Predictors and predictive effects of ambivalence.
Recent interest in people's ambivalence about social behaviours and social categories has provoked a number of challenges for the ways in which attitudes are conceptualized. Research into the implications of ambivalence for attitude-behaviour relationships and for information processing has developed alongside a concern with how best to measure ambivalence and with its implications for the application of social psychological theory. In a study (N = 197) of attendance at a local health club, two novel issues were addressed: firstly, an assessment of the effect of ambivalence on intention-behaviour relationships (using an objective behaviour measure) revealed the hypothesized moderation effect; secondly, in a move towards identifying some of the factors that may lead to ambivalence, an assessment of potential motivational conflicts based on a consideration of behavioural beliefs and outcome evaluations was introduced. We suggest that this method of assessing ambivalence represents a useful framework on which to build a fuller understanding of the relationship between people's attitudes and the variety of motives that may influence their social behaviour. Pointers for future research are outlined.
Sparks
Paul
P
University of Sussex, BN1 9QH, UK. p.sparks@sussex.ac.uk
Harris
Peter R
PR
Lockwood
Nina
N
D001290:Attitude; D003220:Conflict, Psychological; D006801:Humans; D009042:Motivation; D012919:Social Behavior