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INDEX
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3. AN INTRODUCTION TO ETHICS
Etymologically the term ethics correspond to
the Greek word ethos whichmeans character, habit,
customs, ways of behaviour, etc. Ethics is also called
moral philosophy. The word moral comes from
Latin word mores which signifies customs,
character, behaviour, etc. Thus ethics may be defined
as the systematic study of human actions from the
point of viewof their rightfulness or wrongfulness,
as means for the attainment of the ultimate
happiness. It is the reflective study of what is good
or bad in that part of human conduct for which human
has some personal responsibility. In simple words
ethics refers to what is good and the way to get it,
and what is bad and how to avoid it. It refers to what
ought to be done to achieve what is good and what
ought not to be done to avoid what is evil.
As a philosophical discipline, ethics is the study
of the values and guidelines by which we live. It also
involves the justification of these values and
guidelines. It is not merely following a tradition or
custom. Instead it requires analysis and evaluation
of these guidelines in light of universal principles.
As moral philosophy, ethics is the philosophical
thinking about morality, moral problems, and moral
judgements.
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History of Ethics
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Nonnormative approaches
Meta-ethics
Normative approaches
Applied ethics
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Why be Moral?
Pythagorian Ethics
Heraclitian Ethics
Heraclitean fragments suggest that there is an everpresent rational pattern (logos) in this Process or
Becoming. Heraclitus says: To be ethical is to live
a rational life, to obey the dictates of reason, which
is the same for us all, the same for the whole world.
Man is entrusting himself to his senses, and he lives
as if he were epileptic.
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Socratic Ethics
His teachings on moral and religious elements
are philosophical insights. These insights are the
fundamental principles which brightened his life. They
are mainly concerned with good and evil, conscience,
the ethical person and moral virtues. Socrates clearly
did think that all the moral virtues are rooted in
practical wisdom or knowledge. The central teaching
of Socratic ethics is knowledge is virtue. He who
knows, what good is, will do good. By this he wanted
to tell that the right insight led to the right action. For
Socrates, themoral conscience is not mere sentiment
but it is a responsibility before God. Human life is
not tragic; one should confront it with the spirit.
Socratic ethic is teaching that human is a moral
being in general. This was a revolutionary thought
against the belief of the aristocratic people who
thought that morals are limited only to a privileged
group. He believed and taught that doing good is the
moral duty of all human beings and possible for all.
Socrates was teaching two moral imperatives
attributed to the Delphic Oracle: Know Thyself
(gnthi seauton), and Avoid Excess (meden agan).
For Socrates the ultimate evil was the unexamined
life. He forced upon people for the recognition of
their ignorance. At the end of the Apology Socrates
told those jurors, who voted for his acquittal, of his
confidence that death will not be an evil thing for
him. He advised them, to bear in mind this one truth:
that no evil comes to a good man in life or in death.
Socrates believed that there is life after death, which
reflects in the life itself. A virtuous life here leads to
happiness in the life after death. The proof for this is
his death itself. This was done according to his faith
in the immortality of soul. This faith ismore religious
than rational certainty. His life was a faith in the soul
rather than a philosophy of the spirit. For him pleasure
is below to the virtue.
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Protagorian Ethics
Platonic Ethics
Plato sees human more in the soul. He affirms
that we are souls. He meant that Soul is human.
Evil elements are not in human but in the body. The
real evil for human is the body, because human is
always trying to liberate oneself from the bondage
of body. Only with liberation of soul from body, a
person can be happy and his ethics is known as
eudaimonistic ethics. Platos works on ethics are
fundamentally eudaimonistic i.e., about well-being
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Aristotlean Ethics
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Epicurean Ethics
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Stoic Ethics
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characteristic:
What is the evil in war? Is it the death of some
who will soon die in any case, that others may live in
peaceful subjection? This is merely cowardly dislike,
not any religious feeling. The real evils in war are
love of violence, revengeful cruelty, fierce and
implacable enmity, wild resistance, the lust of power,
and such like; and it is generally to punish these things,
when force is required to inflict the punishment, that,
in obedience to God or some lawful authority, good
men undertake wars.
Beyond such insistence that war should not be
fought from love of violence, revengeful cruelty or
lust for power, Augustine did not work out specific
principles for the just conduct of war. Still, in making
it plausible to many Christians that killing in war need
not fall under the divine commandment not to kill;
Augustine freed others to develop principles for what
might be considered the just declaration of war, as
well as the just conduct of war, once it has been justly
entered into.
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Categorical Imperative
Kant viewed human nature as a battlefield of
unceasing struggle between desires (subjective) and
reason (objective) wherein our desires have a stronger
appeal than reason has; therefore, we find that acting
rightly requires an effort that acting on feeling does
not. Categorical Imperative is a term invented by
Immanuel Kant to refer to a command that orders us
to do something unconditionally that is, regardless
of what we want or what our aims and purposes are.
According to Kant, we experience the principle of
morality as Categorical Imperative. Kants categorical
imperative is categorical because it admits of no
exceptions and is absolutely binding, inescapable. It
is imperative because it gives instruction about how
one ought to act and, thus, is a command.
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Jeremy Bentham
Jeremy Bentham (1748 1832), an English
philosopher and the chief expounder of Utilitarianism
showed deep interest in legal and social reforms from
very early age of his life. He wanted to make laws for
the best interests of the whole community, not just
for the convenience of the elite class as it was the
case during his time. Benthams Utilitarian ethical
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2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
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Definition
Contemporary ethical enterprise is an attempt to
justify de novo that ethics as a branch of philosophy
should have at least four important tasks, namely,
the normative, the meta-ethical, the virtue ethical and
the practical tasks.
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and heuristically.
Further, meta-ethicists consider moral language
as such for their truth and meaning. In contemporary
ethics we care for clear criteria for truth and meaning
of moral assertions. This was by far not systematically
dealt in earlier ethics, though no way it has suddenly
popped up owing to fertile imagination of some
contemporary genius like Ayer orMoore
orWittgenstein. Contemporary ethicists followed two
major lines with regards to justification and meaning
of ethical language, where ethical language has
beenmore or less taken as the language pertaining
to ethics or the one that clearly deals with moral
values and value judgments. The cognitivists
including the naturalists, non naturalists and
metaphysical moralists justify the truth of moral
assertions based on the cognition of what has been
asserted by means of either sense experience
(naturalists) or intuitive experience (nonnaturalists)
or by means of spiritual/metaphysical experience
(metaphysical moralists). The cognitivists are divided
partly because they debated over the basis of
justification. The naturalists for justification translate
all ethical assertions to factual assertions without
any distortion in meaning, and hold that like all factual
assertions, ethical statements are to be justified
based on observation and experiment of facts. Hence,
X is good is true because good is translatable to
what one desires, wishes, likes, approves and
so on, thus describing the speakers psychological
state of affairs or describing ones feeling and
emotions about X, which is evidently true as a matter
of fact. This theory is a descriptive theory of meaning
supported by Hume, Westermarck, utilitarians,
Russell, Perry and other naturalists in contemporary
ethics.
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Vedas
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Upanishads
Upanishads are both religion and philosophy. As a
religion it discovers the truth of the inner world and
understands the significance of the divinity of life.
As a philosophy, it synthesizes the science of inner
world with outer world bring about the unification of
understanding of total reality and the effect on the
human life and character, depth of faith and vision
along with breath of outlook and sympathy.
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Jainism
The Jain claims a great antiquity for their religion,
writes Hiralal Jain, their earliest prophet was
Rsbhadeva, whois mentioned even in the Vishnu and
Bhagavata Puranas as belonging to the remote past.
Jainism even thought existed at the time of Vedas
but followed non violence as one of its strong
principle as against animal sacrifice followed by
Vedic people. Jainism teaches strict self discipline
as a path of salvation. Mahavira the 24th Tirthankara,
admitted all aspirants irrespective of caste and gender
and started a system of peaceful proselytization.
Because of him his followers are spread across the
whole country.
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Buddhism
Buddhism like other Indian Philosophies hold the view
that Samsara and Avidya (ignorance) are the two
that one need to escape from. The Kama (desire) is
the root cause of bandage. The moment Mara the
evil leaves, one will be enlightened. Ethics of
Buddhism is traditionally based on what Buddhist saw
as the enlightened perspectiveof the Buddha or other
enlightened souls. So, the scholars look at the
Buddhist scriptures and make use of the
anthropological evidences from the traditional
Buddhist societies.
The ethical principles are at various degrees
depending on the individual capability, there are no
hard and fast rules. There are rules for a layman, and
to those who wants to practice strictly and to a monk
and nun.
For the layman it is simple Panca Silani five
percepts. The English translation to the Pali text is
I undertake the training rule to abstain from taking
the life.
I undertake the training rule to abstain from taking
what is not given
I undertake the training to abstain from sexual
misconduct
I undertake the training to abstain from false speech.
I undertake the training rule to abstain from fermented
drink that causes
heedlessness.
The main perceptive are non violence and non
injury. To a certain extent Buddhism and Jainism
propound similar view regarding non violence. About
killing and punishing others physically it is said in
chapter 10 of Darmapada, Everyone fears
punishment; everyone fears death, just like you do.
Therefore do not kill or cause to kill. Everyone fears
punishment; everyone loves life, as you do. Therefore
do not kill or cause to kill. In the sametext in chapter
26, it states, Him I call Brahmin who has put aside
weapons and renounced violence towards all
creatures. He neither kills nor helps others to kill.
The perceptive for the monks and the nuns varies from
ten to sixteen. The main feature is not to accept
money and to indulge in physical comfort.
To be focused in total self realization, there are
three golden rules to be followed
Taking refuge in Buddha.
Taking refuge in Dharma.
Taking refuge in Sanga.
To be free from samsara, avidya and dukkha, it is not
enough if one knows the principals of Buddhism but
understand the essentials of life. Wisdom, (Prajna)
Ethical conduct (Sila) and the Concentration
(Samadi) are the three essentials. Wisdom prajna
comes from Right view it leads to the right intention.
The right view and intentions guides to Ethical
conduct, sila, - the right speech, right action, right
livelihood and right effort. The next stage is
Concentration, samadi, one pointed focus in self
activity to have right mindfulness and right
concentration. When wisdom, ethics and
concentration becomes the way of life; one gains right
knowledge and release from Dukkha and Mara; there
by attain enlightenment. This is called as Noble
Eight Fold Path.
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Ethics in Epics
The two great epics or the historical record, as it were,
are the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. Both these
immortal works, time and again, remind the humanity
of the moral order in a social structure. Here, the
social condition encompasses the political,
economical, cultural, and the natural order.
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1.
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2.
3.
4.
5.
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Last but not the least; the bhasya constitutes the very
first effort and a massive one at that in bringing the
Vedas out of the sanctuary of Brahmanical dominance
into the open andmake themaccessible to all Hindus;
irrespective of caste and creed. Jordens believes this
to be the strongest argument in him being called The
Luther of India
An Ethics Supporting Hindu Nationalism
Dayananda is one of the chief figures of Indian
nationalism who began as career as a British loyalist.
In fact, the first edition of the Satyartha Prakasha
carries a tract describing the merits of the British rule
which unlike that of the decadent, intolerant Mughals
was rational and scientific in its scope and
expression. When Dayananda had to face the ire of
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Philosophical Analysis
A philosophical understanding ofmoral experience
invites us to explore the meaning of terms such as
good or bad, right or wrong. There are different
approaches to moral experience. Linguistic analysis
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Moral Dilemmas
The term Moral dilemma is applied to any difficult
moral problem. Dilemmas raise hard moral questions.
In the context of relevance of morality, moral
philosophers state moral dilemma when one moral
reason conflicts with another. Moral reasons normally
conflict with religious or aesthetic reasons. Bur moral
dilemmas occur only when there is conflict between
twomoral reasons. Amoral reason is a moral
requirement just in case it would be morally wrong
not to act on it without an adequate justification or
excuse. E.g. X holds a weapon for Y; then X has a
moral reason to return it when asked for. Burt if X
feels that Y would commit a heinous crime with the
weapon, then X has moral reason not to return the
weapon.
Moral Principles
Normally a person of moral principle is associated
with s fixed set of rules that ignores the complexities
of the situation and fails to adapt ones behviour to
changing circumstances. Themorality of principles is
contrasted with the morality of sensibility which lays
stress on virtue as sympathy and integrity. But a
general sense of moral principle indicates some
factor that is generally relevant to what ought to be
done. Moral principles can then be regarded as
statements picking out those factors of situations that
can be appealed to as moral reasons. Correctness of
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c) Universal Intuitionism
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Pleasure as Norm
From the very beginning of human history there had
been people who considered pleasure as the supreme
good of human life. For thempleasure is the only
normofmorality. They believed that every human
activity is prompted by a desire of seeking pleasure.
Hedonism The word hedonism has its root in Greek
word hedone which means pleasure. Hedonism is
one of the oldest, simplest and most earthly of ethical
theories. It is the ethical theory which teaches that
pleasure is the onlymark of good life and those who
desire to lead a good life must seek pleasure by all
means. Historically the beginning of hedonism can
be sought in the philosophy of Cyrenaics and the
Epicureans. We find hedonism first proposed by
Aristippus, the leader of Cyrenaic school, who
identified happiness with pleasure. According to
himpleasure is the only mark of good life and all
pleasures are essentially alike though they differ
fromthe point of view of intensity.
Epicureans also attached importance to pleasure but
they did not give much significance to the momentary
pleasure. For Epicures the end of life is not intense
pleasure, but an abiding peace ofmind, a state of
cheerful tranquillity. Above all we must avoid fear of
the gods and fear of death.
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DEFINING ATTITUDES
The study of attitudes has been at the forefront of
social psychology for many years. Attitude field is vast
and diverse accumulating over 80-plus years. The
study of attitudes has been a core topic in social
psychology. Attitudes are involved in practically every
other area of the discipline, including social
perception, interpersonal attraction, prejudice and
discrimination, conformity, compliance, and so on. The
chief reason why the concept of attitude is so central
to psychology is because the aim of psychology is to
study behaviour, and attitudes are supposed to
influence behaviour (whether or not and how and
when they will be discussed in Unit 3).
Let us first try to understand what exactly an attitude
is.
Early on attitudes were defined very broadly.
Allport (1935) defined attitude as a mental and
neural state of readiness, organised through
experience, and exerting a directive or dynamic
influence upon the individuals response to all
objects and situations with which it is related
(p. 784).
With such a broad definition it is easy to see why
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Classical
Conditioning
Genetic
Factors
Formation of
Attitudes
Instrumental
Conditioning
Observational
Learning
Classical Conditioning
The process of classical conditioning was first
described by Pavlov. In his experiments on dogs, he
found that after repeated pairings of an unconditioned
stimulus (e.g. bell) with a conditioned stimulus (dog),
the latter acquires the capacity to evoke a conditioned
response (salivation), similar to the old,
unconditioned response (salivation).
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Knowledge Function
We all have a need to attain some degree of
meaningful, stable, clear, and organised view of the
world (just as most of us have a need to maintain an
organised cupboard!) Attitudes satisfy this knowledge
function by providing a frame of reference for
organizing our world so that it makes sense. Using
such a cognitive perspective, attitudes serve as
schemas that help us in organizing and interpreting
social information.
Value-Expressive Function
Value-expressive attitudes show who we are, and
what we stand for. Hence they serve to demonstrate
ones self-image to others and to express our basic
values. This function comes from a humanistic
perspective. It seems logical to assume that only
important and strongly self-related (central) attitudes
should serve the value-expressive function.
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GLOSSARY
Belief :
Any cognitive content held as true.
Classical Conditioning :
Learning through association, when a neutral stimulus
(conditioned stimulus) is paired with a stimulus
(unconditioned stimulus) that naturally produces a
response.
Defense Mechanisms :
Unconscious tactics used to safeguard the mind
against feelings and thoughts that are too difficult
for the conscious mind to cope with, for instance,
forgetting, rationalisation, denial, repression,
projection, etc.
Functional Theory of Attitudes:
Attitudes are determined by the functions they serve
for us.
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Affect
Cognition
Behaviour
Fig. 2.1: The ABCs of Attitudes (Adapted from Myers, 2005, p. 134)
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Behaviour
As just mentioned, the things you believe about
something (for e.g. my boss is corrupt and is misusing
company funds) and the way you feel about it (e.g. I
cant stand working for him) may have some effect
on the way you are predisposed to behave (e.g. Im
going to quit my present job). Thus, attitudes have a
behavioural component a tendency or a
predisposition to act in a certain manner. Note that
behaviour is different from a behavioural tendency.
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Attitude Strength
Attitudes differ in strength. Strong, central attitudes
are attitudes that refer to important attitude objects
that are strongly related to the self. These attitudes
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GLOSSARY
Attitude accessibility :
How quickly an attitude is activated from memory.
Attitude strength :
In its most general sense, it may be viewed as the
extent to which an individuals attitude is formed.
Attitude ambivalence :
The ratio of positive and negative evaluations that
make up that attitude
Attitude extremity :
The intensity of feeling on the object of the attitude.
Cognition :
A faculty for the processing of information, applying
knowledge, and changing preferences.
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Attitude Strength
By now you should be able to guess that the stronger
the attitudes are, the greater their impact on
behaviour. We saw in Unit 2 that attitude strength
involves several dimensions, such as how much the
individual knows about the attitude object (certainty),
the intensity of the attitude (how strong is the
emotional reaction provoked by the attitude object),
how the attitude was formed in the first place (origin),
and the extent to which the person is personally
affected by the attitude (importance). Thus, thinking
more about something often results in greater
attitude-behaviour consistency. Attitudes formed
through direct experience are stronger, and as a result,
are better predictors of later behaviour. The attitudes
of more personally involved individuals will be
stronger predictors of behaviour than attitudes of the
less involved.
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Self Awareness
Another aspect that influences behaviour is the self
awareness, that is, how far the individual is aware of
the attitudes that he or she holds. So ong as persons
are not aware of their attitudes , these attitudes will
tend to influence the individuals behaviours all the
more intensely. On the other hand if an individual is
aware of his attitude, he or she will be quite self
conscious about it and may hesitate showing it in
their behaviours. Also when people are more attentive
of their own behaviour, and presumably of their
internal States, their attitude behaviour congruency
increases. People who are self-conscious are usually
Attitude Accessibility
You may recall from the previous unit that attitude
accessibility refers to the ease with which attitudes
can be retrieved from memory. Most modern theories
agree that attitudes are represented in memory, and
that attitudes that are more accessible from memory
are more predictive of behaviour. According to Fazio
(1990), more accessible attitudes can be
spontaneously and automatically activated without
our conscious awareness, and can guide our behaviour
without us being necessarily aware of them.
By definition, strong attitudes exert more influence
over behaviour, because they can be automatically
activated. One factor that seems to be important here
is direct experience. For example, Fazio and Zanna
(1978) found that measures of students attitudes
towards psychology experiments were better
predictors of their future participation if they had
already taken part in several experiments than if they
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GLOSSARY
Behavioural intentions :
The conscious decisions to carry out a specific action.
Prejudice :
A negative attitude towards members of a particular
group formed beforehand or without knowledge of
facts.
Intergroup contact :
Under appropriate conditions, one of the most
hypothesis effective ways to reduce prejudice
between majority and minority group members is
through interpersonal contact (Allport, 1954).
Meta analysis :
A statistical procedure for combining the results of
several independent studies in order to estimate the
integrated effect of variables across these studies.
Role :
A set of norms that define how people in a given social
position should behave.
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ii) Expressive:
We construct an image of ourselves to claim personal
identity, and present ourselves in a manner that is
consistent with that image. For example, image
building by politicians who try to express what they
are and what all they can achieve and how they would
achieve and how caring they are about peoples
concerns and greeting people on all festivals to show
that they care etc. Here the main motive is expressive
motive. Through expressing themselves they also act
accordingly by putting up posters and hoardings about
how they greet people on festivals and also organise
groups and talk in groups about their plans and
actions. There are others who use certain status
symbols such as khadi kurta pajama a sort of dress
that Indian politicians wear showing how they all are
similar to the common man, and convey the
impression that they belong to this group and that
others should recognise them as belonging to that
group.
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i) Instrumental:
We want to influence others and gain rewards. For
instance, we like to dress up very well and would like
to be commented favourably about it. Some will read
up the latest in the field in which he or she is involved
so that they would talk about it and impress others
as to how knowledgeable he or she is. They hope to
be complemented for their knowledge. In a negative
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COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
One of the most influential approaches in social
psychology having far reaching implications is that
human beings have a tendency to seek consistency
in ones cognitions (attitudes, beliefs, selfperceptions). First introduced by Heider (1946), this
principle of cognitive consistency implies that our
attitudes change because we are motivated to
maintain consistency among our cognitions.
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SELF AFFIRMATION
Another interpretation of dissonance theory with a
focus on ones self image is Steeles self affirmation
theory. According to Steele (1988), people are
motivated to maintain the integrity of the self. The
ultimate goal of the self is to protect an image of its
self-integrity, morality and adequacy. These two
premises lead to two implications:
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Besides reducing threats to the individual self, selfaffirmations could also reduce threats to the self at
a collective level, i.e. when people confront some
threatening opinions or humiliating comments about
the groups they belong to, such as nation or gender.
For example, when someone says Women are lousy
drivers as their spatial ability is inferior to men, I often
cite evidence of women having better verbal and
interpersonal abilities.
Hypocrisy :
When an individual publicly advocates some
attitudes or behaviour, but acts in a way that is
inconsistent with them.
Individualism/Collectivism :
One value dimension on which national cultures differ
(Hofstede, 1980). People are individualists, when they
take care only of themselves and their families; they
are collectivists when they distinguish between
ingroup and outgroups and expect their ingroups
(relatives, clans, organisations) to look after them,
in exchange for being loyal to them.
Post decision dissonance :
A state of anxiety experienced after making a decision
regarding the possibility of it being wrong. It is usually
reduced by increasing the importance assigned to the
positive features of the chosen alternative, and
increasing the importance assigned to the negative
features of the nonchosen alternative.
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Self monitoring :
The process through which people regulate their own
behaviour in order to look good so that they will be
perceived by others in a favorable manner.