cognitive dissonance

cognitive dissonance noun: a conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other beliefs.

Noun

cognitive dissonance (countable and uncountable, plural cognitive dissonances)

A conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other beliefs.
- Cognitive dissonance can be seen as an antecedent condition which leads to activity oriented toward dissonance reduction just as hunger leads to activity oriented toward hunger reduction. It is a very different motivation from what psychologists are used to dealing with but, as we shall see...1957, Leon Festinger, A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance, Row, Peterson and Company, page 3
- In the state of ultimate commitment, a true believer feels better for having raised and or given money to the cause. It also aids in overcoming cognitive dissonance (the cause "must be" worthwhile to have attracted these funds). All kinds of rationales are given and accepted for the displayed...1989, Marc Galanter, Cults and New Religious Movements: A Report of the American Psychiatric Association, American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc., →ISBN, page 102

conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other beliefs: تَنَافُر مَعْرِفِيّ tanāfur maʕrifiyy, اِنْفِصَام مَعْرِفِيّ infiṣām maʕrifiyy

conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other beliefs: ناهماهنگی شناختی

Cognitive dissonance can be seen as an antecedent condition which leads to activity oriented toward dissonance reduction just as hunger leads to activity oriented toward hunger reduction.1957, Leon Festinger, A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance, Row, Peterson and Company, page 3:
It also aids in overcoming cognitive dissonance (the cause "must be" worthwhile to have attracted these funds).1989, Marc Galanter, Cults and New Religious Movements: A Report of the American Psychiatric Association, American Psychiatric Publishing...
After expending so much effort, questioning commitment would create cognitive dissonance (Osherow, 1988).2001, Kenneth S. Bordens, Irwin A. Horowitz, Social Psychology, Lawrence Erlbaum, →ISBN, page 223:
Much of the research literature has reintroduced classic cognitive dissonance theory to provide theoretical justification for a sequence of behavior change–belief change.2003, Bernard Spilka, The Psychology of Religion, The Guilford Press, →ISBN, page 356:

plural	cognitive dissonances

Coined by American psychologist Leon Festinger. Dissonance was chosen to avoid the logical connotations of inconsistency.

What does cognitive dissonance mean?: Cognitive dissonance means a conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other beliefs.
What is cognitive dissonance in Arabic?: Cognitive dissonance in Arabic is تَنَافُر مَعْرِفِيّ (tanāfur maʕrifiyy), اِنْفِصَام مَعْرِفِيّ (infiṣām maʕrifiyy). See Cognitive dissonance meaning in Arabic.
How do you use cognitive dissonance in a sentence?: Cognitive dissonance can be seen as an antecedent condition which leads to activity oriented toward dissonance reduction just as hunger leads to activity oriented toward hunger reduction.
What part of speech is cognitive dissonance?: Cognitive dissonance is a noun.
What is the plural of cognitive dissonance?: The plural of cognitive dissonance is cognitive dissonances.

Adapted from Wiktionary: cognitive dissonance (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-cognitive-dissonance.ogg.

Cite this entry: “cognitive dissonance.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cognitive_dissonance. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.