Physiological Mediation of Attitude Maintenance, Formation, and Change

Abstract

The nature/nurture controversy is a recurring one in psychology, and the attitude formation and change literature has not been immune to it. Moore (1929) believed that there is a relation between biological factors (hereditary temperament) and attitude extremity. Klineberg (1940) noted that prejudicial racial attitudes are "sometimes stated in terms of direct, biologically determined hostility or aggressiveness between different racial groups" (pp. 346–347). Allport's (1935) view that attitudes are learned through experience or imitation has superceded this perspective, however, with a widely accepted contemporary definition of attitude being "a learned predisposition to respond in a consistently favorable or unfavorable manner with respect to a given object" (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975, p. 6).