a theory proposing that people have a fundamental motivation to maintain consistency among elements in their cognitive systems. When inconsistency occurs, people experience an unpleasant psychological state that motivates them to reduce the dissonance in a variety of ways (see dissonance reduction). Several variants of this theory have also been proposed, including the new-look theory and self-consistency perspective. Alternative theories have been proposed as well, such as self-affirmation theory and self-perception theory. See also cognitive consonance. [first proposed by Leon Festinger]