Leon Festinger
American social psychologist who proposed cognitive dissonance theory
Student of Kurt Lewin who proposed social comparison theory in 1954 and cognitive dissonance theory in 1957. His 1959 experiment with James Carlsmith on forced compliance is a standard textbook study.
Why this person matters
Festinger's dissonance theory gave social psychology a testable account of attitude change after behaviour. His work was collaborative: Stanley Schachter and Henry Riecken co-authored When Prophecy Fails, and colleagues at Lewin's group dynamics centre, including Kurt Back and John Thibaut, shaped his early work.
Main contributions
Social comparison theory
A Theory of Social Comparison Processes (1954) proposed that people evaluate their opinions and abilities by comparing themselves with similar others. A 1950 paper on informal social communication had begun the idea.
Cognitive dissonance theory
A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance (1957) held that incompatible cognitions create discomfort that people act to reduce. When Prophecy Fails (1956, with Henry Riecken and Stanley Schachter) described a group whose predicted apocalypse did not occur; its members began recruiting converts instead of abandoning their beliefs.
Forced compliance experiment
Festinger and Carlsmith (1959) paid male introductory psychology students $1 or $20 to tell a waiting student that dull tasks were enjoyable. The $1 group later rated the tasks as more enjoyable (+1.35) than the $20 group (-0.05) on a scale from -5 to +5.
Context and limits
The 1959 study was small: 71 men were recruited, data from 11 were excluded and 20 per condition were analysed. The $1 and $20 groups differed significantly on enjoyment (p about .03), but not on the wish to take part again. Around 1963 Festinger moved from social psychology to research on visual perception. The sources read do not summarise later replications or rival accounts of the $1 and $20 result.
In your introductory course
Social psychology.Festinger appears in attitudes and attitude change. Students learn cognitive dissonance, usually through the $1 versus $20 study, and social comparison.
Related course reading: Psychology 2e, section 12.3. This is course context rather than a biographical source.
Years of active work
- 1942
Completed his PhD at the University of Iowa, where he worked with Kurt Lewin.
- 1945
Joined Lewin's Research Center for Group Dynamics at MIT.
- 1954
Published A Theory of Social Comparison Processes.
- 1957
Published A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance.
- 1959
Published Cognitive Consequences of Forced Compliance with James M. Carlsmith.
Sources
- Classics in the History of Psychology (York University), Cognitive Consequences of Forced ComplianceOriginal work. Text passages inspected.
- National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs vol. 64: Leon Festinger (Stanley Schachter)Society or association. Institutional biography inspected.
- Wikipedia, Leon FestingerReference work. Reference article inspected.