Cognitive Consistency–Dissonance among University Students and Its Relationship with Selected Variables

Abstract

Technological progress has become a major cause of cognitive dissonance. When a person's simple reality is at odds with the idealized technological world, the person would changes in lifestyle to decrease cognitive contradictions and restore internal psychological balance. Low cognitive consistency is also a psychological tension that has a motivational character. It is concerned with the circumstances that irritate or add to the discrepancy or dissonance in a person’s frame of reference. Cognitive elements have certain relationships. These may be with the individual or the environment. You also have knowledge of one’s feelings. You also know one’s behaviour, opinions and interests. Finally, you know the ways to attain any desired goal. Given this characteristic, researchers have studied how such phenomenon varies according to the demographic variables and the self-regulation of students.

The aim of the current study is to measure cognitive consistency–dissonance among the students of the University of Kufa and to detect differences according to gender and specialization (scientific and humanities). To reach these goals.

To achieve these objectives Haruki Sakai’s (2021) Recurrent Network Model of Cognitive Consistency was utilized to develop a Cognitive Consistency–Dissonance Scale. The model holds that the mind does not consist of ideas that are not linked with one another, but instead, it works with connected thoughts, beliefs, and emotions.  According to the cognitive dissonance theory proposal, persons attempt to achieve and maintain cognitive consistency but experience cognitive dissonance. Dissonance is not seen as a pathological state but rather as a self-regulatory mechanism aimed at restoring consonance.

There are 25 items in the scale. The psychometric properties of this instrument were established through face validity and construct validity. Reliability was evaluated through test-retest procedures and Cronbach’s alpha, resulting in high correlation coefficients. After testing the instrument’s validity and reliability, the instrument was administered to a stratified random sample. The sample was selected through proportional allocation.

The participants displayed more cognitive consistency than cognitive dissonance, according to the findings. There were distinctions of statistical significance according to gender and academic specialization as well, with males and students from humanities disciplines showing more levels of cognitive consistency.