Functional Theory
Functional Theory of Attitudes proposed by Daniel Katz’s in 1960’s, suggests that people’s attitudes have a specific purpose in assisting them in navigating and adjusting to their social surroundings. According to this idea, attitudes have particular functions that satisfy psychological and social demands rather than being arbitrary collections of beliefs or opinions.
According to functional theory, attitudes may be divided into four main categories:
1. Utilitarian Function: When attitudes assist people in maximizing rewards and minimizing penalties, they have a utilitarian function. Individuals form favorable attitudes toward things or actions that make them happy or beneficial, and unfavorable attitudes toward things or actions that cause them harm or disadvantages. A person may, for instance, feel better and have more energy when they eat healthily, yet they may feel negatively about smoking because of its detrimental impacts on one’s health.
2. Knowledge Function: When attitudes assist people in simplifying, organizing, and understanding their surroundings, they provide a knowledge function. As cognitive frameworks, attitudes help people organize and make sense of complicated information. For example, a person’s beliefs toward political ideology might help them understand and traverse the political environment, which makes decision-making easier.
3. Ego-Defensive Function: When attitudes shield people from dangers to their identity or sense of self-worth, they perform an ego-defensive function. Individuals may adopt attitudes that support their ideas or behaviors as a coping mechanism for uncomfortable emotions or cognitive dissonance. For instance, a smoker who is aware of the health hazards may justify their actions by downplaying such risks in order to maintain their perception of themselves as capable decision-makers.
4. Social-Adjustive Function: When attitudes support people in merging into their social surroundings and preserving social ties, they serve a socially adaptive purpose. In an effort to fit in and be accepted, people adopt attitudes that are consistent with the standards and beliefs of their social groupings. For example, in order to feel accepted and prevent social rejection, teenagers may take on the attitudes and actions of their peer group.
Theories of Attitude Formation: Theory and Examples
Theories of Attitude Formation investigate how people establish their opinions, convictions, and inclinations about different things and people. These theories describe how individual experiences, societal influences, and informational inputs develop attitudes. They include a wide spectrum of psychological, social, and cognitive frameworks. Important theories include the social learning theory, which emphasizes the importance of observation and imitation, the cognitive dissonance theory, which concentrates on the alignment of attitudes and behaviors, and the learning theory, which stresses conditioning and reinforcement. Gaining knowledge of these ideas can help one better understand social interaction dynamics, human behavior, and decision-making processes.