How Cognitive Dissonance Almost Kept Me From Smoking

The author's favorite celebrities made smoking seem cool.

Source: Public Domain/Wikimedia Commons

Have you ever wanted to do something that you knew was bad for you? I once wanted to smoke cigarettes.

My biggest influence was my father who smoked until I was nearly five years old. I could add to that nearly two decades of television cigarette commercials, but most of all, it was seeing my favorite movie stars smoking: They looked so cool! The only thing that stopped me were the warnings that smoking causes cancer.

In 1975 when I started college, smoking was not discouraged at my university. You might say it was encouraged. Students were allowed to smoke in class. Disposable aluminum ashtrays were on the student desks in all the classrooms. Professors had large ashtrays attached to each end of the blackboard.

A university is considered to be a bastion of intelligence and erudition, and I thought: Surely the people running it know whether or not smoking is dangerous to human health.

My desire to smoke was powerful, but at the same time, I was afraid of trying it. I was suffering from cognitive dissonance: On one hand, smoking was acceptable at an institution of higher learning. On the other hand, the science I was exposed to in the media claimed smoking kills.

Then I got a job working in a busy hospital emergency room where I noticed that nearly all the nurses smoked. These were the smartest nurses in the hospital; they were up-to-date on the latest medical technologies, and they treated all manner of injuries and illnesses with alacrity and aplomb. The biggest surprise, however, was the doctors. There were 14 physicians whose full-time job was working in that emergency room and 13 were smokers.

I thought: Surely all these medical professionals knew enough about the human body to know whether or not smoking is dangerous to human health. That was all I needed; my cognitive dissonance was gone. Between my university and the hospital, I was convinced that the danger of smoking had been exaggerated. I smoked half a pack of cigarettes a day for nearly 10 years. Then I started a stressful job and my smoking doubled to a pack a day. I then convinced myself that 10 cigarettes a day was reasonable, but 20 were unacceptable, so I quit.

Cognitive dissonance is the mental discomfort caused by coming in contact with contradictory information. The level of discomfort experienced by an individual is called magnitude of dissonance. In other words, people get upset when their most closely held beliefs are challenged.

People can also suffer cognitive dissonance when they feel that they are being forced to do something against their moral convictions, such as being drafted into the military or giving in to peer pressure. It can also be caused by having to decide between two equally appealing choices; this is what I experienced about smoking. Cognitive dissonance can make people feel stress, embarrassment, sadness, regret, or shame.

There are four ways in which people typically deal with cognitive dissonance:

1. They justify maintaining their behavior or belief by changing the new information. Example: I decided that if I only smoke half a pack a day, then smoking is safe.
2. They justify maintaining their behavior or belief by adding new behaviors or information. Example: I also started exercising and taking vitamins because I believed it would ameliorate the damage of smoking.
3. They ignore or deny the new information that conflicts with their existing belief. Example: I decided the science must be wrong because I knew lots of doctors who smoked.
4. They accept the new information and change their behavior or belief. Example: I quit smoking when my consumption exceeded half a pack a day.

Another way in which people control cognitive dissonance is through selective exposure. This means they limit or shun new information and will only attend to media that agrees with or helps them maintain their current belief system. Selective exposure is the same thing as cognitive bias which I addressed in an earlier post. Hiding from the truth won’t make it go away; it’s better to go ahead find out why it triggers you.

In an age of fake news, indoctrination, and propaganda, cognitive dissonance is on the rise. If you find yourself bewildered and agitated by a story in the news, you might be experiencing cognitive dissonance. This is when you should employ your critical thinking skills.

Ayn Rand had succinct guidance for dealing with this type of cognitive dissonance: “Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think that you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong.”

Rapid change can also cause cognitive dissonance. In today’s modern world technological advances come quickly and keeping up can be challenging. For example, artificial Intelligence combined with CGI (computer generated images) can now create photographs so realistic that people can be tricked into believing things that are not true or even impossible.

Cognitive Dissonance Essential Reads

When Doctors Don’t Have All the Answers

The Effects of Cognitive Dissonance on Romantic Relationships

I have found that a better way to deal with this kind of cognitive dissonance is to prepare for it. In a post on the habits of innovators, I stated that their primary habit is to routinely expose themselves to different viewpoints and new stimuli. Creative thinkers seek out new information and attempt to experience as many new things as possible. This is because the more diverse data you have in your brain, the more material you have for making new connections and combinations. The benefit of this habit for overcoming cognitive dissonance is that once you’ve developed this skill, you will start to notice change early. When you recognize it soon enough, you are better prepared for dealing with it.

If you find yourself baffled or confused, don't try to justify your current belief; fine tune it with creative and critical thinking.