Abstract

In most laypersons' implicit theories of the causes of everyday events, attitudes influence behaviour: People's actions are guided by their internal attitudes. Although social psychologists have certainly investigated this relation (as illustrated most directly by the work described in the preceding chapter), they have given just as much attention to the reverse relation: the influence of behavior on attitudes. This topic has stimulated some of the best known and most-tested theories in social psychology and has elicited significant public interest because it turns laypersons' implicit theories upside down and generates counterintuitive predictions (which have been confirmed). Our goal in this chapter is to review and evaluate this research literature.