Ever had that feeling where you've got two conflicting thoughts in your head? Does it feel horrible, and would you do practically anything to avoid it? That's Cognitive dissonance for you - an uncomfortable state of mind that motivates us to do anything to restore normality. Having two thoughts at the same time isn't always a bad thing, but when they're not only simultaneous, but conflicting, too: you've got a problem on your hands. Here,we examine what exactly cognitive dissonance entails, and what we can do to stop it.
When you're experiencing Cognitive dissonance, it's likely you'll feel a whole range of negative emotions: sad, lonely, worried, frightened, etc. Whatever it is that you're having conflicting thoughts about in your mind, you will be going through intense discomfort, that's for certain. So how do these feelings come about?
Most of the time when we feel Cognitive dissonance, we will have done something regrettable, something that goes against our personal 'rulebook'. For example, the thought: "I can't really motivate myself to do any revision", is dissonant with "I am smart enough to achieve good grades - providing I put the work in". Situations like these are enough to make us feel useless. This is because we are letting ourselves down voluntarily - it's not out of our control to change things.
Smoking is another common example used to illustrate the theory of Cognitive dissonance. As well-educated members of society, we know that smoking is bad for our health and vastly increases our chances of developing lung cancer. Despite this, many people persist with their habit, defying all logic and going against what their head tells them is the intelligent thing to do.
Being aware of what it is can be one thing, but understanding how to resolve the problems inflicted by Cognitive dissonance is much more complex. The most obvious step is to change the way we behave. Most things that happen to us are caused by our own behavior, and using smoking as an example again, the only thing that can be done to resolve the problem is for the person affected to take action against it. The reality of this is that they have to stop smoking to make the issue go away.
Alternatively, it's possible to address the issue by changing the cognition that is disagreeing with the initial thought. Reverting to the exam success crisis, we would have to change "I can't really motivate myself to do any revision" to something like, "I can do revision - I just need to put my mind to it". By doing this, the thought no longer conflicts with the idea of getting good grades by putting effort in. As a result, the feeling of dissonance no longer exists.
Cognitive dissonance happens even to the best of us - no one goes through life without facing problems of some description. We will all go through times where we can't help but act differently to the way we think we should. When we witness people behave in a different manner from what we have come to expect from them, they could well be experiencing dissonance in some form.