Como reduzir sua desonância cognitiva

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Como reduzir sua desonância cognitiva?
Cada par dessas máximas oferece dois pontos de vista opostos sobre situações comuns da vida:
“Olhe diante de você pular”, mas “Aquele que hesita está perdido”.
“Aves de uma pena se reúnem”, mas “Os opostos se atraem”.
“A grama é mais verde do outro lado da cerca”, mas “Lar é onde está seu coração”.
Eles geralmente causam um estado de conflito interno chamado dissonância cognitiva. Os psicólogos
estudam há mais de 60 anos.
Nós comumente sentimos dissonância cognitiva quando o que vemos / ouamos desafia o que
acreditamos / sabemos. Digamos, sua amiga sempre insistiu que ela é honesta, mas você a pega
deitada. Esse comportamento conflitante pode causar dissonância cognitiva em sua mente.
Então a ideia é esta:
Quando você mantém dois pensamentos opostos ao mesmo tempo, ou quando suas ações
entram em conflito com suas crenças, isso cria estresse e ansiedade.
Esse desconforto mental leva você a buscar consistência. E isso, às vezes, pode fazer você se
comportar de maneiras incomuns ou irracionais.
Então, podemos reduzi-lo para que não ajamos de forma irracional? Vamos descobrir.
6 maneiras de reduzir a desonância cognitiva
1. Evitar/Nendo/Rejeitando Informações conflitantes
2. Racionalizando o seu comportamento
3. Mudando suas crenças
4. Mudando o seu comportamento
5. Reconciliando as diferenças
6. Frequência crescente de comportamento dissonante
1. Negar, rejeitar ou evitar informações conflitantes
Negar, rejeitar ou evitar novas informações que contradigam suas ideias e crenças pré-existentes.
Procure informações que apenas apoiem suas crenças existentes (viés de confirmação)
Leon Festinger disse: “As pessoas evitarão informações e situações que possam aumentar essa
dissonância específica”.
Uma maneira simples de reduzir a dissonância cognitiva é evitar ou rejeitar novas informações que
contradigam suas ideias pré-existentes.
In a worse way, you may also try trivializing, denying, or dismissing the contradicting information.
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Some people who depend on external validation to build their self-worth, like grandiose narcissists, use
this worse method. They can tell themselves that those who disagree with them are ignorant, uninformed,
or biased. This reduces their cognitive dissonance and maintains their belief that they are always right.
But there’s a problem with rejecting, denying, or avoiding dissonant information. It fails to teach you
anything new, blocks your critical thinking acumen, and leads to another bias, called “confirmation bias.”
2. Rationalizing The Irrational Behavior
Convincing yourself (or others) otherwise
Rationalizing the irrational behavior
Minimizing the importance of conflicting beliefs
Rationalizing is the process of applying logic to a situation.
It is good when done the right way, as it allows you to make informed decisions based on logic and
evidence. Seeking different options and evaluating the pros and cons can help you take calculated risks
and get better results.
However, rationalizing is bad when it takes the shape of excuses.
You may apply this to reduce your cognitive dissonance. Try to rationalize your irreverent and irrational
actions by inventing implausible (and sometimes ridiculous) excuses.
Despite knowing that smoking causes cancer, a smoker may rationalize the habit by claiming they only
smoke once or twice a day and only when they are stressed at work.
Weick (1968) suggested that when we act in a way that goes against our beliefs or values in front of our
friends and family, we may feel the need to justify or defend our behavior to avoid feeling embarrassed.
This is because changing our behavior to align with our beliefs may make us feel like we were wrong or
hypocritical, which can be uncomfortable. So, instead, we may try to rationalize or justify our behavior to
avoid feeling embarrassed or ashamed.
On the flip side, when you do a cognitively dissonant activity in front of strangers, you do not give a hoot
(unless you are a celebrity).
This is because you know they have no idea of what beliefs you have regarding that activity.
3. Changing Your Beliefs
Change your beliefs to align with your behavior
View the conflicting beliefs as compatible or complementary
Another fairly easy way to reduce your cognitive dissonance is to convince yourself that there is no
conflict.
And tell that to others too. In time, you will start believing in the idea that there is actually no dissonance
since there is no contradiction.
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“You are saying that my idea and your idea do not match. But allow me to explain why there is no
contradiction there.”
And then serve them a “word salad” that leaves them utterly confused to sort out the threads of the
argument.
As a cognitively dissonant person, you may also reach out to and find support from other people who
hold similar opinions or matching ideologies as you, and join their group.
Then all of you might try persuading all outside the group that all fresh information is agenda-driven and
fallacious.
4. Changing Your Behavior
Change your behavior to align with your existing beliefs and values
Modify your actions to be congruent with your attitudes
If your behavior contradicts your beliefs, adjust the behavior
Every so often, your actions don’t match your internalized beliefs and principles. In such cases, rather
than changing your beliefs, you can change your outward behavior instead.
For example, if you believe strongly in environmental conservation but find yourself wasting energy and
resources, you can resolve that dissonance by modifying your daily habits — turning off lights, reducing
consumption, recycling properly, etc. Aligning your conduct with your convictions eliminates the
inconsistency.
This approach allows you to maintain your belief system while updating your behavior to create
psychological consonance. The downside is it requires conscious effort and willpower to override
ingrained patterns of behavior in service of your beliefs.
Some may find it easier to adjust their mindset than to undertake sustained behavioral changes. But for
those motivated to “practice what they preach,” adjusting one’s actions can be an effective way to reduce
conflicting thoughts and regain cognitive consistency.
The key is having enough self-awareness to recognize when your behaviors are clashing with your
internally held values and ideals. With that recognition, you can consciously decide to update your
conduct to resolve the dissonance.
5. Reconciling The Differences
Reconciling the differences between conflicting beliefs
It means resolving the differences between your conflicting beliefs or behaviors and making peace with
those that cause mental distress.
You may shift your beliefs or behaviors to align with each other.
You could find a way to see your beliefs or behaviors as compatible or complementary.
You may accept the validity of pre-existing beliefs and change your behavior to match your views.
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By reconciling the differences, you can reduce the pain and stress of cognitive dissonance.
Sometimes people are simply too exhausted to deal with dissonant situations and might try to find the
easy way out of dissonance. They often resort to ways that are less cognitively taxing.
You could do that — distract yourself into another activity or escape the situation.
If you want to remove the discomfort of dissonance in the long run, you may need to use more complex
strategies
Like changing your attitudes. Or finding a way to transcend your conflicting beliefs.
These are better strategies and require effort and time, but they can help you achieve a greater sense of
consistency in your thoughts and actions.
For best results, you could do a total re-haul of your opinions stack and abandon your pre-existing ideas
to build new ones.
6. Increasing Frequency of Dissonant Behavior
Do the dissonance-causing activity more often
It becomes easierto reduce dissonance when the contradictory behavior is repeated frequently
Essentially desensitizing oneself to the dissonant action through increased exposure
Another way to make your dissonance less painful is to do the dissonance-causing activity more often. It
is easier to stop getting conflicted and stressed when the dissonant activity is repeated frequently.
For example, eating meat while on a vegan diet causes cognitive dissonance, but the more often you do
so, the easier it gets to remain unaffected by the conflict.
Final Words
The good thing about your cognitive dissonance is that it is temporary. The dissonance goes away when
you change your opinion or behavior.
The problem is for those pig-heads who refuse to change their attitudes, actions, or opinions. These
people remain inflexible in the face of our world’s constant change with new information.
If you are in the habit of being dogmatic about your beliefs and resist changing your deeply held beliefs,
then it’s time you stop thinking too much about the past and start moving forward.
√ Also Read: Arrival Fallacy: Why Achieving Goals Doesn’t Make You Happy
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