The Importance of Risk in Determining the Extent to Which Attitudes Affect Intentions to Wear Seat Belts¹

Abstract

Stasson and Fishbein (1990) reported findings indicating that college students' intentions to wear seat belts in low-risk situations were attitudinally controlled, while their intentions to wear seat belts in high-risk situations were normatively controlled. If these findings are valid, manipulations of attitude (toward wearing a seat belt) should have a greater impact on intentions to wear a seat belt in a safe situation than on intentions to wear a seat belt in a risky situation. Three experiments provided strong support for this hypothesis. The implications of these findings for defining behavior and for designing interventions to increase seat-belt use are discussed.

Predicting Back Pain Sufferers' Intentions to Exercise

“…Impressive intention-behavior correlations have been obtained in a number of diverse areas such as cooperating in a prisoner's dilemma game ( r = 232; Ajzen, 1971), having an abortion (r = .96; Smetana & Adler, 1980), using birth control pills ( r = 3 5 ; Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980), breast versus bottle feeding (r = 3 2 ; Manstead, Proffitt, & Smart, 1983), attending church during an Easter holiday (r = .90; King, 1975), performing mental practice before football games ( r = 3 1 ; Trafimow & Miller, 1996), and others (see the meta-analyses by Kraus, 1995, andby Sheppard, Hartwick, &Warshaw, 1988, for systematic reviews of research on this issue). Generally, although it would certainly have been desirable to measure actual exercise behavior, there are precedents for using intentions as a substitute (Fishbein, 1980;Trafimow, 1994Trafimow, , 1996Trafimow & Finlay, 1996;Trafimow & Fishbein, 1994a, 1994b.…”

The moderating influence of hedonic consumption in an extended theory of planned behaviour

“…Conjectures for subjective norm's predictive weakness include measurement problems (Armitage & Conner, 2001), respondents' attitudinal versus normative bias (Trafimow & Finlay, 1996), the behaviours under study (Trafimow & Fishbein, 1994a), and interdependency between norm and attitude (Lim & Dubinsky, 2005).…”

How Do People Form Behavioral Intentions when Others Have the Power to Determine Social Consequences?

“…These findings accord well with the attitude-subjective norm distinction, though it is possible to argue that experimental evidence also is needed to provide a strong case. To address this issue, Trafimow and Fishbein (1994a) manipulated attitudes toward either an attitudinally controlled (AC) or normatively controlled (NC) behavior, as had been determined by previous multiple regression research. AC behaviors are those where attitudes are better predictors of behavioral intentions than are subjective norms whereas NC behaviors are those where the reverse is so.…”