Leon Festinger (8 May 1919 – 11 February 1989) was an American social psychologist who originated the theory of cognitive dissonance and social comparison theory. The rejection of the previously dominant behaviorist view of social psychology by demonstrating the inadequacy of stimulus-response conditioning accounts of human behavior is largely attributed to his theories and research.Zukier, 1989, p. xv Festinger is also credited with advancing the use of laboratory experimentation in social psychology,Zukier, 1991, p. xiv although he simultaneously stressed the importance of studying real-life situations,Festinger, 1953, pp. 169–170. a principle he practiced when personally infiltrating a doomsday cult. He is also known in social network theory for the proximity effect (or propinquity).Festinger, Schachter, & Back, 1950
Festinger studied psychology under Kurt Lewin, an important figure in modern social psychology, at the University of Iowa, graduating in 1941;American, 1959, p. 784 however, he did not develop an interest in social psychology until after joining the faculty at Lewin's Research Center for Group Dynamics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1945.Festinger, 1980, p. 237 Despite his preeminence in social psychology, Festinger turned to visual perception research in 1964 and then archaeology, history, and the human evolutionary sciences in 1979 until his death in 1989.Aronson, 1991, p. 216 Following B. F. Skinner, Jean Piaget, Sigmund Freud, and Albert Bandura, Festinger was the fifth most cited psychologist of the 20th century.
Life Early life and education Festinger was born in Brooklyn New York on May 8, 1919 to Russian-Jewish immigrants Alex Festinger and Sara Solomon Festinger. His father, an embroidery manufacturer, had "left Russia a radical and atheist and remained faithful to these views throughout his life."Schachter, 1994, p. 99 Festinger attended Boys' High School in Brooklyn, and received his BS degree in psychology from the City College of New York in 1939.Schacter, 1994, p. 100
He proceeded to study under Kurt Lewin at the University of Iowa, where Festinger received his MA in 1940 and PhD in 1942 in the field of child behavior.American, 1959, p. 784 By his own admission, he was not interested in social psychology when he arrived at Iowa, and did not take a single course in social psychology during his entire time there; instead, he was interested in Lewin's earlier work on tension systems, but Lewin's focus had shifted to social psychology by the time Festinger arrived at Iowa.Festinger, 1980, p. 237 However, Festinger continued to pursue his original interests, studying level of aspiration,Festinger, 1942 working on statistics,Festinger, 1943aFestinger, 1943b developing a quantitative model of decision making,Carlsmith & Festinger, 1943 and even publishing a laboratory study on rats.Festinger, 1943c Explaining his lack of interest in social psychology at the time, Festinger stated, "The looser methodology of the social psychology studies, and the vagueness of relation of the data to Lewinian concepts and theories, all seemed unappealing to me in my youthful penchant for rigor."Festinger, 1980, p. 237 Festinger considered himself to be a freethinker and an atheist."Festinger, a professed atheist, was an original thinker and a restless, highly motivated individual with (in his words) "little tolerance for boredom". " Franz Samelson: "Festinger, Leon", American National Biography Online, Feb. 2000 (accessed April 28, 2008) .
After graduating, Festinger worked as a research associate at Iowa from 1941 to 1943, and then as a statistician for the Committee on Selection and Training of Aircraft Pilots at the University of Rochester from 1943 to 1945 during World War II. In 1943, Festinger married Mary Oliver Ballou, a pianist,"Deaths: Mary Ballou Festinger," 2006 with whom he had three children, Catherine, Richard, and Kurt.Schachter & Gazzaniga, 1989, p. 545 Festinger and Ballou were later divorced, and Festinger married Trudy Bradley, currently a professor of social work emeritus at New York University, in 1968.Schachter & Gazzaniga, 1989, p. 545
Career In 1945, Festinger joined Lewin's newly formed Research Center for Group Dynamics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as an assistant professor. It was at MIT that Festinger, in his own words, "became, by fiat, a social psychologist, and immersed myself in the field with all its difficulties, vaguenesses, and challenges."Festinger, 1980, p. 237 It was also at MIT that Festinger began his foray into social communication and pressures in groups that marked a turning point in his own research. As Festinger himself recalls, "the years at M.I.T. [sic] seemed to us all to be momentous, ground breaking, the new beginning of something important."Festinger, 1980, pp. 237–238 Indeed, Stanley Schachter, Festinger's student and research assistant at the time, states, "I was lucky enough to work with Festinger at this time, and I think of it as one of the high points of my scientific life."Schachter, 1994, p. 102
Yet, this endeavor "started as almost an accident"Schachter, 1994, p. 101 while Festinger was conducting a study on the impact of architectural and ecological factors on student housing satisfaction for the university. Although the proximity effect (or propinquity) was an important direct finding from the study, Festinger and his collaborators also noticed correlations between the degree of friendship within a group of residents and the similarity of opinions within the group,Zukier, 1989, p. xiii thus raising unexpected questions regarding communication within social groups and the development of group standards of attitudes and behaviors.Festinger, Schachter, & Back, 1950 Indeed, Festinger's seminal 1950 paper on informal social communication as a function of pressures toward attitude uniformity within a group cites findings from this seemingly unrelated housing satisfaction study multiple times.Festinger, 1950
After Lewin's death in 1947, Festinger moved with the research center to the University of Michigan in 1948. He then moved to the University of Minnesota in 1951, and then on to Stanford University in 1955. During this time, Festinger published his highly influential paper on social comparison theory, extending his prior theory regarding the evaluation of attitudes in social groups to the evaluation of abilities in social groups.Festinger, 1954 Following this, in 1957, Festinger published his theory of cognitive dissonance, arguably his most famous and influential contribution to the field of social psychology.Festinger, 1957 Some also view this as an extension of Festinger's prior work on group pressures toward resolving discrepancies in attitudes and abilities within social groups to how the individual resolves discrepancies at the cognitive level.Schachter, 1994, p. 104 Festinger also received considerable recognition during this time for his work, both from within the field, being awarded the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award by the American Psychological Association in 1959,American, 1959 and outside of the field, being named as one of America's ten most promising scientists by Fortune magazine shortly after publishing social comparison theory.Schachter, 1994, p. 103
Despite such recognition, Festinger left the field of social psychology in 1964, attributing his decision to "a conviction that had been growing in me at the time that I, personally, was in a rut and needed an injection of intellectual stimulation from new sources to continue to be productive."Festinger, 1980, p. 248 He turned his attention to the visual system, focusing on human eye movement and color perception. In 1968, Festinger returned to his native New York City, continuing his perception research at The New School, then known as the New School for Social Research. In 1979, he closed his laboratory, citing dissatisfaction with working "on narrower and narrower technical problems."Festinger, 1983, p. ix
Later life Writing in 1983, four years after closing his laboratory, Festinger expressed a sense of disappointment with what he and his field had accomplished:
Forty years in my own life seems like a long time to me and while some things have been learned about human beings and human behavior during this time, progress has not been rapid enough; nor has the new knowledge been impressive enough. And even worse, from a broader point of view we do not seem to have been working on many of the important problems.Festinger, 1983, p. ix
Festinger subsequently began exploring prehistoric archaeological data, meeting with Stephen Jay Gould to discuss ideas and visiting archaeological sites to investigate primitive toolmaking firsthand.Gazzaniga, 2006, pp. 91–92 His efforts eventually culminated in the book, The Human Legacy, which examined how humans evolved and developed complex societies.Festinger, 1983 Although seemingly the product of a disillusioned, wholesale abandonment of the field of psychology, Festinger considered this research as a return to the fundamental concerns of psychology. He described the goal of his new research interests as "see[ing] what can be inferred from different vantage points, from different data realms, about the nature, the characteristics, of this species we call human,"Festinger, 1980, p. 253 and felt bemused when fellow psychologists asked him how his new research interests were related to psychology.Schachter, 1994, p. 106
Festinger's next and final enterprise was to understand why an idea is accepted or rejected by a culture, and he decided that examining why new technology was adopted quickly in the West but not in the Eastern Byzantine Empire would illuminate the issue.Gazzaniga, 2006, p. 92 However, Festinger was diagnosed with cancer before he was able to publish this material. He decided not to pursue treatment, and died on February 11, 1989.Schachter, 1994, p. 106
Work Proximity effect Festinger, Stanley Schachter, and Kurt Back examined the choice of friends among college students living in married student housing at MIT. The team showed that the formation of ties was predicted by propinquity, the physical proximity between where students lived, and not just by similar tastes or beliefs as conventional wisdom assumed. In other words, people simply tend to befriend their neighbors. They also found that functional distance predicted social ties as well. For example, in a two-storey apartment building, people living on the lower floor next to a stairway are functionally closer to upper-floor residents than are others living on the same lower floor. The lower-floor residents near the stairs are more likely than their lower-floor neighbors to befriend those living on the upper floor. Festinger and his collaborators viewed these findings as evidence that friendships often develop based on passive contacts (e.g., brief meetings made as a result of going to and from home within the student housing community) and that such passive contacts are more likely to occur given closer physical and functional distance between people.Festinger, Schachter, & Beck, 1950
Informal social communication