Cognitive Dissonance Examples and Effects

Furthermore, emotional and cognitive conflicts arise in addiction due to cognitive dissonance. Emotionally, individuals may feel guilt, shame, or anxiety as a result of their addictive behaviors conflicting with their personal values. Cognitively, they may experience internal debates and justifications, which further exacerbate the psychological struggle. Modifying social and environmental antecedents and consequences another approach to working with addictive behaviours18. Family members are counselled so as identify potential risk factors for relapse, such as emotional and behavioural changes.

Overcoming Cognitive Dissonance in Addiction Recovery

Explore Psychology provides information about psychology and mental health. The material found on this site is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be used for diagnosis or treatment purposes. Festinger noted that when people realize that behavior is unhealthy, they often find ways to reduce the tension to continue engaging in the cognitive dissonance and addiction behavior. The fear of others noticing the disparity may cause people to hide their true beliefs or actions. People will seek out information that confirms what they already believe to be true while avoiding things that conflict with their beliefs. One way to reduce discomfort is to look for ways to justify the actions that are creating distress.

Stop beating yourself up! Learn how to forgive yourself to move forward

After all, behaving against one’s wishes and intentions violates a fundamental human need to see oneself as a rational and consistent person. Cognitive dissonance can have an important influence https://ecosoberhouse.com/ on your behavior, decisions, and even your well-being. You can try to recognize these uncomfortable feelings when they arise and then look for effective and healthy ways to reduce conflict.

How to resolve cognitive dissonance

• Collective motivational interviewing (CMI) breaks new ground by extending the theory of motivational interviewing (MI) beyond the individual to include the social network.
• Therapy focuses on providing the individual the necessary skills to prevent a lapse from escalating into a relapse31.
• If both options are equally harmless, changing your beliefs to support the option you chose won’t have any long-term negative impacts.
• We consider ourselves to be truthful, hard-working, health-conscious, and in control.

For example, if someone believes smoking is harmful but continues to smoke, they may experience cognitive dissonance. To reduce discomfort, they may quit smoking or find rationales to justify their behavior, such as believing the negative effects are exaggerated. To effectively manage cognitive dissonance in the recovery process, various strategies can be utilized. Leon Festinger first proposed the theory of cognitive dissonance, centered on how people try to reach internal consistency.

New data shows poor mental health impedes creativity

• Mindfulness based interventions or third wave therapies have shown promise in addressing specific aspects of addictive behaviours such as craving, negative affect, impulsivity, distress tolerance.
• Our developed CMI approach makes a clear contribution to the theory of MI and can potentially benefit people with substance use problems with complex needs.
• People also often simply try to avoid information that contradicts their beliefs or behaviors.
• Individuals may attempt to reduce cognitive dissonance by changing their beliefs, modifying their behavior, or rationalizing their actions.

Emotionally, individuals with addiction experience guilt, shame, and sadness due to their inability to control their behavior and the consequences it has on their lives. These emotions can lead to self-destructive behavior and a negative self-view. Cognitive dissonance also influences individuals to seek information that supports their existing beliefs while excluding contradictory information. This can result in a confirmation bias, where individuals only absorb confirming information.

Implications of Cognitive Dissonance Theory

Counseling can help people recognize their dissonant thoughts and change them to more adaptive thoughts that support the changes they want to make to lead happier and healthier lives. The mental state of cognitive dissonance can actually have a very powerful effect on our thoughts and behaviors. We will do a number of things to try to restore harmony between our conflicting thoughts and behaviors. One study compared this feeling of dissonance to the sensations of being hungry or thirsty—we want to get rid of that discomfort, so we eat or get a drink of water (Cooper and Carlsmith, 2002). Cognitive dissonance can prevent addicts from taking responsibility for their lives and lead to a distrust of those who want to help them.

Cognitive Dissonance and Addiction Behaviors

Since they work all day in an office and spend a great deal of time sitting, it is difficult to change their behavior. Sometimes you might find yourself engaging in behaviors that are opposed to your own beliefs due to external expectations at work, school, or in a social situation. This might involve going along with something due to peer pressure or doing something at work to avoid getting fired. The theory behind this approach is that in order to resolve the dissonance, a person’s implicit beliefs about their body and thinness will change, reducing their desire to limit their food intake. Because it is something a person feels internally, it is not possible to physically observe dissonance. As such, no set of external signs can reliably indicate a person is experiencing cognitive dissonance.

• Similarly, when we lose in a contest, we come to desire the prize less because we view it as less valuable.
• Our brains rely on patterns, past experiences, and mental shortcuts to process information quickly.
• The neurobiological basis of mindfulness in substance use and craving have also been described in recent literature40.
• This term simply means that when we have two conflicting thoughts (cognitions), or if we behave in ways that conflict with our beliefs or values, we experience an unpleasant feeling of cognitive dissonance.

DRUGS OF ABUSE AND THE DEVELOPING BRAIN

In one study, 5-year-olds whose mothers had used alcohol, cocaine, and/or opiates while pregnant ranked below unexposed controls in language skills, impulse control, and visual attention. There were no significant differences between the two groups of children in intelligence, visual/manual dexterity, or sustained attention; however, both groups placed below the normative means on these measures (Pulsifer et al., 2008). Another study documented memory deficits in 10-year-old children who had been exposed prenatally to alcohol or marijuana (Richardson et al., 2002). In another study, abusers of 3,4-methylenedioxy-methamphetamine (MDMA, ecstasy) continued to score relatively poorly in tests of immediate and delayed recall of spoken words even after 2.5 years of abstinence (Thomasius et al., 2006). With regard to addictive behaviours Cognitive Therapy emphasizes psychoeducation and relapse prevention.