CMYK

UNIT 6 ATTITUDES
Structure
6.0

Objectives

6.1

Introduction

6.2

Development of Attitudes
6.2.1

Parents

6.2.2

Peers

6.2.3

Conditioning

6.2.4

Forming Attitudes by Balance

6.2.3

Measurement of Attitudes

6.3

Measurement of Attitudes

6.4

Methods to Change Attitudes

6.5

Importance of Attitudes for Nursing

6.6

Let Us Sum Up

6.7

Key Words

6.8. Answers to Check Your Progress

6.0

OBJECTIVES

After completing this unit, you should be able to:

define attitudes;

discuss development of attitudes;

list methods of measuring attitudes;

discuss methods to change attitudes; and

state the importance of attitudes to nursing.

6.1

INTRODUCTION

As you have seen in Unit 4 not only do we learn the skills but also emotional expressions and
attitudes. In this unit you will study about development, measurement and methods to change
attitudes.
Attitudes play a very important role in our life as they determine our reaction to people and the
objects in our environment. Attitudes are our expressions of the likes and the dislikes towards
the people and the objects. They determine or guide our behaviour in social situations. You
would have noticed that your behaviour is different while nursing an elderly man than that of
nursing a child, or if you are nursing a critically ill patient as compared to one with a minor
illness. These differences in behaviour are because of your attitudes towards old people and
the children. Your attitude towards a critical, terminally ill patient determines how you interact
with a patient suffering from these diseases.
Attitudes have been defined as the intensity of positive or negative affect for or against a
psychological object .A psychological object (may be) is any symbol person, phrase, slogan
or idea toward which people can differ as regards positive or negative affect.
An attitude has three components:

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i)

Cognitive

: What a person knows of it and his belief about it.

ii)

Affective

: How he feels about it.

iii)

Conative

: Behavioural tendency both verbal and nonverbal towards the object.

CMYK

CMYK

Attitudes are predisposed tendency to respond in a particular way and not a fixed response.
Attitudes are influenced by a number of factors. Attitudes are evaluations ------ preferences
towards wide variety of attitudinal items such as likes/dislike, anti-pro, positive or negative.
Anything that arouses evaluative feelings can be called as an object of attitude.

Attitudes

A distinction is commonly made between attitude and opinion. An opinion is a belief that one
holds about some object in his environment. It differs from attitude, being relatively free of
emotion, it lacks the affective component central to attitude, Attitude are different from value
systems because attitudes are thought of as pertaining to a single object, even though that
object may be an abstract one. Value systems, on the other hand, are orientations towards
whole classes of object. Individual attitudes are frequently organised into a value system.
Attitudes are often functional, in the sense that they may be emotionally satisfying for the
individual. An individuals entire personality structure and hence his behaviour may be
thought of as organised around a central value system comprised of many related attitudes.
Attribution
To characterize other prople in terms of certain traits, intentions, or abilities requires us to make
attributions, or inferences, about them. Because we do not have access to the personal
thoughts, motives, or feelings of other, we make inferences about these traits based on the
behaviour we can observe. By making such attributions from certain behaviours we are able to
increase our ability to predict how a person will behave in the future.
Check Your Progress 1
Define attitudes and the nature of attitudes.
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6.2 DEVELOPMENT OF ATTITUDES

Attitudes can develop through different modes. Heredity may play only a very small part
through differences in the physical characteristics and intelligence. It is mainly the
environmental factors that are responsible for development of attitudes. These are as follows:
Attitude Development
Parents

Peers

Conditioning
Operant

6.2.1

Balance

Classical

Parents

Family is the first place for formation of attitudes. Parents begin the information flow that forms
beliefs and attitudes about things. Categories are formed in our head on the basis of early
information.
Sullivan has observed that the information provided by the parents in the earliest stages of life
arc very difficult to undo. Erroneous and nonadaptive attitudes moulded from parental
feedback and tremendous implications for further personality development.

6.2.2

Peers

As we grow, we tend to be influenced by other sources such as friends and group members.
They serve as reference group in the development of attitudes. One identities oneself with
friends and moulds ones attitudes in relation to the prevailing norms of the group concerned.

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CMYK

Educational Psychology

6.2.3 Conditioning
i)

Classical Conditioning

You have learnt in Unit 4 that classical conditioning refers to the association of a conditioned
stimulus with an unconditioned stimulus. Staats and Staats (1958) found that words which
have acquired affective meaning can create positive or negative attitudes. Zanna, Kiesler and
Pilkoris (1970) demonstrated the general implications of classically conditioned attitudes. Many
attitudes developed on the basis of classical conditioning are found to be irrational, as they
have been paired with an emotion producing unconditioned stimulus either accidentally or in a
quite extraneous situation. Similarly, the appropriate attitudes can be developed through
classical conditioning.
ii) Instrumental Conditioning
An attitudinal response can be learnt through instrumental conditioning by reinforcing a
response that occurred in the presence of a discriminated stimulus. Insko (1965) demonstrated
the persistence of conditioned attitude over time.

6.2.4 Forming Attitudes by Balance

Balance theory (Heider 1946,50 Newcomb 1953) holds that people prefer consistency or
harmony in the relationship among their cognitions. Since balance is preferred by everyone,
thus people develop attitudes that are harmonious with other existing sentimental relationship.
Check Your Progress 2
Discuss development of attitudes.
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6.3

MEASUREMENT OF ATTITUDES

Attitudes are evaluations. There are different methods to measure attitudes. Some of them are
very simple while others are complex. Broadly attitudes can be measured by:
i) Self Report Methods
ii) Altitude Scales
iii) Involuntary Behaviour Methods
i)

Self Report Methods

In the self reporting method a questionnaire or a list of statements related to the attitudinal
object are given to the respondent. The response format is either fixed i.e. categories for the
response are named such as agree-disagree, like dislike, favourable unfavourable; or left open
ended where respondents can use their own words. The problems of this type of
measurement is that a question may mean different thing to different respondents and hence
may not measure accurately. Another drawback of this method is related to social conformity,
people may respond differently than what they actually believe.

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ii) Attitude Scales

These are most commonly used for measurement of attitudes as with these scales, a precise
measurement is possible. They provide degree of affect that individuals may associate with the
attitudinal object. There are four methods of constructing attitude scales viz. (a) Thurstone
type scale, (b) Likert type scale, (c) Guttmans scalogram and (d) Osgoods semantic
differential type.

a)

In Thurstone type scale respondent is given a set of a fixed responses from which he
must choose. These statements are assigned scale values so that a quantitative index of
the attitude may be obtained. Scare values are assigned to equal appearing interval.

Attitudes

A Scale value is assigned to each statement at the time of scale construction. It is

standardised by giving to large number of judges who decide the degree to which it is
favourable, unfavourable or neutral. Scale values are assigned to equal appearing interval.
A

Agree

Neutral

I
Disagree

The median of all the judgements becomes the value assigned for the statement.
Respondent selects those items with which he, agrees. His attitude score is the average of
all the scale values of the items with which he agrees.
b)

In Likert type scale the respondent chooses one of the five possible responses to each
item. These are strongly agree, agree, undecided, disagree and strongly disagree. These
are given weights of 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 respectively. The total score of an individual is the
sum total of the weights for each response he makes to the statements.

c)

Guttamans scalogram is considered unidimensional. Responses to every item, are

constant with his overall position on the attitude dimension. For example an attitude scale
consists of three items. Individuals could make four possible scores on this scale 3, 2, 1
and 0 representing the agreement with all three items at one extreme and disagreement
with all three at the other. Everyone who agrees with item 3 also agrees with items 2 and
1 and everyone who agrees with item 2 agrees with item 1.

Following table will clarify this scoring:

Person

Score
1

d)

Agrees with items

2
3

In Osgoods semantic differential scale each statement is provided with two opposite
responses like good-bad, fair-unfair. This is relatively simple to construct. This method
has appeared to be useful for certain kinds of scaling problems.

iii) Voluntary Behaviour Methods

In these the physiological measures are used. Earlier galvanic skin response and size of the
pupil of the eye have been used as the indicator of arousal to measure attitudes. These have
not been very successful as only extremity of attitudes can be measured and that too the
direction of attitude cannot be specified. Recently electromyographic recordings from the major
facial muscles have been used to measure attitudes, but this has not been successfully
established.
Check Your Progress 3
List methods of measuring attitudes.
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Educational Psychology

6.4

METHODS TO CHANGE ATTITUDES

Attitudes are consistent ways of reacting towards object, yet they are not static; they can be
changed under different conditions. It is necessary to modify unhealthy or irrational attitudes
for learning new things.
Attitude change is influenced by both factors that are external as well as internal to the
person. One should pay attention to the communicator, communication and the audience to
bring about a change in attitude.
i)

Communicator should be very effective and highly credible. He should be trustworthy

and an expert to produce the change. Communicators, if are similar to the target audience,
their message is well taken.

ii)

Communication has also been subjected to research. The findings are that
communications which discuss both the pros and cons to the point, are more effective in
situations where there is initial resistance to accept. Communications associated with
pleasant emotions can also enhance effectiveness.

iii)

Audience: Personality characteristics of the audience have been linked with attitude change.
However, self esteem and intelligence do not play a very important role in changing attitudes.
Increased discrepancy between the audiences attitude from the targets position can help in
change of attitudes. Committing the audience to take challenges or do something has
proven to be an effective technique for attitude change. Similarly role playing, bringing
change through smaller steps distracting the audience are some other methods which have
been used to change attitudes.
Attitude Change

Communicator

Communication

Audience

Credible
Trustworthy
Expert

Both sides of the

point discussed

Personality
Discrepancy from
target

Similar

Pleasurable Emotions

Committing

Role playing

Distracting

Methods to Change Attitude

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1)

Ask the person to elaborate his attitude towards the object/person. Find/point out
inconsistencies/contractions/faults in the logic given in the justifications for those
attitudes. Find/explore/point out the alternative view points. Have cognitive appraisal.
Discuss the advantages/disadvantages of differing viewpoints, alternatives. This may
lead to an attitudinal change.

2)

Provide information to the person concerned, having negative attitudes towards the
object/person, information that contradicts the attitude ---- without any comments,
suggestions, persuation, etc. It allows the person to take decision himself without
pressure, on his own and this may lead to more favourable attitude towards the object/
person concerned.

3)

Provide an opportunity for the much more closer contact with the object/person
concerned. Let the person learn through it and modify his own attitude.

Example: Unfavourable attitude towards mentally handicapped subjects can be modified by:
a)

Arguing against those attitudes, logically, systematically, countering ones view

points.

b)

Providing information about their rehabilitative status with facts and figures -----but no
arguments and no personal contacts.

c)

Through personal contacts, educational towns to such sheltered workshops

employing mentally handicapped, showing what they could do-if given proper
training and opportunities.

6.5

Attitudes

IMPORTANCE OF ATTITUDES FOR NURSING

Attitudes influence the behavioural responses of the individuals. The professional attitude of
the nurse is not only concerned with her feelings, beliefs and her behaviour towards the
patients but also towards other elements of professional functioning like health care delivery,
scientific interest and collaboration with other professionals. Importance of study of attitudes
for nurses can be related to the following factors:
i) Patient Care
Any negative attitude towards race, community or a disease results in a prejudiced behaviour
that affects the patients. Many a times stereotypic beliefs, which you might have developed in
earlier socio-cultural milieu, are not based on rational scientific reasoning. Due to these
attitudes you can behave inappropriately. This can interfere with your professional
competence.
ii) Formation of Attitudes of Peers or Juniors
Senior nurses have a significant impact on the formation of opinion concerning health related
issues. These attitudes could be learned by other peer nurses, student nurses and other
hospital staff associated in the health care. One has to be careful that the negative attitudes of
one person do not generate similar attitudes in the group.
iii) Acceptance of New Technology
In the present times, many a new innovations in techniques, equipment and methods of health
care delivery are taking place. Our attitudes can bias our acceptance towards new technology
and high profile specialities.
iv)

Interpersonal Skills

Studies have shown that during the training, there is as gradual decline in the interpersonal
skills. This affects history taking, information elicitation from the patient. Studies have also
shown that as students increase their clinical experience, their behaviour pattern changes. In
the first year, students enquire more freely about patients own view of their problems.
v) Curriculum Planning
While planning a new curriculum or to revise the existing curriculum in educational courses one
needs to identify the attitudes of students and the teachers. Accordingly attitude change for
altered behaviour patterns can be seeked and incorporated in the curriculum. For example to
plan a course on AIDS one may study the attitudes on the nursing care of the AIDS patient.
Misconception or areas which need attitude change could be planned and incorporated. This
would enhance the competency in dealing with AIDS patients.
vi) Effects of Attitudes on Meaningful Learning and Retention
It is being recognised that besides cognitive foctors, positive or negative attitudinal bias has
differential effect on the learning of controversial material. With favourable attitude one is
highly motivated to learn, puts greater efforts and concentrates better. Negative attitude leads
to close minded view to analyse new material and hence learning is impaired. Attitude structure
exerts an additional facilitating influence on retention that is independent of cognition and
motivation.

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Educational Psychology

vii) Attitudes Towards Diseases in the Community

In our society there is a lot of stigma attached to certain diseases like AIDS, tubercolosis,
mental illness etc. Negative attitude towards these diseases acts as a hindrance to bring these
patients for treatment. Nurses need to work to bring in change in the attitude towards these
diseases.
Check Your Progress 4
State the importance of Attitudes to Nursing.
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6.6 LET US SUM UP

Attitudes are predisposition to behave or act towards some aspect of environment; intensity of
positive or negative affect for or against a psychological object; or an expression of likes and
dislikes. Attitudes has three components viz. Cognitive, Affective and Conative. Parents start
the basis of attitude formation by giving information. This is later influenced by conditioning.
As per the Balance theory, the harmonious attitude are easily developed. Attitudes are mostly
measured by the self report techniques. With attitudes scales precise and quantitative
measurement is done. The important factors to change attitudes are characteristics of the
communicator, communication message and the audience.
Attitudes play a very important role in nursing education as this has an effect on learning,
patient care, administration and the acceptance of new information.

6.7

KEY WORDS

Affect

: Mood of emotion

Attitude

: An enduring, acquired predisposition behave in a particular way toward a

given object or class of objects

Attitude Scale : A scale for the quantitative measurement of scale attitudes

Attribution

: Characteristic traits, intentions, and abilities inferred on the basis of

observed behaviour

Balance

: Tendency to keep ideas about two or more attitudes in harmony

Beliefs

: Cognitions, or thoughts, about the characteristics of objects

Cognition

: An individuals thoughts, knowledge, interpretations, understanding or

ideas about himself and his environment

Conditioning

: The process by which conditioned responses are learned

Conative

: Motor, behaviour, action oriented

Emotion

: A subjective feeling state which can influence perception, thinking,

behaviour

Measurement : The assignment of numbers to objects or events according to certain rules

Opinion
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: Views people have about something

Questionnaire : A paper pencil test to measure personality or a survey of opinion and

experiences.

6.8

ANSWERS 0TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS

Attitudes

Check Your Progress 1

Refer to and read carefully Section 6.1.
Check Your Progress 2
Attitudes are developed through parents, peers and conditioning. consistent ideas are easily
accepted in forming attitudes. Details given in section 6.2.
Check Your Progress 3
Read carefully from section 6.3.
Check Your Progress 4
Reter to section 6.5.

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