The impact of self-interest on attitudes--a symbolic politics perspective on differences between survey and experimental findings: comment on Crano (1997).

W. D. Crano (1997) argued that vested interest should have a moderating effect on attitudes, increasing attitude consistency and attitude-behavior consistency, and presented supportive data concerning whites' opposition to busing. By normal standards, however, the findings are not very strong. In general, the survey literature, which has focused on ordinary citizens' responses to the public arena, has rarely found significant effects of self-interest. The experimental literature, which has focused mainly on college students' decisions about their daily lives, has often obtained significant effects of vested interest and other indicators of ego involvement. It is suggested that the public arena tends to stimulate more symbolic processing than does daily life, thus diminishing the role of self-interest.