Sarah has always strongly believed that it is wrong to steal. But after she steals a bottle of nail polish from the drugstore, her attitude toward stealing becomes significantly less harsh. What best accounts for her shift in attitude?

Cognitive Dissonance Theory

Explanation:

At first, Sarah strongly believed it's wrong to steal, but after stealing a nail polish her mind set about stealing changed, this can be explained as Cognitive Dissonance

In the field of psychology, cognitive dissonance can be defined as the psychological state when a person holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, values, or participates in an action that goes against one of these.

Dissonance is an unavoidable consequence of making a decision. Cognitive Dissonance Theory suggests that when a person's beliefs and desires conflict, they will experience discomfort as they become aware of the inconsistency.

Answer:Cognitive dissonance

Explanation:Cognitive dissonance occurs when one starts to have a conflicting beliefs, behavior and attitudes.

This lead to discomfort and a person realises they need to make a change by altering their attitudes or beliefs so that they can't feel that discomfort and can regain balance. Since Sara has done something that goes against her beliefs, she has to alter her beliefs to eliminate feeling guilty.

She has dicided to establish consonance between what she expects and reality.