JOURNAL OF SOCIAL ISSUES VOLUME 30, NUMBER 4, 1974

Population Control and the Psychology of Forced Compliance

Joel Cooper * Princeton University

The relationship of the psychology of forced compliance to changing fertility behavior is examined. For many persons, fertility control is a behavior inconsistent with private attitudes. It is assumed that changes of both attitudes and behaviors are necessary for effective and lasting changes in the rate of population growth; therefore, suggestions are offered for effecting behavioral changes that will have the consequence of effecting attitude change. Counterattitudinal behavior can produce changes in attitudes provided that (a) the behavior is induced but not forced, (b) incentives offered for the behavior are just minimally sufficient to elicit the behavior, and (c) the behavior leads to conse- quences that were previously unwanted. Some of the dangers of forced compliance techniques are also discussed.

In the early 1950s and 60s scholars, lawyers, and legislators debated the moral, economic, and practical aspects of school integration. The “shoulds” and “should nots” were contested in argument and counterargument. And when the debate was over and the integrationists had won their case in court, the question of implementing the decision remained problematic. Even today it is not at all clear that private attitudes and behaviors have kept abreast of public policy.

Family and population policies are now the subjects of public scrutiny and debate. If we assume that the need for population planning is compelling and that, as some have argued, our very survival may be at stake (e.g., Ehrlich, 1968), then how can the objectives be fulfilled? Can public policy affect the private changes of individual attitudes and the behaviors of families? It would be tragic indeed if the case for population planning were suffi- ciently compelling to become public policy, but not conveyed to

‘The author is indebted to Alan Orenstein for his valuable comments on an earlier draft of this paper.

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the populace in a way that could alter their behavior. This paper, drawing on some of the major traditions of social psychological research in the last decades, considers the ways in which population policies might be related to personal attitude change.

As Fawcett (1970) has pointed out, there are three basic methods government might use to effect changes in population policies. First, it may urge and cajole the populace to participate in voluntary family planning. Second, it might induce family planning by means of negative and positive incentives. Third, it might require family planning. The question of the effectiveness of a particular method ultimately comes down to a consideration of the ways in which attitudes are changed and the relationship of those attitudes to new behaviors. A first step is to consider some of the research in this area.

BEHAVIOR AND ATTITUDES: THE PSYCHOLOGY OF FORCED COMPLIANCE

It would seem reasonable that a program which attempts to change people’s attitudes toward fertility and family planning be one that considers attitudes to be a prime target of consideration. Conventional wisdom might tell us that actions will be quick to fall into line with the changed attitudes. However, the psychology of forced compliance asks us to consider the possibility that attitudes are affected by behavior. From this vantage point our first goal is to produce behavioral changes under the proper conditions; attitudes will then change to become congruent with the changed behaviors. The new attitude will then help to maintain the changed behavior even after the external pressures to so behave have been removed.

One of the major factors in forced compliance research has been the theory of cognitive dissonance (Festinger, 1957). Accord- ing to dissonance theory, people strive for consistency among their cognitions. Cognitions which are inconsistent arouse a state of dissonance which is experienced as psychological tension. Like other tension states such as hunger, dissonance is motivating toward its own reduction. Consequently, people will attempt to change one or more of their cognitions in order to restore consistency.

Most dissonance studies focus on the discrepancy between one’s belief and one’s behavior. As an example, consider an individual who is induced to make a public statement favoring Position A on a given topic. Privately, he really favors Position

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B, where B and A are opposing points of view. The discrepancy between public behavior and private belief, experienced as the uncomfortable tension state of dissonance, could be eliminated if he changed either his cognition about his act or his cognition about his attitude. Consonance would then be restored. However, his options are somewhat limited. He could come to believe that he really made a speech favoring Position B. This would restore consonance, but would also strain credibility. Surely, he would find it considerably easier to change his cognition regarding his belief. By convincing himself that he really favors Position A, dissonance can be reduced. Therefore, dissonance theory argues that when behavior is made inconsistent with beliefs, opinion change in the direction of the behavior is a likely result.

Festinger and Carlsmith (1959) put this reasoning to the test. In a laboratory situation, subjects were asked to participate in several minutes of peg-turning and spool-sorting. After they had been duly bored to tears, they were asked to tell a subject who was waiting to participate in the study that the task was in fact interesting, exciting, and enjoyable. The investigators reasoned that the behavior of stating that the task was interesting would be discrepant from the subjects’ opinion that the task was dull. The resulting dissonance could be reduced by a change of opinion in the direction of the behavior. Festinger and Carlsmith predicted and found that subjects who had behaved inconsistently with their beliefs manifested opinion change and came to believe that the task had, in fact, been interesting.

Dissonance theory makes the additional prediction that forced compliance will result in internal belief change to the extent that the person is prevented from using an external factor to justify the belief-discrepant behavior. External justifications for behavior may be thought of as cognitions consonant with behavior and may serve to reduce the total magnitude of dissonance. For example, if a person is offered a monetary inducement for behaving in a counterattitudinal fashion, this external factor would serve as a consonant cognition and reduce the dissonance aroused by the behavior. Moreover, hmught to experience less dissonance as the magnitude of the external incentive increases. In short, the more money you are offered, the less need you have to change your original attitude.

In Festinger and Carlsmith’s study, half of the students were offered one dollar if they tried to convince the waiting subject that the experiment was fun, while the other half were promised twenty dollars. The larger the incentive for compliance, the greater

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the consonant cognition that had been added. “Why did I make a statement saying that the peg turning task was enjoyable?” a subject in the $20 condition may ask himself, and reply, “Obviously, it was to obtain the large amount of money.” But can the one dollar subject answer in the same way? Clearly, the justification value of a small incentive is not as effective. So, unlike the $20 subject, the $1 subject must reduce his dissonance by convincing himself that he really did enjoy the task. Festinger and Carlsmith found that subjects offered the minimal incentive came to believe that the task was much more interesting than did $20 subjects.

Although there has been considerable controversy about Festinger and Carlsmith’s findings (Chapanis & Chapanis, 1964; Rosenberg, 1965), their results have been replicated in several different research stiuations. Cohen (1962), for example, asked students at Yale University to write essays favoring the police side of a student-police brawl that had developed in New Haven. The essay was clearly at variance with the students’ true position on the issue. The request to write the propolice essay was accompanied by monetary incentives from fifty cents to ten dollars, with subjects randomly assigned to conditions. When student opinions were measured following the attitude-discrepant task, those who wrote their essay for fifty cents were more propolice than those who wrote for one dollar, with the least opinion change coming from the ten dollar subjects. These and other studies (e.g., Carlsmith, Collins, & Helmreich, 1966; Cooper 8c Worchel, 1970; Freedman, 1963; Linder, Cooper, & Jones, 1967) indicate that inducing behavior that is inconsistent with one’s attitude is a robust way of altering those attitudes, and that, further, the degree of attitude change is greatest when the degree of induce- ment is smallest.

Necessary Conditions for Dissonance Arousal It would be unwise to extrapolate from these basic findings

to a program of population control without first examining some of the important parameters which recent research has shown to be crucial in sustaining the dissonance-produced attitudinal effect.

Freedom. It has been implied that attitude discrepant behavior occurs with some frequency. But since discrepancy produces unwanted tension, most of us try to behave in ways that are consistent with our attitudes. Behavior that is discrepant from attitudes can be obtained in two ways: It can be demanded or it can be carefully coaxed. Research results show that in terms

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of producing opinion change, the former courts disaster while the latter is crucial.

Obtaining attitude discrepant behavior by choice is crucial for dissonance produced attitude change. Davis and Jones (1960) asked subjects to evaluate a partner in very negative terms even though they actually liked their partner. Half of the subjects were given freedom to decline the experimenter’s request while the other half were not. Attitude change occurred only for those subjects who felt free not to perform the attitude discrepant behavior. Linder, Cooper, and Jones ( 1967) orthogonally varied the degree of incentive offered for counterattitudinal behavior and the degree of freedom which subjects were given to perform that behavior. In their study, the inverse relationship between incentive magnitude and attitude change that Festinger and Carlsmith had first discovered was obtained only for those subjects who felt free to perform the counterattitudinal task. In short, the term “forced compliance” is a misnomer, for if compliance is perceived to be forced, it may either be ineffective in producing opinion change or, as I shall discuss later, may produce opinion change in the unwanted direction.

If behavior cannot be coerced, how do we obtain compliance in laboratory situations? Typically, laboratory subjects are given subtle justifications or minimal financial inducements just suffi- cient to assure compliance. Where monetary incentives are used, they tend to be sufficient for the subject to purchase lunch at the local McDonald’s, but not sufficient to order the first course at a four-star French restaurant. Where monetary motives are not involved the requests are more subtle and couched in terms of the needs of science or the needs of the experimenter. People are generally willing to comply with such requests. In fact, the typical study finds that very few people ever exercise their freedom to decline to comply with a request to behave in a counterattitudinal fashion. Yet they will not manifest dissonance produced attitude change unless that freedom-or illusion of freedom (Kelley, 1967)-is open to them.

Auersive Consequences. Counterattitudinal behavior, even if performed with perception of freedom, will not arouse dissonance if it does not lead to an aversive or unwanted consequence. An individual who sided with Israel in the Mid-East War would not experience dissonance if he freely made a pro-Arab speech-in the privacy of his room. That is, if no one were to listen to his speech and therefore could not be convinced by it, if no new policy decisions resulted from his speech, if no one were

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to believe that the speaker was pro-Arab, then the counterattitu- dinal speech would not arouse cognitive dissonance. On the other hand, if the speech did lead to an unwanted event, then it would arouse dissonance and lead to opinion change.

This reasoning was tested by Cooper and Worchel (1970). They argued that counterattitudinal behavior produced disso- nance in the original Festinger and Carlsmith study because subjects felt that they had successfully convinced a fellow student that a dull and boring task was interesting. Soon this fellow student would receive a rude awakening and the subjects felt responsible. If the fellow student had not believed the subject’s assertions, the behavior would not have aroused dissonance. In the Cooper and Worchel(l970) replication of Festinger and Carlsmith (1959), after half of the subjects had finished their counterattitudinal statement, the confederate (the presumed fellow student) indicated that he believed the subject and expected the study to be interest- ing. For the other subjects, the confederate said that, despite the subject’s endorsement, he expected that the experiment would be dull since most experiments are dull.

As predicted, attitude change in the direction of behavior was produced only when the confederate indicated that he was convinced by the subject. In this condition, subjects induced by a small incentive came to believe that the peg-turning task was enjoyable while subjects who were promised a large incentive thought that the task was dull. If subjects believed that their speech had no effect, there was no attitude change at all, no matter what the size of the incentive. These results, as well as similar studies by Collins and Hoyt (1972) and Goethals and Cooper (1972), indicate that behavioral freedom and small incentives are not sufficient for attitude discrepant behavior to result in attitude change. Rather, the behavior must result in an unwanted conse- quence in order for dissonance to be aroused.

EXTRAPOLATIONS TO POPULATION POLICY: POSSIBILITIES AND

DANGERS Assume that we wish to limit the growth rate of the population

by discouraging unlimited fertility and that the means for family planning are readily available for use. Assume, also, that for many people, controlled fertility at the level of two children per family is attitude discrepant (Davis, 1972). We have then a situation in which behavior must bechanged, but to change behavior without a corresponding change in attitudes is risky. Ultimately, we have

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a situation which requires both behavioral and attitudinal change; that is, we have an appropriate situation for the application of the psychology of forced compliance.

Obtaining the Behavior Behavior directed at reducing births can be voluntary, in-

duced, or required. If the behavior in question is attitude discrepant, voluntary compliance is not likely. Publicity campaigns directed at changing attitudes may have some modicum of success in eventually obtaining changes in fertility behavior, but such approaches are of unproven effectiveness and are slow to take effect. Requiring behavioral change is replete with dangers. This leaves behavioral inducement as the key.

In the laboratory studies discussed, inducement was the method by which compliance with an attitude discrepant request was obtained. Extrapolating, it would seem necessary that we find an inducement just sufficient to produce compliance. If this is obtained, attitude change will follow. Stycos (1974) has discussed the types of inducement that can be used: an alteration of the tax structure to reward childless or small families, and /or provid- ing direct monetary subsidies for birth control, sterilization, etc. Conversely, negative sanctions against the conception of too many children can be legislated. Again, this might be accomplished through altering the tax structure, increasing hospital costs as the number of children per family increases, etc.

If the inducements are just sufficient to obtain the attitude discrepant behavior of family planning and if the behavior is perceived as freely chosen and if people understand that their decision to participate in family planning will result in the consequence of smaller families than they had originally desired, then the conditions for dissonance arousal will have been satisfied. The ensuing behavior should result in a new attitude toward family planning which is consistent with the behavior.

Pitfalls and Dangers Insufficient inducements. Inducements can be dangerous. The

laboratory literature deals with two types: those that are more than sufficient to produce counterattitudinal behavior and those that are just barely sufficient. Incentives which are too large, it was shown, serve as cognitions that are consonant with the attitude discrepant behavior and do not result in dissonance- produced opinion change. However, if inducements are insuffi-

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cient to elicit the behavior, they may have effects opposite in direction to those intended.

The forced compliance literature shows that dissonance is aroused when an individual has accepted a (small) inducement to behave in a way that was contrary to his attitudes. Suppose an incentive has been offered but rejected; that is, the individual decides not to perform the counterattitudinal behavior. Is disso- nance created? Undoubtedly dissonance is aroused from the fact that the individual has acted in a way which caused him to relinquish something which he values (e.g., a monetary reward). This decision can be justified in terms of strengthening one’s original opinion. The larger the inducement that is rejected, the greater the dissonance and the greater the opinion change in the direction opposite to that desired. This opinion change may be manifested by becoming more extreme toward one’s position or by maintaining one’s original position more confidently.

Darley and Cooper (1972) tested this notion, offering students either a large or a small incentive to write essays advocating a strict code of dress at school-a position with which they were known to disagree. In addition, the students were aware that their behavior might have aversive consequences (i.e., the publica- tion of the pamphlet with their signed essays included), and they were asked to choose whether or not they wished to comply. The temptation to refuse the request was great; the room in which the essay was to be written was small and hot and the incentives were not of such magnitude as to be overwhelmingly compelling ($50 and $1.50). In fact, every subject chose not to write the counterattitudinal essay. And subjects who rejected the $.50 inducement did not differ from a control group in their moderately anti-dress code attitudes, but subjects who turned down the larger incentive became more extreme and more confident in their anti-dress code opinions.

Thus, it can be said that the rejection of an inducement leads to opinion change in the direction opposite to that of the behavioral request. Inducements can be thought of as ranging from those that are thoroughly insufficient to produce compliance to those that are more than sufficient. As they increase from zero to a point almost sufficient to induce compliance, attitude change in a forced compliance situation will be in the direction of bolstering the initial opinion. However, once compliance is produced, then the smaller the inducement, the greater the opinion change in the direction opposite to one’s initial position.

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The danger of insufficient justification with family planning is thus clear: Inducement must be set at a level just sufficient to produce compliance. Tax incentives or supplements that are too great will be ineffective in producing opinion change which can support continued and sustained use of family planning methods; however, if inducements are too small, dissonance due to the individual‘s rejection of the incentive will ensue. This boomerange effect will likely produce individuals who are more extreme in their desire for larger families-an effect just opposite to what we desire.

Lack of freedom. We turn now to a consideration of required or legislated family planning as a means of controlling population size. If a change in behavior is needed, why not require it? Instead of concerning ourselves with opinion change, why not simply enforce a change in behavior?

Research indicates that enforced counterattitudinal behavior which ignores at least the illusion of freedom will not be effective in changing attitudes. In terms of dissonance theory, when one can attribute one’s counterattitudinal behavior to environmental demands, one has a sufficient justification and explanation for that behavior. One need not reduce dissonance by changing one of the discrepant elements; one merely needs to focus upon the important and fundamental cognition that is consonant with the attitude discrepant behavior-i.e., one was forced to behave in that way by the environment.

It has been mentioned severaI times that forcing counterat- titudinal behavior may be dangerous. This is different from the dissonance theory statement that forcing such behavior is merely ineffective. Another social psychological theory is relevant to this present problem. Brehm’s theory of psychological reactance (1966) holds that a person is motivationally aroused any time he thinks one of his freedoms has been eliminated or threatened, and he responds to this arousal by attempting to restore the freedom that is lost. Suppose that a job recruiter for a local firm is asked to make a choice between two candidates for a particular position; he believes that George would do well, but Jane would be better. If the recruiter’s colleague tells him that he mwt choose Jane for the job, the recruiter’s freedom has been threatened, and he is motivated to restore that freedom directly or indirectly. For example, he may change his assessment of the difference between the two candidates and may become more favorable toward George. The recruiter’s colleague gained neither compli-

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ance nor his intended attitude change. In fact, the attitude change produced was in a direction opposite to his intentions.

According to reactance theory, then, to force behavior by usurping freedom may have effects which are opposite to those intended. Importantly, the behavior that is forced may be either counterattitudinal or proattitudinal; the effects will be the same (Brehm and Sensinig, 1966). Brehm (1972) has put the issue this way:

Exercising a freedom threatened means engaging in the option threat- ened with loss. If a person’s freedom to engage in behavior A is threatened, that freedom can be restored by his engaging in behavior A; if the freedom not to engage in A is threatened, it can be restored by his refusal to engage in A [p. 31.

The implication for requiring family planning as a means of population control is clear. In the absence of at least the illusion of freedom, people who agree with family planning and those who are against it will experience psychological reactance. One possible response to the threatened usurpation of their freedom may be to increase their motivation to have larger families and / or to decrease their use of contraceptive techniques.

If freedom is usurped not by a colleague but rather by a legitimate agent of the state with the power of enforcement, need we worry about direct behavioral manifestations of reactance? If negative sanctions will be issued for noncompliance, need we concern ourselves with people’s motivation to restore their free- dom? In such cases, the strain on the system would be immense. If compliance could be obtained by statute, indirect means of restoring freedom by attitude change and by aggression against the state are possible results (Worchel, 1971). The tension on the system might also create powerful noncompliance, even in the face of threatened sanctions. When residents of Lamar, South Carolina, were ordered to accept forced bussing in their school system, they responded by turning over school busses-with children inside. When Congress and the states passed the Prohibi- tion amendment to the Constitution, a widespread system of noncompliance was established to combat the elimination of what was considered to be an important free behavior. Were these events due to psychological reactance? It is not now possible to tell. But can we afford to adopt population policies which run the risk of convincing advocates and foes alike to turn against family planning and participate in behavior which is antithetical to population control?

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CONCLUSION

The psychology of forced compliance lends a cautiously optimistic note to the debate on the types of public policy that can effect population control. This review has considered the ways in which people whose attitudes are discrepant with the planning of a small family can be made to change both their attitudes and behaviors. In considering a choice between volun- tarism, inducement, and compulsion, we have used the data and theory of cognitive dissonance to support an inducement approach to obtaining behavior consistent with family planning. That beha- vior, once adopted, can lead to changes in attitudes which can then bolster and buttress family planning behavior.

Such a recommendation is, however, simplistic without certain cautions. First, the behavior must appear to have been engaged in freely. Second, the inducements to behave in accord with family planning procedures must be greater than the minimum necessary to obtain compliance. Very high inducements may produce no long lasting behavioral effect since they would be ineffective in producing opinion change. Small inducements may be disastrous if they fail to produce compliance; their effect might be to make people more rigid or extreme in their desires to have larger families.

The important research question for which there are as yet no data is to determine the degree of incentive that is just sufficient to produce fertility reductions in a significant portion of the population. Since incentives which are just barely sufficient for one income, educational, racial, ethnic, or personality group may be too much or too little for other groups and since inappropriate incentive structures may have unwanted effects, it is important to explore the range of incentives appropriate for different parts of a society.

Changing fertility behavior is a complex task and I have not meant to suggest that there are easy solutions. The world of the laboratory, from which much of the data have been collected, and the world of everyday life are not identical. Many other variables at the societal and political levels must interact with the psychological to produce an effective policy. Nonetheless, it is suggested that the psychology of forced compliance, by studying the relationship of behavior and beliefs, can provide appropriate insights into the formation of meaningful policies.

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Correspondence regarding this article may be addressed to J. Cooper, Department of Psychology, Princeton University, Princeton, N J 08540.