Self-Selected Group Membership as a Moderator of Vicarious Cognitive Dissonance

Abstract

This paper examines how vicarious cognitive dissonance operates for self-selecting groups. In the main study, Princeton students elected to either listen to rap or classical music and then read that they would be analyzing an essay in favor of raising tuition written by someone in either the same or opposite group. There was no significant attitude change towards agreement with raising tuition as a result of the manipulation. However, there was a significant effect among participants in the rap music group in the same-group condition who increased agreement with both favorable and unfavorable stereotypes about their in-group. The finding leads the researchers to speculate that vicarious dissonance in self-selecting groups can be reduced by increasing approval of the in-group on measures more central to the defining criteria for group membership and decreased approval on dimensions not directly relevant to the group boundaries.