Download - Attitude - Organizational Behaviour
Attitude Dr. Rajasshrie Pillai
Individual Process And Behavior:Attitude: Importance of attitude in an
organization, Right Attitude,Components of attitude, Relationship
between behavior and attitude,Developing Emotional intelligence at the
workplace, Job attitude, Barriers tochanging attitudes
ATTITUDES
Attitudes represent beliefs, feelings and action tendencies towards objects, ideas or people
“An Attitude is mental state of readiness, learned and organized through experience, exerting a specific influence on person’s response to people, object and situations with which it is related”
Experience with the object
Classical Conditioning
Operant Conditioning
Vicarious Learning
Family and Peer Groups
Neighborhood
Mass Communication
Economic Status Attitude
Formation of Attitude
Attitudes
Three Components of Attitude Attitude
Affective Component The feeling, sentiments, moods and emotions about
some idea, person, event or objectCognitive Component
The belief, opinion, knowledge or information held by the individual
Behavioral Component The predispositions to get on a favorable or
unfavorable evaluation of something
FUNCTIONS OF ATTITUDEAttitude serves four important functions:
The adjustment (Adaptive) functionSome attitudes serve to enable people to attain particular,
desired goals or avoid undesirable circumstance
The knowledge function Some attitudes are useful because they help to make
the world more understandable. They help people ascribe causes to events and direct attention towards features of people or situations that are likely to be useful in making sense of them.
The ego-defensive functionSome attitudes serve to protect the person that
holds them from psychologically damaging events or information by allowing them to be recast in less damaging or threatening ways.
The value expressive functionSome attitudes are important to a person
because they express values that are integral to that person’s self concept (i.e. their ideas about who they are). The attitude is, consequently, ‘part of who they are’ and the expression of that attitude communicates important things about that person to others.
Job-Related AttitudesJob involvement ( Employee Engagement
Kahn)Extent that a person identifies with his job.
Organizational commitment Extent that a person identifies with the
organization. This is a great predictor for turnover.
Job satisfaction (Edwin A. Locke’s)A pleasurable or positive emotional state
resulting from the appraisa1 of one's job or job experiences“.
Types of Attitudes
Responses to Job Dissatisfaction
CHANGING ATTITUDES
Barriers to changing attitudesThere are two basic barriers that can prevent
people from changing their attitude. One is called prior commitment, which occurs when people feel a commitment to a particular course of action and are unwilling to change.
A second barrier is the result of insufficient information. Sometimes people do not see any reasons to change their attitude.
OVERCOMING BARRIERS
Providing information.Use of fearResolving discrepancies Influence of friends or peersThe co-opting approach
Changing Attitudes of Employees Give feedback Provide positive conditions Positive Role modelProviding new information Use of fearInfluence of friends or press The co-opting approach Group Membership RewardsOthers
Changing Attitudes of Self
Be aware of one’s attitudesThink for self Realize that there are few, if any, benefits
from harboring negative attitudes Keep an open mind. Get into continuous education program Build a positive self-esteem Stay away from negative influences
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Self-Perception TheoryAttitudes are used after the fact to make sense out of an action that has already occurred.
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy:
Process by which ones expectations about another person eventually lead the other person to behave in ways that confirm these expectations
© 2003 Prentice Hall Inc. All rights reserved. 3–25
The Theory of Cognitive Dissonance
Desire to reduce dissonance• Importance of elements creating dissonance• Degree of individual influence over elements• Rewards involved in dissonance
Measuring the A-B RelationshipRecent research indicates that the attitudes
(A) significantly predict behaviors (B) when moderating variables are taken into account.
Moderating Variables• Importance of the attitude• Specificity of the attitude• Accessibility of the attitude• Social pressures on the individual• Direct experience with the attitude
EIEmotional intelligence is the capacity for
recognizing our own feelings and those of others for motivating our selves, and for managing emotions well in ourselves and in our relationship.” Daniel Goleman
Sample Attitude Survey