Day 20 – Q 1.What do you understand by the cognitive component of attitude? Explain with the help of suitable examples.
1. What do you understand by the cognitive component of attitude? Explain with the help of suitable examples.
आप दृष्टिकोण के संज्ञानात्मक घटक द्वारा क्या समझते हैं? उपयुक्त उदाहरणों की सहायता से समझाएँ।
Introduction:
Attitudes are views, beliefs, or evaluations of people about something (the attitude object). The attitude object can be a person, place, thing, ideology, or an event. Attitudes can be positive or negative. Thus attitude is subjective individual interpretation of objective outside world.
Body
Cognitive component of attitude
The cognitive component of attitudes refers to the beliefs, thoughts, and attributes that we would associate with an object. It is the opinion or belief segment of an attitude. It refers to that part of attitude which is related in general knowledge of a person. This component of attitude is the product of deliberate thoughts, interpretations and rationality.
Cognitive component consists of following elements:
- Knowledge about target object
- Awareness about other’s opinion about that object
- Overall societal opinion about that object
- Awareness of societal expectations as to how the attitude towards that object be.
Suppose a person sees a snake. In this case cognitive component of his attitudes would be as follows:
- His knowledge that a few snakes are dangerous and a few are not.
- That there are some persons who treat snakes as an integral part of biodiversity
- Society regards it as Nagdevtha
- A person is supposed to worship but not kill the snake. All these determine how s/he interprets the sight of snake.
Suppose an SDM/Sub-collector holds a meeting with leaders of two religious communities to avoid a communal clash. In this case, cognitive component of attitude of SDM towards religious communities involves
- Awareness about the past behavior of given religious communities
- Readings about communal clashes elsewhere in the country
- Stereotypes about the religious communities and their leaders
- his/her personal past experience in dealing with religious leaders
All these factors collectively determine the cognitive component of an SDM’s attitude.
Suppose DC/DM wants to make his District Open defecation free, then cognitive component of attitude of DC/DM involves
- Awareness about clean environment and need of it to make his district ODF
- Reading about other Districts which became open defecation free
- His personal experiences in dealing about open defecation which spreads diseases like Cholera, Diarrhea.
All these factors collectively determine the cognitive component of a DC/DM’s attitude.
Suppose a person wants to vote to a political party his/her Cognitive component deals knowledge, thoughts and associated interpretations, newspaper reports, political manifestos, coffee table discussions, grapevine and other such media, a person develops some conscious opinions about political ideologies and implementation mechanisms. Whenever a conservative political party captures power, a person opines that it would set development targets that are just over the target of previous year. Similarly, an individual would think that a leftist party would tighten labor regulation. These cognitive components drive person to vote to particular political party.
Conclusion
“Attitude decides one’s Altitude” .Our attitude is what influences all our actions. Attitude can be understood as the factor that shapes our goals. It also corresponds to how to perceive, view and approach the different aspects of life. Attitudes speak of an individual’s personality. Constructive or right attitudes make a strong and commendable personality, while destructive or wrong attitudes make a weak and deplorable personality. It is only the right attitude, which gets us good results.
