COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

Cognitive Dissonance

Cognitive Dissonance

Cognitive dissonance refers to the psychological discomfort that people experience when there is inconsistency between their knowledge or beliefs and their behavior. Dissonance is distressing because humans strive to be consistent within themselves. A major category of cognitive dissonance is known as postdecision dissonance. This refers to the distress that occurs after one makes a decision (Plous, 1993).

Whenever individuals decide between a set of desirable alternatives, their decision will result in dissonance. For example, imagine that a person is considering job offers from company A and company B. Both positions have several positive features that make each of ...