Difference Between Emotional & Cognitive Dissonance

Dissonance is the experience of inconsistency or conflict between thoughts, actions or feelings. Cognitive dissonance occurs when an individual holds two conflicting thoughts or concepts within her head at the same time. These thoughts may involve herself, the world or both. Emotional dissonance occurs when an experienced emotion comes into conflict with a person's self-concept or when expressed emotions are not genuine.

Forms of Emotional Dissonance

• An individual who forces himself to hide his true emotions, such as those who work in customer service or sales, may experience emotional dissonance. It is commonly experienced when someone is hurt or angered by another's rude behavior, yet feels compelled to show a polite or kind exterior regardless of true feelings. Another type of emotional dissonance occurs when a person's experienced emotions come into direct conflict with his perceived identity. For example, a man who has always considered himself a pacifist may experience emotional dissonance upon recognizing that he felt joy and exhilaration upon losing his temper and hitting another person.

Forms of Cognitive Dissonance

• Cognitive dissonance may pertain to the world outside the person. For example, a person may be proud of being a citizen of the U.S. and believe that it upholds "freedom and justice for all." However, recognizing that the country was built on slavery will create a sense of cognitive dissonance. It may also occur regarding a person's identity. If a person believes himself to be a good and moral person, yet he recognizes that he occasionally cheats and steals, this could produce cognitive dissonance.

Subjective Versus Objective

• Emotional dissonance is always a subjective experience because emotions are strictly subjective. It will always be experienced as a threat to a person's identity and may be more unsettling than cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance can be either subjective or objective because it does not necessarily have to call a person's identity into question, but may simply call into question the facts of the world around him.

Coping Strategies

• Many individuals who experience cognitive dissonance can alleviate the discomfort by creating explanations to justify one side or the other. For example, a person who feels dissonance over stealing despite considering himself moral might tell himself that the incident is insignificant because it happens rarely. Emotional dissonance may be more difficult to remedy, and may require a person to see a therapist or broaden his concept of himself in order to alleviate it.