Cognitive dissonance explains about our experience of being at the stand of having incompatible thoughts (lecture, 11/1/04). The self-discrepancy theory however, suggests that we have a few conceptions of the self, where one of them is called the ideal self. The ideal self touches on the idea of what we would like to be (lecture, 11/22/04). When people begin to feel that their behavior goes against their sense of morality, they attempt to adjust this by changing either their behavior or cognitions to justify themselves, in order to fit the idea of their ideal self better. Also, if we wished to adjust our behavior, we would probably attempt to do this by exercising the executive control function where we would begin to regulate our behavior in ways which would bring it in line with the dissonant cognition. For example, if I was asked to sign an animal-rights poster stating that I supported animal rights and if I were to find myself wearing a fur-coat at the same time, I would then probably feel an unpleasant physiological arousal. Thus, I would feel more motivated to regulate my behavior by not wearing fur-coats any
Cognitive dissonance explains about our experience of being at the stand of having incompatible thoughts (lecture, 11/1/04). The self-discrepancy theory however, suggests that we have a few conceptions of the self, where one of them is called the ideal self. The ideal self touches on the idea of what we would like to be (lecture, 11/22/04). When people begin to feel that their behavior goes against their sense of morality, they attempt to adjust this by changing either their behavior or cognitions to justify themselves, in order to fit the idea of their ideal self better. Also, if we wished to adjust our behavior, we would probably attempt to do this by exercising the executive control function where we would begin to regulate our behavior in ways which would bring it in line with the dissonant cognition. For example, if I was asked to sign an animal-rights poster stating that I supported animal rights and if I were to find myself wearing a fur-coat at the same time, I would then probably feel an unpleasant physiological arousal. Thus, I would feel more motivated to regulate my behavior by not wearing fur-coats any