130 BOOK REVIEWS

pression. It is only at thè end of thè

author finds treated the intrinsic wor
privately responsible persons.
It is unfair to ask an author for a hook h
It is nonetheless true that each reader no
literary history for itself must create his
book by paralleling Beye's literary histor
aspects of Greek linguistic expérience.
scholars should try this. Then Beye will
reasoned, unpedantic tale of poetic an
among which rhetoric and philosophy

CARROLL C. ARNOLD
Department of Speech Communication
The Pennsylvania State University

Belief, Attitude, Intention, and Behavior: An Introduction to Theor

and Research. MARTIN FISHBEIN and ICEK AJZEN. Readin
Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company. 1975. Pp.
+ 578. $13.95

For nearly half a Century attitude has remained a central concept,

if not the most distinctive, in social-psychological inquiry. Indeed,
the concept seems virtually indispensible to contemporary social-
psychological theory and research. Yet, one must be taken with the
level of disagreement, apparent inconsistency and contradiction,
and seeming inconclusiveness in the vaste literature on attitude and
attitude-related topics. Accordingly, many question whether the
concept holds more problem than promise. Speaking to this issue,
Fishbein and Ajzen hâve attempted to "présent a cohérent and
systematic framework that can be applied to the diverse literature
on attitudes" and thereby demonstrate that "the attitude literature
is neither as inconsistent nor as inconclusive as it first appears"
(Preface). The resuit of their efforts should stand as a welcomed ad-
dition to the literature by most serious students of social psy-
chology.
 BOOK REVIEWS 131

Fishbein and Ajzen's perspective on a

should trouble very few. For them, an a
but specifically as "a learned prédispo
sistently favorable or unfavorable man
object" (p. 6). Their conceptual frame
timely, provocative, and potentially usef
our understanding of attitude should
distinctions among belief, attitude,
behavior itself, and through assumptio
and séquences among the four. In bri
toward an object as following upon bel
turn, yielding intentions and ultimate
same. While attitude remains their centr
most basic construet in their approach
and topics.
The volume is organized in terms admirably consistent with this
conceptual orientation and with the authors' conviction that at-
titude theory and research is addressed to three essential questions:
(1) What are the déterminants of beliefs, attitudes, intentions, and
behavior? (2) How are thèse variables related to one another? (3)
What are the ways in which thèse variables can be influenced and
thus changed? This scheme is sufficiently familiär to make the
specialized reader feel suitably comfortable with the authors9
treatment of the literature. Yet, it is also straight-forward enough to
make "good sensé" to the nonspecialist.
Specifically, Part I of the volume deals with a wide variety of at-
titude and attitude-related théories, measurement techniques, and
methodological concerns. Certainly, the authors may be faulted for
what is (perhaps strategically) excluded from serious considération.
For this reviewer, the most notable exclusion is the social judgment-
involvement approach to attitude theory and research; the many
and well-known insights from the works of Shérif and Shérif and
others bearing on this approach receive only token considération in
the présent volume. Nonetheless, Fishbein and Ajzen must be
applauded for the rather broad range of theoretical and empirical
literature included in the section, for their integration of the great
bulk of that literature into a single, cohérent framework, and for
their treatment of same in generally clear and cogent prose.
132 BOOK REVIEWS

Much the same interprétation holds

dealing with the central issues relating
attitudes, and intentions, and to the pré
this section may well be the best of the
some of the most insightful and useful
them is an excellent integration of t
research findings on inferential belie
processes (Chapter 5), a cogent exposit
between beliefs and attitudes (Ch
provocative discussion (in terms not e
of thè nature of intention and the préd
7 and 8).
Part III of the volume deals with the
crucial question of change. While t
strength and appeal characterizing th
nevertheless interesting and worthy of
chapter (Chapter 9) is perhaps its bes
change understood within the author
thus providing both a logicai conclusi
throughout earlier chapters and an i
considération of stratégies of change.
most changes in attitude, intention, and
the final analysis, initiated by chang
changes in belief are, for the most part
"new information." The remainder of the section extends this view
through a discussion of stratégies of change under the headings "ac-
tive participation" (Chapter 10) and "persuasive communication"
(Chapter 11), and a concluding chapter. While the authors'
theoretical posture in this section is, in my opinion, neither im-
pressive nor insightful, their attempts at reconciling conflicting
findings and at generating a sensible explanation of the influence
process are both admirable and entirely respectable.

RODNEY B. DOUGLASS
Department of Speech Communication
California State University at Fresno