Discuss the types and components of attitudes.

 Attitudes are defined as “Complex of feelings, convictions, prejudices, fears and other tendencies that have given a set or readiness to act to a person because of varied experience” (Chave, 1928). These attitudes may be classified into four types:

· Positive attitude,

· Negative attitude,

· Neutral attitude, and

· Sikken attitude.

1. Positive attitude: A person with positive attitude keeps a positive mindset and thinks about the greater good, whatever may be his experiences or circumstances. One has to understand how much of positiveness of attitude is needed to keep a work progressing.

Persons with positive attitude generally do not care about the obstacles that they face in their personal and professional life. They tend to develop their talents and skills every day and try to overcome all the difficulties they come across to achieve their own goals. These people put efforts to identify their earlier mistakes rather than blaming others. And they try not to repeat them.

There are different personality traits which come under this category. Some of them are: Self-confidence, joyfulness, hardwork, sincerity and punctuality, decision-making, determination, satisfaction, cooperation, sharing, accepting responsibility for failures, etc. Some of these are elaborated below:

Joyfulness: Some people are always joyful. Self-confidence adds to joy and happiness. Happiness generates contentment and positive thinking. A happy mind-set is an abode for all good in one’s life or organisation.

Punctuality and Sincerity: These personality traits are important to work with a positive mind set. Punctuality is discipline in time management, while sincerity is devotion to any task or mission.

2. Negative attitude: Some of the attitudes of an individual are harmful to total personality. Some of these attitudes are anger, frustration, dissatisfaction, doubting, jealousy, prejudices etc. In general, people with such negative attitudes focus on failures and limitations and ignore the positive dimensions of life. Negative people run away from tough situations. Negative attitudes always create hindrances to success even to optimum utilisation of capabilities. Let us discuss some of the personality traits that form negative attitudes.

Anger: Anger is an emotional state that adversely affects thinking and reasoning. A person with negative attitude will always be fault finding. Sometimes there may be no reason at all for getting angry, yet the habit of getting angry overpowers the man. This mindset is dysfunctional for constructive work.

Doubt: A person who has no confidence in himself is always doubtful and will have a negative mindset. This attitude will not let him progress in his work. Self trust and trusting others are essential for a positive climate for work.

Frustration: Frustration is the result of anger and lack of confidence. A negative person is a frustrated person. As said earlier, attitude defines the person. And the mood of frustration will create unfavourable results. A dying spirit cannot generate a living action.

3. Neutral Attitude: This is another type of attitude that is common. People with this attitude generally tend to ignore their problems in life, and wait for others to take care of their problems. They are generally victims of complacency and are often unemotional. They never feel the need to change themselves as they can simply live with the way they are. A person with a neutral attitude will feel disconnected quite often and that is why having neutral attitude is very bad and should be fixed as soon as possible. A person with neutral attitude succeeds only if he or she adopts a positive attitude. In most cases, it has been seen that the attitude adjustment mental therapies have led persons to a road filled with positivity.

4. Sikken Attitude: It is very difficult to deal with persons having Sikken attitude, because they find bad in everything and can change a positive idea into negative. Sometimes their negativity in thinking dominates others’ thinking as well. In general, a person with positive attitude will be an inspiration for many in the team. Therefore, companies look for people with positive attitudes. People in general seem to stick around the positive vibration, as that will motivate them enough to progress in life. Bad or good, attitude has the power to change people’s thoughts and therefore, their behaviour.

Components of Attitude

The composition of three aspects forms the bases of the attitude. The acronym for these three aspects is ABC: A- Affective (emotional), B-behavioural (conative) C- Cognition (information).

Information/knowledge which consists of beliefs, values and ideas of a person about the object form an attitude. This is known as cognitive/information component. This information in reality may or may not be correct. But this is used as key to an individual’s attitude.

Emotional (affective) component involves our individual’s feelings and likings. Behavioural component involves the behaviour of the individual in a specific manner towards an object. The first and second component can’t be seen by others but surely enough, it can be inferred. To understand the third component, the first two components are essential.

Direct experience of a person: In association with previous attitude towards the objects, family, peer group, economic status, mass media etc, are different sources which play a major role in the formation of one’s attitudes. All the attitudes of an individual may not be consciously held. In some cases the individuals may not be aware of their own positive/ negative attitudes and the sources of attitude which they possess. Attitudes formed by direct experiences resist change whereas attitudes formed by social learning may change easily. If the individual experience is positive, it may lead to the formation and sustenance of positive attitude.

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