BRIEF ARTICLES 349

LESSER, G. S., KRAWITZ, RIIODA N., & PACKARD, RITA.
Experimental arousal of achievement motivation
in adolescent girls. Journal of Abnormal and Social
Psychology, 1963, 66, 59-66.
MANDLER, G., & SARASON, S. B. A study of anxiety
and learning. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psy-
chology, 19S2, 47, 166-173.
MCCLELLAND, D. C., ATKINSON, J. W., CLARK, R. A.,
& LOWELL, E. L. The achievement motive. New
York: Applelon-Cenlury-Crofts, 1953.
MILLER, N. E. Experimental studies of conflict be-
havior. In J. McV. Hunt (Ed.), Personality and
the behavior disorders. Vol. 1. New York: Ronald
Press, 1944. Pp. 431-465.
NEWCOMB, T. M. Social psychology. New York:
Holt, Rinehart, & Winston, 1950.
ROSENPELD, H. M. Social choice conceived as a level
of aspiration. Journal of Abnormal and Social
Psychology, 1964, 68, 491-499.
ROSENPELD, H. M., & FRANKLIN, S. S. Arousal of
need for affiliation in women. Journal of Personal-
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VEROFF, J., ATKINSON, J. W., FELD, SHEILA, C., &
GURIN, G. The use of thematic apperception to
assess motivation in a nationwide interview study.
Psychological Monographs, 1960, 74(12, Whole No.
499).
(Received September 28, 1964)

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

1966, Vol. 3, No. 3, 349-353

A TEST OF A MODEL FOR COMMITMENT

CHARLES A. KIESLER 1 JOSEPH SAKUMURA

Yale University Ohio State University

Commitment is defined as a binding of the individual to behavioral acts, and a

theoretical model is presented for the role of commitment in attitude change.
The derivation tested here is: the greater the inducement offered S for perform-
ing an act consistent with his beliefs, the less committed he is to that act,
and the less the resistance to subsequent countercommunications. Ss were
differentially paid for performing an act consistent with their prior beliefs.
Later all Ss received a strong countercommunication on the same topic. The
hypothesis was confirmed: Ss receiving the greater payment for performing
the consonant act later showed greater attitude change in the direction
advocated by the countercommunication.

There is a rapidly increasing body of evidence
indicating that a thorough understanding of the
role of commitment is a necessary requisite to an
adequate theory of attitude change. Perhaps
Brehm and Cohen (1962), in their discussion of
dissonance theory (Festinger, 1957) have voiced
the most explicit interest in commitment as a
variable, but other authors (e.g., Hovland, Janis,
& Kelley, 1953; Secord & Backman, 1964; Sherif
& Hovland, 1961) have also been concerned with
the topic. Although theoretical interest has been
increasing, there have been few efforts to deal
directly with the concept experimentally.
Recently, however, Kiesler 2 proposed a pre-
liminary theoretical model for the role of com-
mitment in attitude change. He defines commit-
ment as a pledging or binding of the individual
1
The data were collected while the senior author
was at the Ohio State University.
2
"Psychological Commitment in Attitude Change,"
proposal submitted to the National Institute of Men-
tal Health, United States Public Health Service, 1964.
to behavioral acts, and discusses how commit-
ment to specific behaviors will relate to attitudes
and their resistance to change. Some of the basic
assumptions and hypotheses are presented below.
1. The individual attempts to resolve incon-
sistencies between the attitudes he holds and be-
havioral acts which he, for one reason or an-
other, is induced to perform. This assumption is
quite similar, if not identical, to the main assump-
tion of the "consistency" models proposed by
Festinger (19S7), Heider (1958), and Osgood
(1960), and hence is supported by evidence re-
lated to those theories. We assume that to resolve
the inconsistency, one may change either the at-
titude or the act (including the psychological im-
plications of the act).
2. The effect of commitment is to make an act
less changeable. Thus, utilizing Assumptions 1 and
2, we may hypothesize: (a) if the act is consistent
with the subject's previous belief system then
commitment to the act makes the subject more
resistant to subsequent attack on his beliefs; (b)
if the act is inconsistent with the subject's previ-
350 BRIEF ARTICLES
ous belief system, then the commitment to the
act acts as a force on the subject to change his
attitudes towards consistency with the act.
3. The magnitude of the effect of commitment
is positively and monotonically related to the
degree of commitment. Thus, the greater the
commitment, the greater the resistance in la and
the greater the attitude change in 2b.
4. Finally, the assumption is made that the de-
gree of commitment may be manipulated in sev-
eral ways. We may hypothesize, for instance, that
one may increase the degree of commitment by
increasing one or more of the following: (a) the
number of acts performed by the subject; (&)
the importance of the acts for the subject; (c)
the explicitness of the act, for example, how pub-
lic or otherwise unambiguous the act was; (d)
the degree of irrevocability of the act; (e) the
degree of volition perceived by the subject in
performing the act. In turn, we hypothesize that
the degree of volition may be increased by: an
increase in the degree of perceived choice in per-
forming the act; a decrease in the degree of ex-
ternal pressure exerted upon the subject to per-
form the act. As implied above, perceived choice
and external pressure are not independent phe-
nomena. The former relates to the phenomeno-
logical world of the subject and the latter is re-
lated to operations performed by the experi-
menter. In addition, there is some evidence (cf.
Cohen, 1960) that the two variables are inversely
related to each other. Thus, increasing the degree
of external pressure exerted upon the subject to
perform a particular act should decrease his per-
ceived choice in performing the act.
Thus, the model assumes the subject is pledged
or bound by the performance of an overt act.
How "committing" a given act is for the sub-
ject depends upon those variables listed above.
The model further assumes that the subject at-
tempts to resolve inconsistencies between be-
havioral acts and attitudes. To resolve an in-
consistency, the subject may change either his
attitude, or distort or deny the meaning of the
act. The greater the commitment, the less the
subject's tendency to distort the act, and the
greater the tendency to change an attitude in-
consistent with the act. Commitment equal, if a
given act is consistent with previously held at-
titudes, the act increases the resistance of the
subject to subsequent countercommunications.
The greater the commitment, the greater is the
resistance to change. If a given act is inconsistent
with previously held attitudes, the inconsistency
acts as a force on the subject to change his at-
titudes to make them more consistent with the
act. The greater the commitment, the greater the
force.
The present experiment proposes to test one
derivation from this model: namely, the less the
pressure exerted on the subject to perform an
act consistent with his beliefs, the greater his re-
sistance to subsequent countercommunications.
In the present case, subjects are induced to per-
form an overt, explicit act consistent with their
beliefs: half of the subjects are paid $5 for doing
this; half are paid $1. At a later time, all sub-
jects are presented with a strong communication
contrary to their beliefs. Assuming that the de-
gree of payment is operationally equivalent to the
degree of pressure to perform the act, the pre-
diction for the present experiment is clear: The
less the payment for performing an act consistent
with one's beliefs, the greater the resistance to
subsequent countercommunications.
METHOD
Two experiments were carried out with only
minor procedural differences between the two.
In addition, however, two control groups were
included in the second experiment. The two ex-
periments will be described in sequence.
Experiment I
Subjects. Forty-two male and female students in
an introductory psychology course at Ohio State
University volunteered for the experiment, entitled
"Opinion Survey," as a regular part of their course
requirements. Five subjects were suspicious about
the manipulations and were dropped: four in the $5
condition and one in the $1 condition. The experi-
menter met individually with each subject.
Procedure. On arrival, subjects were told that the
experimenter was actually a research assistant for
two different faculty members, Drs. E and M, and
that the experimenter would be gathering data for
two different studies during the subject's hour. (This
is not unusual at Ohio State and subjects invariably
accepted the information without comment.) Dr. E's
material was to come first and the subjects were
asked to express their opinions on 12 items, each on
a 7-point scale ranging from strongly agree to
strongly disagree. The key item for the present ex-
periment was, "The legal age of voting should be
lowered to 18 years of age." This item had been
found in previous work to produce a bimodal dis-
tribution in the Ohio State population.
The consonant act. Two communications had previ-
ously been prepared, each representing a moderate-to-
extreme position on the key issue. The experimenter
covertly noticed whether the subject was pro or con
on the key issue. The experimenter then assigned the
subject the communication consistent with the sub-
ject's position and asked him to read it into a tape
recorder, identifying himself by name. The subjects
were told that Dr. E would pay them $1 or $5 for
 BRIEF ARTICLES
doing this, depending on condition. The experimenter
said:
Dr. E is not only interested in opinion surveys, but
also he is interested in the media of mass com-
munication, or the dynamic interaction between
speaker and the audience. He's especially interested
in determining whether a person's geographical
origin has a differential effect upon a listener. Are
you from Ohio? [Usually, the subject said, "Yes."]
Dr. E wants to know whether your Midwestern
voice has a differential effect upon a listener or
listeners. For example, does a Southerner have a
differential effect upon a listener? I was born in
Sacramento, California. As a person from the Far
West and from a different racial group [the ex-
perimenter was a Japanese-American 1, Dr. E
wanted my voice for demonstration purposes in the
seminars which he conducts throughout the coun-
try. He asked me to record your voice to be used
for these demonstrations. Since Dr. E is paid for
conducting these seminars, he told me to give you
some remuneration . . . give you some funds . . .
pay you some money. I don't think my voice is
worth it, but he gave one dollar [five dollars]
when I recorded my voice for him. I think he
wants to give the money because he'll use the tape
over and over again. It's like the T.V. commercials.
You know that a person who tapes a commercial
is not only paid for the initial taping, but also
whenever it's used. Would you mind reading this
communication into the tape recorder? Inciden-
tally, don't be dramatic. Use your normal voice.
If Dr. E wanted a dramatic voice, he could have
gone to the Speech Department, or hired profes-
sional actors. He wants ordinary voices like yours
and mine to see how ordinary voices influence a
listener. Are there any questions?
After the subject had recorded the communication,
the experimenter announced that was the end of Dr.
E's study. He then attempted to separate the two
portions of the experiment by providing the subject
with a short break, signing the subject's credit card
for the experiment, and making various irrelevant
remarks before continuing with the experiment.
Cannier communication. The experimenter an-
nounced that Dr. M was gathering some preliminary
data, that the experimenter was not quite sure what
it was all about, since this was the first time it has
been done and the experimenter had not had time
to discuss the project with Dr. M. Consequently, he
could not answer any questions. The experimenter
gave the subject the second (counter-) communica-
tion to read. He then gave the subject a "personal
inventory" to fill out. The personal inventory had
been duplicated by a different process than the previ-
ous opinion survey, and the 13 items were cast in
varying formats. The key item, of course, was re-
peated in identical form.
Termination. As a method of ferreting out suspi-
cion, subjects were asked if they had any ideas they
would like to contribute on cither experiment. The
351
experiment was then explained to them; they were
sworn to secrecy and dismissed.
Experiment II
Procedural differences from Experiment I. There
were only two procedural differences between Experi-
ment I and Experiment II: the clause, "I don't think
my voice was worth it, but . . . ." was deleted from
the experimenter's monologue; after the subject had
agreed to read the first communication, he filled out
a form, indicating his name, address, and the amount
of money he was to be paid. This form was kept in
front of the subject during the rest of the experiment.
Control groups. Note that in both Experiments I
and II, the sequential arrangement for the subject is:
take prequestionnaire, read consonant speech into
tape recorder, read countercommunication, take post-
questionnaire. In both studies we would like to
measure the resistance to the countercommunication.
However, the difference between the pre- and post-
questionnaires would include not only attitude change
due to the countercommunication, but also any ef-
fects which might occur as a result of reading the
consonant communication (e.g., strengthening of be-
lief) . To check on this, two control conditions were
included in Experiment II: one was paid $1 for
reading the consonant communication; one was paid
$5. After the communication had been read, they
took the usual break, filled out Dr. M's personal
inventory, and were dismissed without ever reading
the countercommunication. By proper comparisons
with these control conditions, we may ascertain both
the effect of performing the consonant act and the
effect of reading the countercommunication.
RESULTS
The results for the attitude change obtained in
experimental conditions are presented in Tables
I and 2. It may be seen from Table 2 that the
procedural differences between Experiments I and
II produced no difference in results (Winer, 1962,
pp. 213-216), and we may confidently pool the
results of the two experiments. It may be seen
TABLE 1
MEAN ATTITUDE CHANGE TOWARD A COUNTER-
COMMUNICATION AS A FUNCTION OF PRIOR
DIFFERENTIAL PAYMENT FOR PER-
FORMING A CONSONANT ACT
Payment
$1 $5
Experiment I .18 .86 .53
(18) (19) (37)
Experiment II .09 .65 .40
(14) (17) (31)
Total .14 .76)
(32) (36)
Note.—Ns in parentheses.
 352 BRIEF ARTICLES
TABLE 2
ANALYSIS OK VARIANCE OF ATTITUDE CHANGE
SCORES TOR KxrfiKiMENTAL CONDLTIONS
~V
Source " is MS P
Experiments (E) .370 1 .370 <1C
Payment (P) 6.454 1 6.454 S.i
.060 1 .060 <!.(
E X 1>
Within 73.970 64 1.156 —
Total 80.854 67
* f < .05.
that in both experiments the predicted effect took
place: subjects who received less payment for
performing an act consonant with their beliefs,
showed greater resistance to subsequent counter-
communications.
The results for the two control conditions are
presented in Table 3. The two means are not
statistically different from each other (i < 1.0),s
nor is either of them significantly different from
zero (t < 1.0 in both cases). We may now com-
pare the two experimental conditions against the
control conditions. We find that the $5 experi-
mental condition produced greater change than
the $5 control condition (t = 2.47, df = 51, p <
.02), but that the $1 experimental condition did
not produce significantly greater change than the
$1 control condition (I = .66). Thus we may con-
clude that the main hypothesis for the present
experiment is supported: subjects who received
less payment for performing an act consonant
with their beliefs, showed greater resistance to
subsequent countercommunications. In addition,
we may not conclude that the payment itself and
the consonant act had any differential or absolute
effect on the subjects' attitude.
DISCUSSION
The main hypothesis for the present experi-
ment was supported: subjects who received less
payment for performing an act consonant with
their beliefs showed greater resistance to sub-
sequent countercommunication than subjects
whose payment was greater. Aside from the sup-
port for the model presented here, what are the
implications of this finding? Let us look at some
recent work with theoretical ties.
Recently, Festinger and Carlsmith (1959),
working within the framework of Festinger's
(1957) dissonance theory, performed an experi-
ment in which subjects were induced, for differ-
ential payment, to perform an act discrepant or
dissonant with their beliefs. They found that the
less the payment, the greater the attitude change
towards consistency with the act. One may note
3 4
All t tests are two-tailed.
TABLE 3
MEAN ATTITUDE CHANGE AS A (''UNCTION OF DIF-
FERENTIAL PAYMENT FOR PERFORMING A
CONSONANT ACT (CONTROL CONDITIONS)
Payment
*1 *s To
Attitude change -.025 -.15 .08
(20) (17) (3
Note.—Ns in parentheses.
that the present model accounts for those data,
but that dissonance theory does not account for
the data in the present experiment. The present
authors do not think that dissonance theory can
be applied to this paradigm (with which Festinger
agrees 4 ). One may note, however, that if one
wanted to contort dissonance theory to apply to
the present experiment, it would predict results
opposite to those obtained. That is, one might
theorize that the greater the payment for voicing
your own beliefs, the greater the dissonance be-
tween payment and acknowledged importance of
the beliefs, that is, the subject does not think
his beliefs important enough to require such pay-
ment for their verbalization. One presumably
would reduce this dissonance by psychologically
increasing the importance of the beliefs. In-
creased importance should produce greater re-
sistance to countercommunications. Thus, the
derivation leads to the prediction that increased
payment would produce increased resistance—
precisely the opposite of what was obtained here.
Undoubtedly, this is not the only way to con-
tort dissonance theory to fit the present paradigm,
but this particular contortion does bring up an
important point. That is, differential payment
may indeed have affected the perceived im-
portance of either the act or the belief. We have
no evidence to present on this point, other than
the lack of difference between control conditions.
We may merely note that if perceived importance
were affected by the manipulations, it would
serve to attenuate differences between conditions,
rather than strengthen them. Thus this argument
leads to the conclusion that greater control of
the importance variable would have produced
stronger results than we obtained.
One last point should be made clear. The
authors are not attempting to say that the model
proposed here accounts for all of the dissonance
theory data; indeed, it clearly does not. It does,
however, account for all of those data in which
there is an inconsistency between act and at-
titude. At the same time, this narrowness of scope
L. Festinger, personal communication.
 BRIEF ARTICLES 353

is precisely the limitation of the present model.
The authors would argue, however, that the
present model is an exploratory attempt to clarify
a variable too long ignored by social psychology:
commitment.
REFERENCES
BREHM, J. W., & COHEN, A. R. Explorations in cog-
nitive dissonance. New York: Wiley, 1962.
COHEN, A. R. Attitudinal consequences of induced
discrepancies between cognitions and behavior.
Public Opinion Quarterly, 1960, 24, 297-318.
FESTINOER, L. A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stan-
ford: Stanford Univer. Press, 1957.
FESTINGER, L., & CAELSMITH, J. M. Cognitive con-
sequences of forced compliance. Journal of Abnor-
mal and Social Psychology, 1959, 58, 203-210.
HEIDER, F. The psychology of interpersonal relations.
New York: Wiley, 1958.
HOVLAND, C. L, JAMS, 1. L., & KELLEY, H. H. Com-
munication and persuasion. New Haven: Yale Uni-
ver. Press, 1953.
OSOOOD, C. E. Cognitive dynamics in the conduct of
human affairs. Public Opinion Quarterly, 1960, 24,
341-365.
SECOED, P. F., & BACKMAN, C. W. Social psychology.
New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964.
SHERIF, M., & HOVLAND, C. I. Social judgment. New
Haven: Yale Univer. Press, 1961.
WINER, B. J. Statistical principles in experimental
design. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1962.
(Received October 14, 1964)

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

1966, Vol. 3, No. 3, 353-356

EFFECTS OF UNCERTAINTY ABOUT THE NATURE AND

ADVENT OF A NOXIOUS STIMULUS (SHOCK) UPON
HEART RATE
ROGERS ELLIOTT *
Dartmouth College

Heart rale (HR) and ratings of tension were obtained from 6 groups of 10
randomly selected male undergraduates while they awaited a shock. A group
knew or did not know when the shock would arrive, and knew that the
shock would be mild, that it would be strong, or knew nothing about it. The
only significant effect on both the HR acceleration scores and the tension
ratings was associated with whether or not S knew anything about the nature
of the shock to come.

Nearly 40 years ago Skaggs (1926) investi-
gated what he called variously "upsetness" and
"excited expectancy" (terms he considered more
neutral than "emotion") by measuring the
cardiac and respiratory effects upon subjects of
awaiting "one or more severe shocks" whose
nature was unknown and whose time of occur-
rence uncertain. This condition eventuated in
a heart rate (HR) acceleration of 10 beats per
minute (bpm) among his male subjects during
the minute following the instruction, as compared
with the base rate recorded prior to it. Subjects
tended to describe their feelings during the wait-
ing period as "tense." Skaggs did not manipulate
levels of his two independent variables—knowl-
edge of the nature of the shock and of the time
1
1 wish to thank Gus Buchlcl, Ray Peters, and
Joseph Cardillo for getting the data, and the Fac-
ulty Research Committee of Dartmouth for as-
sistance in preparing this report.
of its arrival—but Deane (1961) has recently
done so. The HR acceleration relative to a basal
rale was measured while his subjects spent 30
seconds awaiting a mild shock. One group had
had the experience of the shock, and the other
had not; and half of the subjects in each group
knew just when to expect shock, and the other
half did not. There was a greater tonic accelera-
tive HR change in the group which had not
experienced the shock than in the group which
had; but the knowledge-of-time variable had no
effect. Dean suggested in his discussion that use
of stronger shock might have produced changes
different from the ones he found with mild shock.
The theoretical importance of such observa-
tions as Skagg's and Deane's lies in the fact
that they pertain to an emotional response (HR
acceleration) whose antecedent is some degree
of uncertainty about the nature and advent of
an important event. Because of this theoretical