When Prophecy Fails Leon Festinger

Et Al (1956)
Purpose: to test Festinger's Theory of Cognitive Dissonance ! the distress created as a result of
colliding beliefs; proposes that people have the motivational drive to reduce dissonance by justifying,
blaming, or denying.
History: Chicago housewife, Dorothy Martin claimed to have received automated messages from aliens
that notified her that the world was going to end in a great flood before dawn on December 21, 1954.
She gathered a group of believers and formed a cult that believed that the aliens would rescue them if
they behaved a certain way and excluded the out-group. This gave Festinger and his researchers an
opportunity to examine dissonance When Prophecy Fails.
Hypothesis: The failure of beliefs would lead to dissonance and the cult would not break the
commitment to the group, however it will look for ways to explain the event to maintain their
confidence.
Methodologies:
Research Method: Participant, Covert
Observation.
Subjects: The cult; Dorothys Believers
Sampling Method: Opportunity Sampling
Experimental Design: Repeated Measures
Methodology: Festinger and his researchers
were to pretend to be a part of the cult in order
to observe the behaviors of the in-group and
their reaction to the flood not happening.
They agreed to remain with the group until
December 21, 1954, the day the great flood
was to occur.
Blind Technique: single
Conclusions:
Results: The members came to the agreement
that the reason the world was not destroyed was
because god saved it thanks to their prayers and
actions.
Analysis: Shows signs of the avoidance of
dissonance as Festinger predicted. The members
of the cult quickly gave themselves credit for the
outcome of the situation(dispositional) while
simultaneously assuming that god was the reason
their beliefs did not prove true(situational). This
is an example of Self-serving bias.
These results also support social identity theory,
social comparison, and social representations.
Supporting Studies: Milgrams obedience to
authority, Cialdini et Al (1974)
Evaluation:
Ethics: No informed consent, deceit, no
debriefing, no confidentiality.
Strengths: It is ecologically valid, opportunity
for detailed and in depth knowledge.
Weaknesses: Low reliability, ethical concerns,
observers failures to play the role could affect
results, data is difficult to record.
Gender Influences: The impact of a female
leader may be different than that of a male. Men
and women might not react the same way.
Cultural Influences: Takes place in Chicago in
the 1950s, so the people are generally
westernized.









Learning Outcomes:
" Discuss how and why particular
research methods are used at the
sociocultural level of analysis.
" Discuss ethical considerations
related to research studies at the
sociocultural level of analysis.
" Describe the role of Situational and
dispositional factors in explaining
behavior.
" Discuss Errors in attributions.