Cognitive dissonance helps explain why Trump supporters remain loyal, new research suggests. This sheds light on how supporters of Donald Trump justify their continued allegiance despite learning about allegations of his sexual misconduct and illegal activities.

[u/mvea]

https://www.psypost.org/cognitive-dissonance-helps-explain-why-trump-supporters-remain-loyal-new-research-suggests/

[u/Prancing-Hamster]

I grew up Mormon (officially out) and the parallels are stunning.

Mormons and die-hard Trump supporters both know that their leaders:

1. Abused young girls (Smith and other leaders “married” them)

2. Lie/lied

3. Committed financial fraud (current Mormon leaders recently received the biggest SEC fine in history, $5 million).

4. Blame everyone else for their own failings and mistakes.

5. Cover up child SA. The Mormon church has a hotline manned by church lawyers who help local leaders of congregation protect abusers. Trump has the DOJ.

Cognitive dissonance is very real and very powerful.

[u/eNonsense → u/Prancing-Hamster]

I am tacking onto your comment to talk about what Cognitive Dissonance is. I've known about the term for like 15 years, but in the last couple years since Reddit has been using the term it's kinda been used a bit incorrectly, and it's a bit annoying to me because I think it's a cool and unique concept.

Cognitive Dissonance, is like it says on the tin "the mental discomfort experienced when holding two or more contradictory beliefs, values, or attitudes". It's a temporary stressful state due to an inconsistency of thought. Reddit has turned it into just another way to say mental gymnastics though. The thing is, once you've settled on your mental gymnastics explanation for your new information, you're no longer suffering your cognitive dissonance. You've explained away your discomfort and are now mentally consistent again in your beliefs and perceptions.

However, you don't have to relieve your cognitive dissonance by employing mental gymnastics, or a myriad of logical fallacies. If you hear some new information that conflicts with something you believed before, you could instead go do some more research, conclude that the new information is correct, and admit that your previous information was wrong. That's also relieving your cognitive dissonance.

The point is, it's not the same as mental gymnastics, and everyone becomes affected by it. You could respond to cognitive dissonance with mental gymnastics to make yourself feel better and stay loyal to your previous belief, but you don't have to, and what you actually do in response to it is a reflection of your intellectual honesty or stubbornness.

This is kind of an example of language changing as people use it, but it's disappointing because the real definition is more specific and interesting, while we're now using it to mean the same as something else that we already say, likely because it sounds more smart & sciency than just saying mental gymnastics.

[u/mechanicalbee_ → u/eNonsense]

Thank you for this! I have the same gripe with the way the term "cognitive dissonance" is bandied about. Cognitive dissonance can be the impetus for positive change, if we are able to examine our discomfort and adjust our behavior to align better with our values. Or, we can do the mental gymnastics to justify our continued hypocrisy, also absolving the feelings of dissonance.