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Attitude strength: Distinguishing predictors versus defining features
Author(s) -
Luttrell Andrew,
Sawicki Vanessa
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
social and personality psychology compass
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.699
H-Index - 53
ISSN - 1751-9004
DOI - 10.1111/spc3.12555
Subject(s) - psychology , certainty , social psychology , confusion , ambivalence , attitude , variety (cybernetics) , attitude change , epistemology , computer science , philosophy , artificial intelligence , psychoanalysis
Attitudes play a fundamental role in many aspects of social psychology, but researchers have long recognized that attitudes vary in their susceptibility to change and their influence on behavior and cognitive processes. This insight lies at the heart of attitude strength , which is defined as an attitude's durability and impact. A variety of attitude attributes such as certainty and ambivalence have been shown to correlate with these aspects of attitude strength, which has made for some confusion as to what variables define strong attitudes versus predict an attitude's strength. In this article, we highlight this distinction between predictors and defining features of strength and review recent programs of research demonstrating the independence of strength‐related attitude attributes and attitude strength itself. Specifically, although some attitude attributes are associated with the attitude's durability and impact, there are conditions under which those attributes fail to predict attitude strength or even have the opposite effects. Throughout, this review reveals nuances in the attitude strength literature and provokes new questions for future inquiry.