Strategies for Resisting Information

From 

"There Must Be a Reason: Osama, Saddam and Inferred Justification.”

http://sociology.buffalo.edu/documents/hoffmansocinquiryarticle_000.pdf

Strategies for Resisting Information

• Counter arguing

• Attitude Bolstering

• Selective Exposure

• Disputing Rationality

• Inferred Justification

"Motivated reasoning…envisions respondents as processing and responding to information defensively, accepting and seeking out confirming information, while ignoring, discrediting the source of, or arguing against the substance of contrary information.....

 Hoffman concluded, “Our data shows substantial support for a cognitive theory known as ‘motivated reasoning,’ which suggests that rather than search rationally for information that either confirms or disconfirms a particular belief, people actually seek out information that confirms what they already believe. In fact, for the most part people completely ignore contrary information".

The paper goes on to say that 

"Motivated reasoning is found among all races and across the income spectrum" (Lodge and Tabor 2000).