If someone has a strong belief of something and contradicts it, they are likely to feel more guilty than someone less passionate would. It also depends on the person, because some people would care less if their public self-image was destroyed than their private. Also, something minor would be less detrimental to one’s self image than a major cognitive dissonance. However, overall I think that today’s day in age, people would rather preserve their public image more than their private. This reasoning stems from people’s need to be accepted. A threat to someone’s public self image would be more detrimental to their self esteem because they would be judged by others and themselves. A way one could test/explore whether public or private self-concept matters more is to have people who experience cognitive dissonance have the choice whether to tell others or keep it to themselves. If they choose to tell others then it can be said that others opinions on them don’t matter to them and they are more considered with how they personally feel about themselves. If they were to keep it to themselves it can be said that they would rather be the only one to know about their contradiction and they would feel ashamed if the public knew.
I think that people experience cognitive dissonance because of a threat to both their private and public self-image. At least for me, if I get newr information on something that causes me to think completely different, not only am I questioning why I was like that before, I am also hard on myself for thinking that way. I’m not only worried about how I’m viewed publically, but also how that new information will change my own view of myself. However, most people (including myself) would be more worried about their public self-image than their private self-image. As Madison stated, it’s a lot easier to justify something to yourself than it is to justify to other people without being stigmatized in some way. For example, I want to believe that I am a good student who pays attention in class consistently. However, every now and then I find myself looking at other things or not paying attention to a lecture I am watching. This distraction makes me stop my work, and I feel guilty later when I know I could have gotten more work done. This dissonance makes me want to change my behavior, and prove to myself and others that I am a hard worker and I study consistently, but it’s hard to show that if I get distracted easily. I could justify it to myself that I’m taking breaks to improve my workflow later, but justifying it to others in that sense wouldn’t work that way, and would be significantly more difficult to explain. Generally, this does depend on the person, the situation, and where their self-esteem lies. If they generally like proving their worth to themselves, and think about themselves in a high regard, they’re more likely to think about their private self-image. If the person wants to prove themselves to someone else (such as family, friends, or a relationship partner), then they’ll think more about their public self-image instead and hope their public image doesn’t change drastically with one dissonance situation, especially if they crave validation from others. If the situation cases only a small amount of dissonance, it might not cause one of the self-concepts to change. However, if the cognitive dissonance is larger, it might affect both of the self-concepts, or one of them greatly. One way we could explore which self-concept matters more is to have test subjects and induce them into a cognitive dissonance situation. Then have them write how they feel about the dissonance and how it affected them. If they write anything involving the perspective of others, then their public self-image matters more to them. This might be hard to tell since they could write about both their private self-concept and their public self-concept. In that case, one could argue that both are important to the person. Depending on the ratio of what they write about, one could tell which is more important to the subject.
Emad Tawfik
RE: Cognitive Dissonance and Self-Concept
COLLAPSE
People, I believe, feel cognitive dissonance as a result of a threat to both their private and public image. In my personal experience, there have been times when I cared for both, which is a natural human reaction in many circumstances. On the one hand, I believe that because cognitive dissonance threatens one’s self-esteem, some people may be more concerned with their private self-image because they don’t care what others think of them. On the other hand, some individuals may be more concerned about their public image if they rely greatly on the validation of others, or if they are influencers or famous since they believe they must defend their image at all costs, as others have said. I absolutely believe it depends on the individual because I believe people with poor self-esteem are less likely to have dissonant arousal than those with strong self-esteem, which makes a significant difference. When people care more about their public or private lives, I believe it is clear most of the time. I don’t believe there is a precise way to test this since, as I previously stated, it truly depends on the individual and their standing in life, whether they are a regular living person or someone as important as the president who has to make decisions that affect the entire country. Therefore, I believe that a person may fully test themselves by considering which one is more important to them and why, but no one can truly test another. Because this relates to a mental conflict that happens when a person’s behaviors and beliefs do not coincide, it produces a lot of tension and psychological issues for many because the individual might often maintain two contradictory views. I believe there are other instances that could be provided, but the greatest one that I can provide is the dieting cheat example. This is when a person is on a diet and feels that they need to eat properly in order to achieve a certain objective, such as losing weight or being healthier but contradicts that by having a cheat meal or day. They end up eating something that contradicts their dietary goals, but they convince themselves that it’s acceptable since they have an excuse. This scenario, I believe, may be applicable to many people, as it is to me.
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