A study of Cognitive Dissonance Using Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation

Cognitive dissonance is a reaction to inner conflicts caused by an inconsistency between a person’s opinions, attitudes, preferences or actions. It drives people to reduce emerged discomfort by changing their contradicting attitudes to minimize the discrepancy between them. In difficult choices between two or more highly preferred options, cognitive dissonance forces people to decrease reevaluation of rejected items. Neuroimaging studies revealed several brain regions involved in preference changes during cognitive dissonance; in our study, we focus on the role of the posterior medial frontal cortex (pMFC). We used transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) for modulation activity of the pMFC and magnitude of attitudes alteration. The previous study with cathodal (inhibitory) tDCS showed the possibility to decrease such magnitude. However, we haven’t found opposite effect for anodal (excitatory) tDCS. For further research, a new line of TMS studies is proposed