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Science 14 January 1966:
Vol. 151. no. 3707, pp. 217 - 219
DOI: 10.1126/science.151.3707.217
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Articles

Control of Pain Motivation by Cognitive Dissonance

Philip G. Zimbardo 1, Arthur R. Cohen 1, Matisyohu Weisenberg 1, Leonard Dworkin 1, and Ira Firestone 1

1 Department of Psychology, University College, New York University, New York 10453

Responses by humans to painful electric shocks are significantly modified at subjective, behavioral, and physiological levels by verbal manipulations of degree of choice and justification for further exposure to the aversive stimuli. Pain perception, learning, and galvanic skin resistance are altered under these conditions of "cognitive dissonance," as they are by reductions in voltage intensity.

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)