Social judgment theory (1 of 2)

1. (a) What is the central tenet of social judgment theory? (b) Upon what is the effect of a persuasive communication said to centrally depend? (c) What are the two steps involved in attitude change (according to social judgment theory)?

2. (a) Explain the idea that people have judgments of the alternative positions available on an issue. (b) How can researchers obtain such judgments? (c) Describe the Ordered Alternatives questionnaire. (d) What instructions are respondents given for completing the Ordered Alternatives questionnaire?

3. (a) What are the judgmental latitudes? What is the latitude of acceptance? Rejection? Non-commitment? (b) Explain how, for social judgment theory, a person’s stand on an issue is represented by more than the person's most-acceptable position.

4. (a) What is ego-involvement? (b) Is ego-involvement issue-specific or a general personality disposition? (c) Is being ego-involved in a issue the same thing as holding an extreme position on the issue?

5. (a) How is ego-involvement predicted to influence the structure of the judgmental latitudes? (b) What latitude structure is said to be characteristic of a person high in ego-involvement? Of a person low in ego-involvement?

6. (a) What is the “known group” procedure? (b) How was the known-group procedure used to validate the use of the size of the latitude of rejection (on the Ordered Alternatives questionnaire) as a measure of ego-involvement? (c) What is the Own-Categories procedure? (d) Explain how ego-involvement is thought to influence the number of categories used in the Own-Categories procedure; explain how ego-involvement is thought to influence the distribution of statements across categories in the Own-Categories procedure.

7. (a) What is social judgment theory’s rule of thumb concerning attitude change effects following persuasive communications? (b) What is “discrepancy”? (c) What is the relationship between discrepancy and attitude change, according to social judgment theory? (d) Describe how this analysis suggests different approaches to persuading high- and low-involvement receivers.