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Review
. 2018 Jan 4:69:299-327.
doi: 10.1146/annurev-psych-122216-011911. Epub 2017 Aug 25.

Attitudes and Attitude Change

Dolores Albarracin  1 , Sharon Shavitt  1
Affiliations
Review

Attitudes and Attitude Change

Dolores Albarracin et al. Annu Rev Psychol. .

Abstract

This review covers research on attitudes and attitude change published between 2010 and 2017. We characterize this period as one of significant progress toward an understanding of how attitudes form and change in three critical contexts. The first context is the person, as attitudes change in connection to values, general goals, language, emotions, and human development. The second context is social relationships, which link attitude change to the communicator of persuasive messages, social media, and culture. The third context is sociohistorical and highlights the influence of unique events, including sociopolitical, economic, and climatic occurrences. In conclusion, many important recent findings reflect the fact that holism, with a focus on situating attitudes within their personal, social, and historical contexts, has become the zeitgeist of attitude research during this period.

Keywords: attitude; belief; culture; evaluative judgment; goal; opinion; persuasion.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Proportion of articles in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology whose abstracts mention attitude, persuasion, belief, opinion, or evaluative judgment.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

LITERATURE CITED

    1. Ajzen I, Madden TJ. 1986. Prediction of goal-directed behavior: attitudes, intentions, and perceived behavioral control. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 22(5):453–74
    1. Albarracín D, Handley IM. 2011. The time for doing is not the time for change: effects of general action and inaction goals on attitude retrieval and attitude change. J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 100(6):983–98 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Albarracín D, Handley IM, Noguchi K, McCulloch KC, Li H, et al. 2008. Increasing and decreasing motor and cognitive output: a model of general action and inaction goals. J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 95(3):510–23 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Albarracin D, Kumkale GT, Del Vento PP. 2017. How people can become persuaded by weak messages presented by credible communicators: Not all sleeper effects are created equal. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 68:171–80 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Albarracin D, Zanna MP, Johnson BT, Kumkale GT. 2005. Attitudes: introduction and scope. In The Handbook of Attitudes, ed. Albarracin D, Johnson BT, Zanna MP, pp. 3–19. Hove, UK: Psychol. Press

RELATED RESOURCES

    1. Banaji MR, Greenwald AG. 2016. Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People. New York: Bantam
    1. Brock TC, Green MC. 2005. Persuasion: Psychological Insights and Perspectives. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Sage. 2nd ed.
    1. Mercier H, Sperber D. 2017. The Enigma of Reason. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press
    1. Sloman S, Fernbach P. 2017. The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone. New York: Riverhead Books

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