Cognitive dissonance is a term this year’s University of Idaho Common Read keynote speaker, Carol Tavris, spent her life writing about.
Tavris, who earned her Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Michigan, defines cognitive dissonance as “a state of tension that occurs whenever a person holds two cognitions that are psychologically inconsistent” in the book she co-authored with Elliot Aronson, “Mistakes Were Made (but Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts.”
Tavris’s book was selected to be the University of Idaho’s 2017 Common Read. The Common Read program has the aim of uniting incoming UI first-years around a shared reading experience. The Common Read is part of the reading list for all Integrated Seminar (ISEM) 101 classes as part of the general education curriculum.
Students and community members will have the chance to hear Tavris speak in person at her keynote address at 7 p.m. Monday in the International Ballroom of the Bruce Pitman Center.
“It has always been interesting to me to find resistance to evidence,” Tavris said. “Even evidence that can only make our lives better.”
Tavris said an awareness of the self-justification processes we put ourselves through is “one of the most important tools in our mental tool box.”
“Understanding self-justification is a tool that we can take with us throughout our lives in every dimension of our lives,” Tavris said.
For those who haven’t read the book, Tavris said her keynote address will be engineered to engage an audience who might be new to cognitive dissonance theory, without boring those who are familiar with the idea.
In addition to covering “the core of what cognitive dissonance is,” Tavris said she will discuss ways that the theory can be “applied to current events in society and our lives.”
Russel Romney, a UI senior and the member of the Common Read committee who will be introducing Tavris before her speech, said he is an avid reader and looks forward to meeting an author he admires in person.
“So rarely do you get to hear the personality and depth behind (an author’s work),” Romney said. Given the chance to meet the author of a book Romney describes as “profoundly uncomfortable,” Romney said he appreciates the book for its “self-informing” nature instead of “self-help.”
“(‘Mistakes’) makes us uncomfortable with our current selves,” Romney said. “I try to think about things objectively, and this book offered me (a) really insightful way to think about both my actions and the actions of others.”
Romney said he sees the transition into college as being an especially important time to develop self-awareness.
“(Freshmen) are entering a brand-new place, where they don’t have to be attached to their old selves,” Romney said. “It’s a critical time for them to be informed about themselves.”
Sarah Nelson, a member of the Common Read committee and UI Associate Professor of French, said she values the program for the “common intellectual experience” it provides to the incoming class. Nelson has been a member of the Common Read committee for almost four years, and said the program gives new UI students a sense of what college is really like.
“Talking about thoughts and ideas…that’s what college is really about,” Nelson said.
Nelson said the selection process for the Common Read starts each year in November. UI students, faculty and staff are invited to nominate their favorite nonfiction books to the committee for review, with preference given to those which find a balance between “a serious academic level and being fun to read,” Nelson said.
More information about the Common Read can be found at www.uidaho.edu/class/general-education/common-read. The lecture will be held at 7 p.m. in the International Ballroom in the Bruce Pitman Center, and is free to the public.
Beth Hoots can be reached at [email protected]