A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance
E615421
A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance is Leon Festinger’s landmark 1957 book that introduced and elaborated the influential psychological theory explaining how people strive to reduce the mental discomfort caused by holding conflicting beliefs or attitudes.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance canonical | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T6752859 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance Context triple: [Leon Festinger, notableWork, A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance]
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A.
A Theory of Human Motivation
A Theory of Human Motivation is the seminal 1943 paper by psychologist Abraham Maslow that introduced the hierarchy of needs as a framework for understanding human behavior and motivation.
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B.
Die Krise der Psychologie
Die Krise der Psychologie is a seminal work by Karl Bühler that critically examines the theoretical foundations and methodological problems of early 20th-century psychology.
-
C.
Motivation and Personality
Motivation and Personality is a seminal psychology book by Abraham Maslow that systematically presents his theory of human motivation and the hierarchy of needs.
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D.
Toward a General Theory of Action
Toward a General Theory of Action is a foundational sociological work that systematically outlines a comprehensive framework for understanding human action and social systems.
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E.
The Fixation of Belief
The Fixation of Belief is an 1877 philosophical essay by Charles Sanders Peirce that analyzes how people form and secure their beliefs and proposes a scientific method as the most reliable way to fix them.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance Target entity description: A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance is Leon Festinger’s landmark 1957 book that introduced and elaborated the influential psychological theory explaining how people strive to reduce the mental discomfort caused by holding conflicting beliefs or attitudes.
-
A.
A Theory of Human Motivation
A Theory of Human Motivation is the seminal 1943 paper by psychologist Abraham Maslow that introduced the hierarchy of needs as a framework for understanding human behavior and motivation.
-
B.
Die Krise der Psychologie
Die Krise der Psychologie is a seminal work by Karl Bühler that critically examines the theoretical foundations and methodological problems of early 20th-century psychology.
-
C.
Motivation and Personality
Motivation and Personality is a seminal psychology book by Abraham Maslow that systematically presents his theory of human motivation and the hierarchy of needs.
-
D.
Toward a General Theory of Action
Toward a General Theory of Action is a foundational sociological work that systematically outlines a comprehensive framework for understanding human action and social systems.
-
E.
The Fixation of Belief
The Fixation of Belief is an 1877 philosophical essay by Charles Sanders Peirce that analyzes how people form and secure their beliefs and proposes a scientific method as the most reliable way to fix them.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (48)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
book
ⓘ
psychology book ⓘ |
| academicDiscipline | experimental social psychology ⓘ |
| author | Leon Festinger ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
United States
ⓘ
linked to:
United States of America
|
| describes |
cognitive dissonance theory
ⓘ
linked to:
theory of cognitive dissonance
|
| explains |
attitude change
ⓘ
how people strive for internal consistency ⓘ mental discomfort from conflicting cognitions ⓘ post-decision dissonance ⓘ rationalization of behavior ⓘ selective exposure to information ⓘ |
| field |
psychology
ⓘ
social psychology ⓘ |
| hasImpactOn |
theories of persuasion
ⓘ
theories of self-perception ⓘ |
| hasKeyConcept |
cognition
ⓘ
consonance ⓘ dissonance ⓘ effort justification ⓘ forced compliance ⓘ insufficient justification ⓘ magnitude of dissonance ⓘ post-decision dissonance ⓘ pressure to reduce dissonance ⓘ selective exposure ⓘ |
| includes |
experimental studies
ⓘ
field studies ⓘ |
| influenced |
attitude change research
ⓘ
behavioral economics ⓘ decision-making research ⓘ self-justification research ⓘ social cognition research ⓘ |
| influencedBy | earlier consistency theories in psychology ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| mainTopic |
cognitive dissonance
ⓘ
social psychology ⓘ |
| notableFor |
formalizing cognitive dissonance theory
ⓘ
shaping modern social psychology ⓘ |
| proposes |
dissonance arises from inconsistent cognitions
ⓘ
dissonance can be reduced by adding consonant cognitions ⓘ dissonance can be reduced by changing behavior ⓘ dissonance can be reduced by changing cognitions ⓘ dissonance can be reduced by trivializing conflicting cognitions ⓘ people are motivated to reduce dissonance ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1957 ⓘ |
| publisher | Stanford University Press ⓘ |
| timePeriodDescribed | mid-20th century social psychology ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance Description of subject: A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance is Leon Festinger’s landmark 1957 book that introduced and elaborated the influential psychological theory explaining how people strive to reduce the mental discomfort caused by holding conflicting beliefs or attitudes.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.