ATTITUDE DISSIMULATION AND PERSUASION

Because people's true attitudes toward an object become more accessibl e immediately after indicating an attitude that they know to be false, we predicted that such attitude dissimulation might paradoxically cau se the true attitude to have a stronger effect on subsequent judgments . In two experiments, participants were randomly assigned to express f alse, true, or no attitudes toward Albert Einstein. Next, in an ostens ibly separate study, participants read a persuasive message describing Einstein's dislike for a particular technology and then rated their a ttitude toward this technology. As expected, results indicated that pa rticipants who had previously indicated false or true attitudes toward Einstein indicated more dislike for the technology than participants who had not previously expressed attitudes toward him. A second experi ment replicated the effect of attitude dissimulation using a manipulat ion that was similar to that employed in cognitive dissonance experime nts. Possible effects of falsely indicating ''politically correct'' at titudes are discussed. (C) 1998 Academic Press.