According to cognitive dissonance theory, people strive to maintain consistency (or consonance) among cognitive elements. When cognitive elements are inconsistent (or dissonant) with one another (e.g., I smoke, yet I know smoking is unhealthy), people experience an aversive motivational state called “dissonance”, which they seek to reduce or eliminate. Dissonance can be reduced in various ways, such as changing behavior (e.g., quitting smoking), deleting dissonant cognitions (e.g., convincing oneself that smoking is not unhealthy), and adding new consonant cognitions (e.g., telling oneself that smoking reduces stress). Describe one specific situation in which you yourself experienced significant dissonance and discuss what you did to reduce or eliminate that dissonance.
