Are you familiar with the term cognitive dissonance? If not, I invite you to consider reading this post in order to enrich your knowledge about this uncomfortable experience. In a blogpost entitled Confirmation Bias and Cognitive Dissonance, I stated:
Confirmation bias occurs when our existing acceptance of something as being accurate takes precedence over new information which challenges our assumption. We may accept some of the new evidence though we also reject facts we don’t like or which we don’t want to acknowledge as legitimate.
Our beliefs about new evidence can even lead to an uncomfortable feeling (emotion or sensation). This effect is known as cognitive dissonance—the state of having inconsistent thoughts, beliefs, or attitudes, especially as relating to behavioral decisions and attitude change.
Recently, when watching an episode of the Whatever Podcast, I observed a suitable example of cognitive dissonance. Unique disclaimer: Nothing stated herein is intended to ridicule, demean, or otherwise correlate with the embarrassment of any individual from the episode.
During the episode, debater Andrew Wilson and host Brian Atlas discussed racial matters with a female panelist. When logic and reason didn’t favor her argument, the panelist stood up and walked away from the conversation (approximately minute 4:07:10).
Responding to the event, Atlas asked, “Is that cognitive dissonance?” Wilson responded, “That’s what that looks like. It’s very painful. So cognitive dissonance is always very painful for people and that’s what happens. They get very emotional […] it becomes a very physical response when their worldview collides with reality.”
If you were familiar with cognitive dissonance prior to reading this post, have you ever endured it? I’ve personally experienced this phenomenon, as well as observing it in regard to the clients with whom I work. According to the American Psychological Association:
The existence of dissonance, being psychologically uncomfortable, motivates the person to reduce the dissonance and leads to avoidance of information likely to increase the dissonance. The greater the magnitude of the dissonance, the greater is the pressure to reduce dissonance.
In the interest of a psychoeducational illustration, forgive me a number of personal anecdotes. I experienced psychological and physiological trauma at the hand of my late mom. She had a particular penchant for cruel remarks.
On many occasions, when I resided with her up until fifth grade, my mom would call me “ugly,” remind me of how “fat” I was, inform me, “I should’ve aborted you,” call me a “retard,” and she exhibited a predilection for telling me “no one will ever love you!” I believed the things my mom told me.
Moreover, I developed the unhelpful belief that I was unlovable. As life went on and the years passed, I received compliments from people from time to time. “You’re intelligent,” an individual would suggest, or, “You’re handsome,” someone would say.
Because I unfavorably believed poorly of myself, the compliments I received conflicted with my personal philosophy of life. When told otherwise unobjectionable things I concluded, “They’re only saying these things to be nice to me. That’s what people do.”
Thus, my unhelpful conclusion relieved the pressure I experienced when receiving compliments. This tension correlated with the emotion of disgust and physical sensation of soreness in my gut.
From the perspective of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), in particular the ABC model, receiving compliments (Action) didn’t cause unpleasant feelings (Consequence). Although people tend not to know this, there is no Action-Consequence connection of this sort.
Rather, in consideration of a Belief-Consequence (B-C) connection, when receiving compliments (Action) and unfavorably assuming, “I’m unlovable, and so what I’m being told can’t be true” (Belief), my rigid attitude caused unpleasant feelings (Consequence).
Principally challenging were the moments during which people told me that they loved me. After residing in the care of a children’s home from half of seventh grade through the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of high school, a family took me into their home.
The matriarch of the family frequently told me that she loved me. Perhaps frustrated with her beliefs about my dismissive attitude regarding her sentiment, one day she made it her mission to persuade me by cornering me in my room, hugging me, and repeatedly shouting “I love you!”
Even I was surprised by my B-C connection response associated with cognitive dissonance. Have you ever heard of someone becoming so self-disturbed that the person has “blacked out” or “seen red” during an episode of anger, rage, hostility, aggression, or violence?
To this day, I can’t recall the moment of the actual self-disturbed event. However, what I do recall is that when the motherly figure behaved as she did, my vision narrowed and suddenly I was outside of the home while kneeling on a sidewalk and holding a knife.
Apparently, I blacked out and instead of opening the door to exit the room and eventually the home, I beat through the door of the room – shattering it into large pieces and thousands of splinters. At some point during the episode of rage, I thought the grab my pocket knife.
Evidently, I stepped through the wreckage of the door and ran out of the home. In pursuit of me, the matriarch was able to grab me and drag me to the ground where I knelt while regaining consciousness.
In my self-disturbed state, I recall being able to say nothing other than, “I want to die, I want to die, I want to die!” Fortunately, the knife was taken from me before I could perform a method of suicide taught to me by my mom (length, not width).
A healthier resolution to dissonance would’ve been to have reasoned, “It can’t be true that I’m unlovable, because I’m clearly lovable to this person.” However, I resolved my cognitive, emotive, and behavioral dissonance in a spectacularly unhealthy and costly manner.
The family that took me in decided to replace all interior doors of their home and I can only imagine how much money they spent doing so. Hopefully the psychoeducational illustrations provided herein benefit you in your understanding of cognitive dissonance.
In any case, I had rational compassion when observing the female panelist of the Whatever podcast ostensibly experiencing a self-disturbed B-C connection in regard to cognitive dissonance. Moreover, I think she behaved well by dismissing herself for a brief moment.
When working with clients who experience similar B-C dissonance, I remain mindful of how challenging it can be to sit with and even push through discomfort. Regarding this matter, one REBT source states:
Maultsby (1984) has argued that change itself can be an uncomfortable experience for clients. He refers to a state called “cognitive-emotional dissonance” during which clients feel “strange” as they work at strengthening their conviction in their rational beliefs. Encourage your client to accept that this feeling of “strangeness” is a natural part of change and if necessary dispute any ideas that he must feel natural and comfortable all the time.
There’s no logical or reasonable basis for the notion that a person should, must, or ought to experience comfort when addressing the discomforting phenomenon of cognitive dissonance. Why must it be any other way than as it simply is?
Of this, and to put a final point on this blogpost, I’m reminded of a quote by the late Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard who advocated choosing that which one will regret less in a given scenario. Regarding the current blogpost, I propose to you:
Experience discomfort by allowing B-C self-disturbance in the form of cognitive dissonance to keep you from realizing your interests and goals or experience discomfort by doing the work of disputing irrational beliefs associated with cognitive dissonance while working in alignment with your interests and goals. Don’t do the work, and you’ll regret it; do the work, you’ll also regret it. Work or don’t work, you’ll regret it either way. Either way, there’ll be discomfort.
If you’re looking for a provider who works to help you understand how thinking impacts physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral elements of your life—helping you to sharpen your critical thinking skills, I invite you to reach out today by using the contact widget on my website.
As a psychotherapist, I’m pleased to help people with an assortment of issues ranging from anger (hostility, rage, and aggression) to relational issues, adjustment matters, trauma experience, justice involvement, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and depression, and other mood or personality-related matters.
At Hollings Therapy, LLC, serving all of Texas, I aim to treat clients with dignity and respect while offering a multi-lensed approach to the practice of psychotherapy and life coaching. My mission includes: Prioritizing the cognitive and emotive needs of clients, an overall reduction in client suffering, and supporting sustainable growth for the clients I serve. Rather than simply helping you to feel better, I want to help you get better!
Deric Hollings, LPC, LCSW
Photo credit (edited), fair use
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