When you don’t act as I expect

Abstract

The attitudes and opinions of most people have been shown to be rather unstable and people seem to express different views on different occasions. Some researchers even go as far as claiming that many people let chance decide what they answer on opinion polls and surveys. Still, there has long been a preference for strong opinions in our society. However, very strong and fixed attitudes may not be ideal in a modern world facing complex dilemmas. Instead, the ability to take in different arguments and change our attitudes should be valued. Therefore, the aim of this study has been to investigate what happens when people change their attitudes and do not act as expected. A literature review has been conducted with the purpose of looking closer at the role of expectancy violations and disconfirmations in the interpretation and evaluation of people’s attitudes. The articles included in this review either takes the perspective of the Expectancy Violations Theory or the Attributions Theory. The findings show that expectancies do influence how we interpret and evaluate the behavior and attitudes of other people but they are not decisive in this process and it is possible to overcome them. Furthermore, the findings indicate that expectancy violations can lead to both increased and decreased persuasiveness depending on the strength of the arguments and how well regarded the person is. Moreover, expectancy violations can result in increased or decreased sincerity depending on if the expectancies that are violated are based on general or specific information.