Self-focused attention and self-report validity' John B. Pryor/ Ohio State Uriiversity, Frederick X. Gibbons, and Robert A. Wicklund, University of Texas at Austin, Russell H. Fazio, Princeton University, and Ronald Hood, University of Texas at Austin One of the longest standing problems in social psychology and personahty research is the inconsistency between self-reports and behavior (Liska, 1975). A classic example of inaccurate reporting of past behavior is found in La Piere's (1934) study of the relation- ship between verbal and behavioral indices of prejudice among hotel-restaurant managers. On the behavioral side. La Piere found that only one out of 251 hotel-restaurant establishments actually refused to serve a Chinese couple, but in contrast, on a subse- quently mailed questionnaire only a small percentage replied that they would not refuse to serve Chinese. Certainly this is a con- spicuous example of the possible invalidity of self-report measures, at least self-report measures directed at prior behavior. The problem seems equally acute in the attempt to gain pre- dictive validity. For example, in an extensive series of studies on childhood morahty, Hartshorne and May (1930) found no sig- nificant correlations between stated belief in the wrongness of cheating and actual resistance to an opportunity to cheat. Recent reviews by Mischel (1969) and Wicker (1969a) have indicated that self-report forms are generally of only slight validity, and reasonably enough. Wicker (1969a, 1969b) has emphasized the necessity of uncovering variables that would mediate the connec- tion between self-reports and behavior. It is our purpose here to examine what may be an influential factor. A variable that motivates a person to resolve cognitive in- consistencies, including attitude-behavior inconsistencies, is sug- 1. The present research was supported in part by NSF Grant SOC 72-05222 to Robert A. Wicklund. The authors wish to thank Marilyn Pribble and Marilyn Ross for their apt performance as experimenters, as well as Connie Prodc and Marlene Bakst, who were the confederates in Experiment I. 2. Requests for reprints should be sent to John B. Pryor, Department of Psychology, 404G West 17th Avenue, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 43210.