Cognitive dissonance | Behavior

Cognitive dissonance | Behavior | MCAT | Khan Academy

Cognitive dissonance refers to a situation involving conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviors. This produces a feeling of mental discomfort leading to an alteration in one of the attitudes, beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort and restore balance.

Examples :  smoking, religion, diet, climate change.

Cognitive Dissonance Theory: A Crash Course

For example, when people smoke (behavior) and they know that smoking causes cancer (cognition), they are in a state of cognitive dissonance.