Cognitive Dissonance Theory – Explained

In India, an estimated 120 million people smoke. But unlike Western countries, smoking is on the rise in India. Cigarettes compromise just 19 percent of tobacco consumption. Bidis account for 53 percent

·         Did you know that 800 million bidis are sold in India each year

·         Bidis contain more tar, nicotine and other toxic substances but less tobacco than traditional cigarettes.

This being the facts yet an average smoker still finds reasons to smoke. I wanted to understand the psyche of these people who do it and why they do it which landed me on the theory of cognitive dissonance. It is widely accepted that cigarettes can cause lung cancer, yet virtually everyone wants to live a long and healthy life.  The desire to live a long life is dissonant with the activity of doing something that will most likely shorten one's life. This feeling of uncomfortable tension which comes from holding two conflicting thoughts in the mind at the same time. Dissonance is often strong when we believe something about ourselves and then do something against that belief. If I believe I am good but do something bad, then the discomfort I feel as a result is cognitive dissonance.

 The theory of cognitive dissonance is proposed by Leon Festinger. Festinger states that when we have two contradictory beliefs we feel anxiety for example, we know how to fix our car but we bring it to a mechanic to fix--we will attempt to reduce our anxiety, called dissonance reduction, by coming up with a reason for our actions we might justify the mechanic working on our car because we "don't have the proper tools" or "don't have the time to fix it"

Cognitive dissonance appears in virtually all evaluations and decisions and is the central mechanism by which we experience new differences in the world. When we see other people behave differently to our images of them, when we hold any conflicting thoughts, we experience dissonance. Dissonance increases with the importance and impact of the decision, along with the difficulty of reversing it.

 So how do you get over it, simple when you start feeling uncomfortable, stop and see if you can find the inner conflict. Then notice how that came about. If it was somebody else who put that conflict there, you can decide not to play any more with them.