Organisational Behaviour_6

Attitude & Values

Attitude is defined in 2 ways:
- Conceptual approach
- Operational approach


Attitude is a mental and neutral state of readiness organized through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon the individuals response to all objects and situations with which it is related.


Attitude is a predisposition to respond in a positive or negative way to someone or something in ones environment.

Features of attitude:
a) Attitude affect behavior of an individual.
b) Attitudes are acquired through learning over a period of time.
c) Attitudes can be observed by observing the behavior of an individual.
Attitudes are persuasive and every individual has some kind of attitudes towards the objects in his environment.


Factors in attitude formation:
1) Family
2) Reference Groups
3) Social Groups



Values

Values represent some basic convictions that a specific mode of conduct is personally or socially preferable to an opposite mode of conduct.


Characteristics of Values:
1) Part of culture: Values are elements of culture & culture is the complex of values, ideas, attitudes & other meaningful symbols to shape human behavior in society.

2) Learned responses: Human behavior represents learned phenomenon. This id because human beings live in a society that have certain cultural characteristics which prescribe to behave in a particular way.

3) Inculcated: Values are inculcated and passed through generation to generation by specific groups and institutions.

4) Social Phenomenon: Values are a social phenomenon, i.e. cultural habits are shared by aggregates of people living in an organised society.

5) Gratifying responses: Elements in the culture become extinguished when they no longer are gratifying to the members of the society.