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The Instrumentality of Attitudes: Toward a Neofunctional Theory
Abstract
This paper proposes that attitudes should be viewed as strategies for meeting personal needs; they serve psychological functions. After reviewing the early functional attitude theories proposed by Katz and by Smith, and some of the problems associated with them, a new functional approach is outlined. This neofunctional approach distinguishes two principal sources for the benefit related to attitudes: the attitude's object and the attitude's expression. Within these two major categories, specific functions are described based on the author's research and that of earlier functional theorists. The personality, situational, and domain characteristics likely to influence the functional value of attitudes are also discussed. Strategies suggested by this approach for changing attitudes are briefly considered.
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Citations
Cited by
How General Is Trust in “Most People”? Solving the Radius of Trust Problem
Delhey, J., Newton, K., & Welzel, C. (2011) · American Sociological Review · doi:10.1177/0003122411420817 · Cited by 817
Kyle, G., Graefe, A., Manning, R., & Bacon, J. (2003) · Journal of Leisure Research · doi:10.1080/00222216.2003.11949993 · Cited by 477
The Psychology of Group Conflict and the Dynamics of Oppression: A Social Dominance Perspective
Sidanius, J. (1993) · Explorations in Political Psychology · doi:10.1215/9780822396697-009 · Cited by 365
Self‐Identity and the Theory of Planned Behavior: A Useful Addition or an Unhelpful Artifice?1
Sparks, P., & Guthrie, C. A. (1998) · Journal of Applied Social Psychology · doi:10.1111/j.1559-1816.1998.tb01683.x · Cited by 317
Shah, D. V. (1998) · Political Psychology · doi:10.1111/0162-895x.00114 · Cited by 295
Metadata
- Authors
- Herek, G. M.
- Venue
- Journal of Social Issues
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 1986-07
- Volume
- 42
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 99-114
- ISSN
- 0022-4537 (ISSN-L)
- 1540-4560
- OpenAlex
- W2116267601
- Cited by
- 267
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 28.89
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
