Date of Award

6-2011

Document Type

Open Access

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Kenneth DeBono

Language

French

Keywords

cognitive dissonance, self-concept, dissonance, rumors

Abstract

This study investigates the connection between self-monitoring and cognitive dissonance as moderated by the number of people present when projecting counter-attitudinal beliefs. Subjects were asked to complete Snyder’s (1974) Self-Monitoring Scale and write a counter-attitudinal essay about Union College’s academic calendar. Participants in either of the two experimental conditions- sessions run with either three (condition 2) or six (condition 3) participants— were led to believe that their essay could be chosen to be read aloud to the rest of the group. Participants in the control condition were told their essays would remain confidential. Lastly, all participants filled out a campus issues questionnaire to assess attitude change concerning the school’s academic calendar. It was hypothesized that high self-monitoring individuals would experience more dissonance in the experimental conditions while low self-monitoring individuals would experience more dissonance in the control condition. Contrary to the hypothesis, the pattern of means suggested that low self-monitoring individuals experienced more dissonance than high self-monitoring individuals in the two experimental conditions.

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