The two-component model of behavior factors: Evidences of orthogonality of explicit and implicit factors

Abstract

There is a growing understanding in social sciences that even purposeful human behavior cannot be fully explained by rational motives. The behavioral economy developed a program for studying economic behavior considering more factors than the blind pursuit of ones benefit. In social psychology, the theory of two groups of factors that influence human behavior has been developed: explicit factors are determined mainly by conceptual thinking, while implicit factors - by non-rational motives, often not obvious for the subject of action. It is argued that the study of both groups of factors is a prerequisite for the correct understanding and accurate prediction of behavior since they are of different nature, irreducible to each other, and have very different effects on behavior. The article focuses on the issue of the different nature of explicit and implicit factors. Can we say that the models of dual decision-making from social psychology are applicable to social action? We tested the nature of the interaction of the explicit and implicit components of the attitude towards the United Russia party with the basic judgments that, it would seem, should form this attitude. The results were paradoxical. It turned out that ideologically biased statements addressed to the political party form an attitude towards it on the implicit level. At the same time, the attitude to these statements depends on the attitude to the party, but at the rational level. Thus, this is a convincing evidence of the fundamentally different nature of explicit and implicit factors of social behavior.