Behavioral Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance

Freedman (1963) based his study on the study of

Aronson and Carlsmith (1963) who found that

children who were forbidden to play with a toy

evaluated it more positively if they were severely

threatened than if they were only mildly threatened.

Cognitive dissonance was higher for children in the

mild threat condition because they had less

justification to leave the toy untouched than children

in the severe threat condition.

Contributor © POSbase 2005

Behavioral Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance

In order to test the effect of cognitive dissonance

on behavior, Freedman (1963) had seven to

nine-year old children sitting individually in a lab.

He told each child that he will go out for some

time, and that the child is forbidden to play with

a very attractive robot, which was among five

toys, until the experimenter is back.

© POSbase 2005

Behavioral Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance

© POSbase 2005

There were two conditions:

In the mild threat condition, the experimenter

told the child not to touch the attractive robot

he is back because this would be wrong.

In the severe threat condition, the experimenter

threatened to that he would get angry and has

something to do about it.

Most children complied with the experimenter’s

instructions.

Behavioral Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance

© POSbase 2005

Six weeks after the children visited the lab, a

woman came to their school and gave them an

opportunity to play with the five toys.

In the severe threat condition, 77% of the

children played with the attractive robot.

In the mild threat condition, only 22% chose

the robot.

Behavioral Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance

© POSbase 2005

This finding demonstrated behavioral consequences of cognitive dissonance.

Children in the mild threat condition felt more dissonance that children in the severe threat condition, who had more justification to follow the experimenter’s instruction.

Therefore, children in the mild threat condition adjusted their attitude towards their behavior, and found the forbidden toy less attractive.

Behavioral Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance

© POSbase 2005

This study helps explaining why children like to

play with forbidden toys. According to the present

study, parents who want to induce a stable

behavior should not punish too harshly, because

the child will show the behavior again if the threat

of punishment – and with it the justification to

suppress the forbidden behavior – is taken away.

Mild punishment, however, leads to more stable

suppression of unwanted behavior.