Opinion change as a result of effortfully drawing a counterattitudinal conclusion

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis, derived from dissonance theory, that the more effort subjects exerted to attain the conclusion to a syllogistic argument the more they would come to agree with that conclusion. Three experimentally manipulated levels of effort were created by varying the number of preliminary syllogisms subjects had to solve in addition to finding the conclusion to the final set of premises, the assertion that cigarette smoking causes lung cancer. Two levels of commitment to the belief that cigarette smoking does not cause lung cancer were defined by dividing subjects into those who smoked and those who did not. Attitude change scores indicated that the amount of effort expended was directly related to the amount of attitude change for smokers, but that nonsmokers in the three effort conditions did not differ in the amount of attitude change evinced. The data were interpreted as the result of dissonance reducing effort justification, but several alternative explanations are discussed. Also, the authors note the relevance of these findings of the question of whether it is best for a communicator to state his conclusion or leave it as an implication to be drawn from his premises by the audience.