ATTRIBUTION OF PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY AND DISSONANCE REDUCTION

Abstract

The relationship between personal responsibility and dissonance reduction was investigated in a situation where an individual had to undergo a negative consequence caused by an agent beyond his control, i.e., by chance. Eighty participants received either strong or weak electric shock, depending on the oddness or evenness of spots of a die thrown either by the experimenter (Ex-perimenter-Caused condition) or by the participant himself (Participant-Caused condition). It was found that participants in the Participant-Caused condition evaluated electric shocks less painful, estimated their heart rates to be less faster, and perceived the experimenter more intelligent and favorable than participants in the Experimenter-Caused condition. These results were interpreted as lending support to the newly reformulated dissonance theory.