ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR MANJULA DEVI P

MANGALORE UNIVERSITY ASSISTANT PROFESSOR

GFGC BETTAMPADY

Module -2 Perception and Attitude

Perception
Meaning and Definition of Perception

Perception Meaning

"Perception is the process by which information obtained from the outside environment is
selected, received, organized, analyzed, and evaluated to make it meaningful for people. This
meaningful information results in better decisions and activities."

Perception Definition

According to S.P. Robbins, "Perception may be defined as a means by which people organize
and understand their sensory impressions to give meaning to their surroundings".

According to Joseph Reitz, "Perception includes all those processes by which an individual
receives information about his environment-seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting, and smelling",

According to Kolasa, "Perception is selection and organization of material which originates

from the external environment at one time or the other to provide the meaningful reality we
experience".

Nature of Perception

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The nature of perception in organizational behaviour is as follows:

1) Intellectual Process: Perception involves selection, organization, and analysis of data from
the surroundings to gain some viewpoints. Hence, it is an intellectual process.

2) Psychological Process: Perception is based on the psychology of individuals. Hence, it can

be said that how a person acts, thinks, or feels is influenced by the perception of his
environment.

3) Subjective Process: Two or more persons might observe the same event differently.
This depends on their ability to choose what to understand, how to classify the information
collection and analysis of the event. Thus, perception is a subjective process.

4) Lens Providing Worldview: Perception acts as a lens because it equips a person with a
viewpoint about his surroundings and their reality.

5) Socially Connected: Every individual needs to understand the nature of another person
every now and then because the mindset of an individual keeps on changing with time. Hence,
it is said that perception is socially connected.

6) Culturally Influenced: Views of people can be influenced by their cultural values about
the world. For example, people belonging to different cultures speak different languages.

7) Self-Fulfilling: When we talk about person perception, both the perceiver and the perceived
are the persons, which ultimately makes the scenario more complex. For example, during hard
times, people believe that the present situation is bad and it will become worse in the days to
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come. Hence, they start behaving selfishly. They just focus on protecting themselves and their
families.

Importance of Perception
Perception is important due to following reasons:

1) Helps in Understanding Human Behaviour: Every individual observes the world

differently and deals with the problems differently. An object might not be perceived in the
same manner as it really is. If a person purchases fruits from a particular vendor it is not because
the vendor is selling the best fruits in the whole market but because the person perceives him
to be doing so. It is due to the perception that a job that one person finds suitable and satisfying
might not appear as good to the other. So, perception plays a significant role in understanding
human behaviour.

2) Helps in Forecasting Behaviour: Different individuals behave differently when facing the
same situation as they view the same situation differently. A person's behaviour can be
predicted by understanding his current situation and his current perception of the environment.

3) Facilitates Needs Determination: A person's perception is influenced by his needs. Hence,

by understanding the perception of a person about a certain situation, his needs can also be
understood. For example, mirrors in an amusement park show different images of the same
object.

4) Assists in Handling Subordinates Effectively: If a manager wants to be effective and

intends to avoid mistakes in the work environment, he needs to understand the perception of
his employees. This would help him in predicting the behaviour of employees as he would be
aware of their viewpoints.

Factors Influencing the Perceptual Set: 3 Factors

The important factors influencing the perceptual set, i.e,
(a) Characteristics of the Perceiver,
(b) Characteristics of the Perceived, and
(c) Characteristics of the Situation.

A. Characteristics of the Perceiver:

When a person looks at a target and attempts to interpreter what he sees, his interpretation is
greatly influenced by his personal characteristics which are discussed as follows:

1. Needs and Motives:

Our need pattern plays an important part in how we perceive things. A need is a feeling of
discomfort or tension when one thing he is missing something or requires something.
Therefore, unsatisfied needs or motives stimulate individuals and may exert a strong influence

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on their perception. When people are not able to satisfy their needs, they are engaged in wishful
thinking which is a way to satisfy their needs not in the real world but imaginary world. In such
cases, people will perceive only those items which suit their wishful thinking. Motives also
influence the perception of people. People who are devious are prone to see others as also
devious.

2. Self Concept:
Self concept indicates how we perceive ourselves which then influences how we perceive
others and the situation we are in. The more we understand ourselves, the more we are able to
perceive others accurately. For example, secure people tend to see others as warm and friendly.
Less secure people often find fault with others. Perceiving ourselves accurately and enhancing
our-self concept are factors that enhance accurate perception.

3. Past Experience:
Our perceptions are often guided by our past experiences and what we expect to see. A person’s
past experiences mould the way he perceives the current situation. If a person has been betrayed
by a couple of friends in the past, he would tend to distrust any new friendship that he might
be in the process of developing.

4. Current Psychological State:

The psychological and emotional states of an individual are likely to influence how things are
perceived. If a person is depressed, he is likely to perceive the same situation differently than
if he is elated. Similarly, if a person is scared out of wits by seeing a snake in the garden, she
is likely to perceive a rope under the bed as a snake.

5. Beliefs:
A person’s beliefs influence his perception to a great extent. Thus, a fact is conceived not on
what it is but what a person believes it to be. The individual normally censors stimulus inputs
to avoid disturbance of his existing beliefs.

6. Expectations:
Expectations affect the perception of a person. Expectations are related with the state of
anticipation of particular behaviour from a person. For example, a technical manager will
expect that the non- technical people will be ignorant about the technical features of the
product.

7. Situation:
Elements in the environment surrounding an individual like time, location, light, heat etc.,
influence his perception. The context in which a person sees the objects or events is very
important.

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8. Cultural Upbringing:
A person’s ethics, values and his cultural upbringing also play an important role in his
perception about others. It is difficult to perceive the personality of a person raised in another
culture because our judgement is based upon our own values.

B. Characteristics of the Perceived:

Characteristics of the person who is being observed can affect what is perceived. Though, it
may go against logic and objectivity, but it cannot be denied that our perceptions about others
are influenced by their physical characteristics such as appearances, age, gender, manner of
communication as well as personality traits and other forms of behaviour. For example,
loud people are more likely to be noticed in a group than are quite ones. So too are extremely
attractive or extremely ugly individuals.

Persons, objects or events that are similar to each other tend to be grouped together. People
dressed in business suits are generally thought to be professionals, while employees dressed in
ordinary work clothes are assumed to be lower-level employees.

Manner of communication, both verbal and non-verbal, affect our perception about others. For
example, the choice of words and precision of language can form impressions about the
education and sophistication of the person. The tone of voice indicates the mood of the person.
The depth of conversation and choice of topics provide clues of people’s intelligence. The body
language or expressive behaviour such as how a person sits and the movement of his eyes or a
smile can indicate whether he is nervous or self confident.

The status or occupation of a person also influences the perception. We tend to behave in a
more respectful way when we are introduced to the principal of a school in which our child is
studying, judge of the high court or Supreme Court or a famous cricket player. Sometimes our
perception of a person tends to be; biased, depending upon the description given to us by other
persons. When we meet a person who is described to us as warm and friendly, we treat him
differently as compared to meeting a person who is known to be cold & calculating.

C. Characteristics of the Situation:

The context in which we see objects or events is very important. The surrounding environment
and the elements present in it influence our perception while perceiving a particular situation
or event, its physical, social and organisational setting can also influence the perception. For
example, if you meet a person for the first time and he is with a person whom you respect and
admire, you will create a favourable image about him in your mind as compared to a situation
in which you see him with another person whom you intensely dislike. Of course, the initial
impressions may change with the passage of time, but the saying that “First impression is the
last impression” is very valued.

Location of a given event is also very important factor in determining the behaviour. For
example, a conversation with the boss taking place in a casual reception area may be perceived

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differently than when taking place in the boss’s office with the door closed. Organisational
setting also affects the behaviour of the people. An organisation setting where people are given
an opportunity to interact in a friendly and sociable work situation, they become more
trustworthy and less defensive.

Perception Process

Perception is the process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting information. This process,
includes the perception of select stimuli that pass through our perceptual filters, are organized
into our existing structures and patterns, and are then interpreted based on previous
experiences. Although perception is a largely cognitive and psychological process, how we
perceive the people and objects around us affects our communication.

The Perception Process

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We respond differently to an object or person that we perceive favourably than we do to
something we find unfavourable. But how do we filter through the mass amounts of incoming
information, organize it, and make meaning from what makes it through our perceptual filters
and into our social realities?

Selecting Information

We take in information through all five of our senses, but our perceptual field (the world around
us) includes so many stimuli that it is impossible for our brains to process and make sense of it
all. So, as information comes in through our senses, various factors influence what actually
continues on through the perception process.

Selecting is the first part of the perception process, in which we focus our attention on certain
incoming sensory information. Think about how, out of many other possible stimuli to pay
attention to, you may hear a familiar voice in the hallway, see a pair of shoes you want to buy
from across the mall, or smell something cooking for dinner when you get home from work.

We tend to pay attention to information that is salient. Salience is the degree to which
something attracts our attention in a particular context. The thing attracting our attention can
be abstract, like a concept, or concrete, like an object. The degree of salience depends on three
features, they are:

Visual and Aural Stimulation

Needs and Interests

Expectations

Organizing Information

Organizing is the second part of the perception process, in which we sort and categorize
information that we perceive based on innate and learned cognitive patterns. Three ways we
sort things into patterns are by using proximity, similarity, and difference.

In terms of proximity, we tend to think that things that are close together go together. For
example, have you ever been waiting to be helped in a business and the clerk assumes that you
and the person standing beside you are together? The slightly awkward moment usually ends
when you and the other person in line look at each other, then back at the clerk, and one of you
explains that you are not together. Even though you may have never met that other person in
your life, the clerk used a basic perceptual organizing cue to group you together because you
were standing in proximity to one another.

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We also group things together based on similarity. We tend to think similar-looking or similar-
acting things belong together.

We also organize information that we take in based on difference. In this case, we assume that
the item that looks or acts different from the rest doesn’t belong with the group. Perceptual
errors involving people and assumptions of difference can be especially awkward, if not
offensive.

We also organize interactions and interpersonal experiences based on our firsthand

experiences. When two people experience the same encounter differently, misunderstandings
and conflict may result.

Interpreting Information

Although selecting and organizing incoming stimuli happens very quickly, and sometimes
without much conscious thought, interpretation can be a much more deliberate and conscious
step in the perception process.

Interpretation is the third part of the perception process, in which we assign meaning to our
experiences using mental structures known as schemata. Schemata are like databases of stored,
related information that we use to interpret new experiences. We all have fairly complicated
schemata that have developed over time as small units of information combine to make more
meaningful complexes of information.

Schemata are like lenses that help us make sense of the perceptual cues around us based on
previous knowledge and experience.

Issues involved in Perception (Distortion in perception)

Various issues involved in perception are as follows:

• Selective Perception
• Halo Effect
• Contrast Effect
• Projection
• Stereotyping
• Attributional Bias
• Impression
• Inference
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
• Pygmalion effect

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1. Selective Perception
People are prone to describe a situation based on their interests, background, experiences, and
attitude. On the road, they will notice those vehicles more which resemble their own, or in-
office why some employees get an appreciation for doing a certain act which when done by
others is overlooked. This is because people cannot observe every time and everything
happening around them, so they perceive things selectively. For example, if there is a rumour
that due to a reduction in sales, the company is planning for reduction, and meanwhile a senior
executive plans a routine visit. It would be presumed that he is visiting the premises to eliminate
employees; however, that would be the last thing in his mind.
2. Hallo Effect

At times we judge a person exclusively based on a single trait. This is known as the halo effect.
Under the influence of a halo, a perceiver cannot judge an individual properly because he does
not consider all his traits. For example, if an employee is always the first one to reach the
office and the last one to leave office, he is considered to be very industrious and creative.

On the other hand, an employee with a casual attitude and relaxed body language would not be
taken seriously and would not be relied upon. These two judgments taken by a manager are
based on the halo effect and might not be accurate as the manager has taken into account only
a single obvious characteristic of the employees. Such judgments should be carefully examined
as a single trait cannot define the character and performance of an employee.

3. Contrast Effect

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The contrast effect states that something dramatically different will overstate the contrast
between it and everything else. For example, in an interview when there are huge numbers of
job applications, distortion in the evaluation of any candidate may occur based on the place of
his application. If his application is placed after a relatively weak candidate, it may immediately
grasp the attention of the interviewer whereas it may lose its charm if it is placed after a very
strong candidate.

Another example of the contrast effect is that after rating an excellent performer, the supervisor
begins to rate other performers. But due to contrasting effects, the supervisor will find
significant differences in their performances, productivity, and aptitudes and hence will rate
him as an average performer. Therefore, the contrast effect plays a negative part in the
supervisor decision-making

4. Projection

Connecting one's own characteristics to other people. If a person is respectable and trustworthy,
he so takes it for granted that other people are also honest and trustworthy. People who engage
in projection tend to perceive others according to what they are like, rather than what the person
being observed in reality is like. When observing other people who actually are like them, these
observers are quite accurate - not because they are conscious but because they always judge
people as being similar to themselves. So when they do find someone who is like them, they
are naturally correct.

5. Stereotyping

Stereotyping refers to making a general image regarding the characteristics (which is usually
wrong) of all members of a group. This hampers a manager's ability to take correct
decisions. For example, Mahesh is an introvert but an excellent salesman, but his manager
underrates his performance as compared to the other salespersons because he does not fit with
them. The manager here ignored his performance due to stereotyping and made an inaccurate
judgment.

At certain levels, stereotyping can help to evaluate the environment. On the other hand, its
negative consequences can lead to everlasting inaccuracies. It creates social biasness, erroneous
decisions, hampers innovation, infects utilization of human resources, futility, and
incompetence. For example, in the case of impaired employees, the employer's stereotype is
the major problem that workers face. Workers are regarded as lacking job-related skills, having
lower performance levels, and taking more leaves. However, findings state that these
stereotypes are not true. When highly talented, well-educated people are considered unqualified
due to stereotyping, then it becomes a problem. For example, a study based on female and
male executives stated that females with less power had to face more obstacles and had to do
more assignments for promotion as compared to men.

6. Attributional Bias
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Attribution is the method that helps an individual in determining the causes behind his
behaviour. In an organization, people are not only concerned about an individual's behaviour
but also about the reason behind that behaviour. For example, if the productivity of a plant
increases after the installation of new machines, then the credit would be given to the newly
installed machines rather than to the manager and his employee-handling ability.

7. Impression

The first impression has a great impact on others. The way a person talks, behaves or even is
silent has an influencing effect. This first impression decides what kind of relation the two will
share in the future. Errors because of impression occur when due to some reason the person
formulates a negative image of the other person and then refuses to change it.

For example, If a manager notices that an employee is not performing properly. The reason
behind this is that his parents had recently died in a mishap. After some time, he became normal
and started giving high-level performance but the manager's opinion did not get changed as he
was negatively influenced by the first impression of that particular employee.

8. Inference

Certain people have the impulse to judge others based on insufficient knowledge. For
example, an employee might sit at his workstation throughout. the entire day, and do nothing.
Still, he might be considered committed to his work. Hence, before giving performance
appraisals entire information about the employee must be collected. The behaviour of the
employee with his colleagues and customers, his productivity, etc. must also be taken into
account

9. Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Prejudiced perceptions may find their way based on expectations. Many times people try to
justify their perceptions of reality although they are totally inaccurate. Things that are
acceptable in one culture might be considered inappropriate in another culture. Hence, in
business, managers must gather information about cultural norms to avoid any awkward
situation or hurt the feelings of others. For example, an American manager employed in Japan
should be aware of the fact that while frequent smiling in America is considered polite, it would
be considered foolish in Japan.

10. Pygmalion Effect

The "Pygmalion effect," also sometimes known as the "Rosenthal effect" for the psychologist
credited with discovering it, is a theory teaching that people will act or behave in the way that
others expect them to. It is very similar to the concept of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The effect
has both positive and negative outcomes-a person expected by his or her superiors to succeed
will, but the opposite is also usually true. Most of the time, these expectations are not openly

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discussed. They are communicated passively through things like word choice or body
language. To increase the likelihood of being positive Pygmalion's, managers need to
remember three things:

• a) Individuals behave toward others consistent with their expectations of them.

Managers who have high expectations of their employees are supportive and generally
give employees more training and challenging jobs. By contrast, managers that have
low expectations of their employees are not supportive and generally would not give
employees training and challenging jobs.
• b) A person's behaviour affects others, not only will those treated positively benefit
from special opportunities but these opportunities will also bolster their self-esteem.
• c) People behave in ways following from how they are treated. People who have
benefited from special treatment and who have confidence in their abilities are likely to
be high performers.

Specific Application of Perception in Organizations

People often see the same phenomenon differently both within the organizational context and
outside the organization. For example, in relation to a strike, a manager may perceive the
immediate cause of the strike as trivial, while the workers may see it as very serious. Similarly,
when there is any accident in the factory, the supervisor may treat it as the carelessness of
workers while the workers may treat it as the high-handedness of management and lack of
adequate provisions of security measures. A manager is mainly concerned with the
achievement of organizational objectives through specified behavior of its members. And the
behavior of the people is invariably affected by perception. The behavior of people gets
affected by the facts which they consider important even though factually that may
be incorrect or non-existent. The organizational world has begun to realize the importance of
perception so that managers are trained to understand human perception as much as possible.
The understanding of perception is the key to understand and control behavior. The major areas
where the special attention is required in regard to perceptual accuracy and management and
behavioral application of perception of utmost importance, are followings:

a) Employment Interview
A major input to find who is hired and who is rejected in any organization is the employment
interview. It’s fair to say that few people are hired without an interview. But the evidence
indicates that interviewers make perceptual judgments that are often inaccurate. In addition,
agreement among interviewers is often poor, that is different interviewers see different things
in the same candidate and thus arrive at different conclusions about the applicant. Interviewers
generally draw early impressions that become very quickly entranced. If negative information
is exposed early in the interview, it tends to be more heavily weighted than if that same
information comes out later. Studies indicate that most interviewers’ decisions change very
little after the first four or five minutes of their interview. As a result, information elicited early
in the interview carries greater weight than does information later eluted “Good applicant” is
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probably characterized more by the absence of unfavorable characteristics than by the presence
of favorable characteristics.
b) Selection of Employees
It is one of the areas, where managers need to be very careful. Normally, employees are selected
on the basis of selection tests, interviews and reviews of the applicant’s background. There are
various cases, where information is vague and managers are subject to many of the perceptual
problems where they make the selection decisions. Managers sometimes get swayed away by
Halo effect and stereo-typing. There can be times when manager’s emotional state is not fit for
justifying his role as a selective authority. He might make a mountain out of molehill when not
in a good mood.
c) Performance Appraisal
Every organization has some system of performance appraisal. It is generally done by superiors
and sometimes by people at different levels as in 360 degree performance appraisal. Many a
time, it has been found that superiors or others get carried by Halo effect or their personal
biases. They have liking or favor for some people and dislike for others. These factors act as
hindrance to objective performances appraisal. And sometimes these factors weight so much
in favor of or against some employees that the real purpose of performance appraisal gets
defeated.
d) Delegation of Authority
In organizational set up delegating authority to do various task is the way of life. But, a manager
decision whether to delegate or whom to delegate is many time affected by his perception of
employees. Various perceptual errors make him delegate someone who is not the best available
choice in the organizations for that job. And this phenomenon has a very discouraging effect
on the person who has been overlooked and his perception regarding delegating authority
changes towards unreality.
e) Interpersonal Working Relationship
Organizations are intended to bring about integrated behavior. Therefore, managers in the
organization need to know whether or not members share similar or at least compatible
perceptions. If they do not, the problems of the organization becomes greater and requires
efforts to make perceptions more compatible. Mis-perceptions usually lead to strained relations
and may even result in open conflict among people.
f) Employee Effort
In many organizations, the level of an employee’s effort is given high importance just as teacher
frequently consider how hard you try in a course as well as you perform in examinations. So
often do managers. An assessment of an individual’s effort is a subjective judgment susceptible
to perceptual distortions and bias.
g) Employee Loyalty

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Another important judgment that managers make about employees is whether or not they are
loyal to the organization. Despite the general decline in employees, especially those in the
managerial ranks, openly disparage the firm. Furthermore, in some organization, if the word
gets around that an employee is looking at other employment opportunities outside the firm,
that employee may be labeled as disloyal and he may be cut off from all future advancement
opportunities. The issue is not whether organizations are right in demanding loyalty. The issue
is that many do, and that assessment of an employee’s loyalty by one decision maker may be
seen as excessive conformity by another. An employee who questions a top management
decision may be seen as disloyal by some, yet caring and concerned by others.

Attitude
Meaning of Attitude
In psychology, an attitude refers to a set of emotions, beliefs, and behaviours towards a
particular object, person, thing, or event.
Attitudes are often the result of experience or upbringing, and they can have a powerful
influence over behaviour. While attitudes are enduring, they can also change.

Definition of Attitude

Attitude is the manner, disposition, feeling, and position about a person or thing, tendency, or
orientation, especially in mind.

According to Gordon Allport, “An attitude is a mental and neural state of readiness, organized
through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon the individual’s response
to all objects and situations with which it is related.”

Frank Freeman said, “An attitude is a dispositional readiness to respond to certain institutions,
persons or objects in a consistent manner which has been learned and has become one’s typical
mode of response.”

Psychologists define attitudes as a learned tendency to evaluate things in a certain way. This
can include evaluations of people, issues, objects, or events. Such evaluations are often positive
or negative, but they can also be uncertain at times.

For example, you might have mixed feelings about a particular person or issue. Researchers
also suggest that there are several different components that make up attitudes. The components
of attitudes are sometimes referred to as CAB or the ABC's of attitude.

Nature / Characteristics of Attitude

1. Attitudes are the complex combination of things we call personality, beliefs, values,
behaviours, and motivations.
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2. It can fall anywhere along a continuum from very favourable to very unfavourable.
3. All people, irrespective of their status or intelligence, hold attitudes.
4. An attitude exists in every person’s mind. It helps to define our identity, guide our
actions, and influence how we judge people.
5. Although the feeling and belief components of attitude are internal to a person, we can
view a person’s attitude from their resulting behaviour.
6. Attitude helps us define how we see situations and define how we behave toward the
situation or object.
7. It provides us with internal cognitions or beliefs and thoughts about people and objects.
8. It can also be explicit and implicit. Explicit attitude is those that we are consciously
aware of an implicit attitude is unconscious, but still, affect our behaviours.
9. Attitudes cause us to behave in a particular way toward an object or person.
10. An attitude is a summary of a person’s experience; thus, an attitude is grounded in direct
experience predicts future behaviour more accurately.
11. It includes certain aspects of personality as interests, appreciation, and social conduct.
12. It indicates the total of a man’s inclinations and feelings.
13. An attitude is a point of view, substantiated or otherwise, true or false, which one holds
towards an idea, object, or person.
14. It has aspects such as direction, intensity, generality, or specificity.
15. It refers to one’s readiness for doing Work.
16. It may be positive or negative and may be affected by age, position, and education.

Components of Attitude

• Cognitive Component: Your thoughts and beliefs about the subject

•
• Affective Component: How the object, person, issue, or event makes you feel
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•
• Behavioural Component: How attitude influences your behaviour

Attitudes can also be explicit and implicit. Explicit attitudes are those that we are consciously
aware of and that clearly influence our behaviours and beliefs. Implicit attitudes are
unconscious but still have an effect on our beliefs and behaviours.

Attitude Formation

There are a number of factors that can influence how and why attitudes form. Here is a closer
look at how attitudes form.

1. Experience

Attitudes form directly as a result of experience. They may emerge due to direct personal
experience, or they may result from observation.

2. Social Factors

Social roles and social norms can have a strong influence on attitudes. Social roles relate to
how people are expected to behave in a particular role or context. Social norms involve
society's rules for what behaviours are considered appropriate.

3. Learning

Attitudes can be learned in a variety of ways. Consider how advertisers use classical
conditioning to influence your attitude toward a particular product. In a television commercial,
you see young, beautiful people having fun on a tropical beach while enjoying a sports drink.
This attractive and appealing imagery causes you to develop a positive association with this
particular beverage.

4. Conditioning

Operant conditioning can also be used to influence how attitudes develop. Imagine a young
man who has just started smoking. Whenever he lights up a cigarette, people complain, chastise
him, and ask him to leave their vicinity. This negative feedback from those around him
eventually causes him to develop an unfavourable opinion of smoking and he decides to give
up the habit.

5. Observation

Finally, people also learn attitudes by observing people around them. When someone you
admire greatly espouses a particular attitude, you are more likely to develop the same beliefs.
For example, children spend a great deal of time observing the attitudes of their parents and
usually begin to demonstrate similar outlooks.
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ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR MANJULA DEVI P
MANGALORE UNIVERSITY ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
GFGC BETTAMPADY
Functions of Attitude

Daniel Katz outlines 4 functions of attitudes;

1. Adjustment Function.
2. Ego-Defensive Function.
3. Value-Expressive Function.
4. Knowledge Function.

Adjustment Function

Attitudes often help people to adjust to their work environment. When employees are well
treated, they are likely to develop a positive attitude toward management and the organization.
When employees are criticized and given a minimal salary, they are likely to develop a
negative attitude toward management and the organization.

These attitudes help employees adjust to their environment and are a basis for future behaviour.
The adjustment function directs people toward pleasurable or rewarding objects and away from
unpleasant, undesirable ones. It serves the utilitarian concept of maximizing reward and
minimizing punishment.

Thus, the attitudes of consumers depend to a large degree on their perceptions of what is needed
satisfying and what is punishing.

Ego-Defensive Function

The ego-defensive function refers to holding attitudes that protect our self-esteem or that justify
actions that make us feel guilty. This function involves psychoanalytic principles where people
use defence mechanisms to protect themselves from psychological harm.

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ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR MANJULA DEVI P
MANGALORE UNIVERSITY ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
GFGC BETTAMPADY
Mechanisms include denial, repression, projection, rationalization, etc. For example; an older
manager whose decisions are continually challenged by a younger subordinate manager may
feel that the later is brash, cocky, immature, and inexperienced.

In truth, the younger subordinate may be right in challenging the decisions. The older manager
may not be a very effective leader and may constantly make poor decisions. On the other hand,
the older manager is not going to admit this but will try to protect the ego by blaming the other
party.

Value-Expressive Function

Whereas ego defensive attitudes are formed to protect a person’s self-image, value-expressive
attitudes enable the expression of the person’s centrally held values.

Central values tend to establish our identity and gain us social approval thereby showing us
who we are, and what we stand for. Some attitudes are important to a person because they
express values that are integral to that person’s self-concept. Therefore, consumers adopt
certain attitudes to translate their values into something more tangible and easily expressed.
Our value-expressive attitudes are closely related to our self-concept.

One whose central value is freedom, the individual may express very positive attitudes towards
the decentralization of authority in the organization, flexible work schedules, and relaxation of
dress standards.

Knowledge Function

The knowledge function refers to our need which is consistent and relatively stable. This allows
us to predict what is likely to happen, and so gives us a sense of control. Some attitudes are
useful because they help to make the world more understandable.

They help people ascribe causes to events and direct attention towards features of people or
situations that are likely to be useful in making sense of them. Consequently, they help to make
the world more understandable, predictable, and knowable. Knowing a person’s attitude helps
us predict their behavior.

For example- people who are not familiar with nuclear energy may develop an attitude that is
dangerous and should not be used as an energy source. Stereotyping is another example. In the
absence of knowledge about a person, we may use a stereotyped attitude for judging the person.

Change in Attitude

While attitudes can have a powerful effect on behavior, they are not set in stone. The same
influences that lead to attitude formation can also create attitude change.

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ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR MANJULA DEVI P
MANGALORE UNIVERSITY ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
GFGC BETTAMPADY
Learning Theory

Classical conditioning, operant conditioning, and observational learning can be used to bring
about attitude change. Classical conditioning can be used to create positive emotional reactions
to an object, person, or event by associating positive feelings with the target object.

Operant conditioning can be used to strengthen desirable attitudes and weaken undesirable
ones. People can also change their attitudes after observing the behaviour of others.

Elaboration Likelihood Theory

This theory of persuasion suggests that people can alter their attitudes in two ways. First, they
can be motivated to listen and think about the message, thus leading to an attitude shift.

Or, they might be influenced by the characteristics of the speaker, leading to a temporary or
surface shift in attitude. Messages that are thought-provoking and that appeal to logic are more
likely to lead to permanent changes in attitudes.

Dissonance Theory

As mentioned earlier, people can also change their attitudes when they have conflicting beliefs
about a topic. In order to reduce the tension created by these incompatible beliefs, people often
shift their attitudes.

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