Cognitive style and political ideology.

Employed a systematic coding technique to assess the integrative complexity of policy statements of 45 US Senators who, on the basis of their 1975 and 1976 voting records, had been classified as liberal, moderate, or conservative. Two hypotheses were tested. One hypothesis, derived from research on the authoritarian personality and conservatism, was that Ss who consistently voted for conservative ideological causes would be more prone to rely on simple (good vs bad) evaluative rules in interpreting policy issues than liberal or moderate Ss. The 2nd was that Ss who voted in ideologically consistent patterns (regardless of the liberal or conservative content of the ideology) would be more prone to rely on simple evaluative rules in interpreting issues than Ss who voted in less consistent patterns (moderates). 20 paragraph-sized statements were sampled from the speeches of each S; all material was coded for integrative complexity. Results indicate that conservative Ss made significantly less complex statements than their liberal or moderate colleagues. This finding remained significant after controlling for political party affiliation, education, years of service in the Senate, and age. Alternative interpretations of the data are examined. (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive Characteristics of belief systems.

Claims that J. Frank's (see record 1978-06868-001) discussion of scientific humanism and transcendental religion would have benefitted from consideration of 3 characteristics of belief systems: intelligibility, truth, and explanatory power. Such consideration may provide conclusions about the basis for a comparison of transcendental-religious and scientific-humanist belief systems as cognitive systems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style and teacher-student compatibility.

Studied the effects of cognitive style matching in 32 teacher–student pairs. Tests of 2 cognitive style dimensions—serialism/holism and field dependence/independence—were administered to 54 final-year trainee mathematics teachers and 58 1st-yr psychology students. (Measures were the Group Embedded Figures Test and the Grandlemuller Test). From these, 32 teacher–student pairs were formed so that teachers and students were matched or mismatched on one or both cognitive style dimensions, in conformity with a 2–4 experimental design. Teachers structured and taught to their partners a 30–40 min lesson on the mathematical concept of network tracing. Students were then independently examined. Matching effects were obtained on objective test performance and on teachers' and students' subjective ratings of each other at the extremes of the field dependence–independence dimension. (16 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style in two modalities: Vision and audition.

Administered the visual Matching Familiar Figures Sequential Presentation Task (MFF-SPT) and the Auditory Impulsivity Task (AIT), 2 match-to-sample tasks designed to measure cognitive style, to 81 4th graders. A moderate negative correlation was found between errors and latencies on the AIT, thus indicating that longer latency did not always result in better performance. A high negative correlation was found on the MFF-SPT. 55% of the Ss maintained their classification as reflective, impulsive, fast–accurate, or slow–inaccurate across the 2 modalities, providing evidence that the 2 tasks were measuring somewhat different abilities. Ss employed the same search strategy in both modalities. It is suggested that auditory cognitive style be investigated for relationships with reading ability. (26 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style differences in children's spatial perspective taking.

Examined spatial perspective taking in a total of 80 4-, 6-, 8-, and 10-yr-old reflective and impulsive children (as indentified by scores on the Matching Familiar Figures Test) using a modification of Piaget's 3 mountain task. Results indicate that reflectives made more mature errors at 6 yrs of age and were more accurate in predicting another's perspective at 8 yrs of age, but they did not differ from impulsives in performance at 4 or 10 yrs of age. Results suggest that the development and expression of children's cognitive structures, at least in the spatial realm, is mediated by cognitive style factors. (5 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive development and cognitive style as factors in mathematics achievement.

Sought to provide a theoretical framework for the learning of mathematics from Piaget's theory about the development of the number concept and the theory of field dependence–independence advanced by H. A. Witkin et al (1977). The relationship between operativity on Piagetian tasks of number, classification, seriation, field dependence–independence, and mathematics achievement on concepts, computations, and applications was investigated, using 102 Ss from Grades 2–4. Results were analyzed separately within each grade for the total mathematics achievement test score, as well as for the 3 subtests consisting of mathematics concepts, computations, and applications. In all grades, field independence was related to high mathematics achievement, especially for the concepts and applications subtests. High operativity was related to high achievement in mathematics concepts only in Grade 2. (12 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive strategies, expectancy, and coping style in the control of pain.

Measures of tolerance, self-reported pain threshold, and overall discomfort of cold-pressor pain were obtained from 114 male undergraduates in a pretest–training–posttest experiment. Training consisted of brief practice in 1 of 4 cognitive strategies: rational thinking, compatible imagery, incompatible imagery, and task-irrelevant cognition. Analyses of covariance indicated that (a) cognitive-imaginal strategies facilitated endurance of pain and raised self-reported threshold, (b) rational thinking and compatible imagery were generally the most effective treatments, (c) expectancy alone was not a significant pain-attenuating factor, (d) treatments did not affect discomfort ratings, and (e) individual differences in imaginal ability and coping style did not correlate with changes in any of the dependent measures. (3 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style, sensation seeking, and assortative mating.

Examined assortative mating, the tendency of persons to marry others with similar characteristics, among 177 couples (male mean age 37.7 yrs, female mean age 35.1 yrs). Ss completed the Kinesthetic Figural Aftereffects Test, Embedded Figures Test, Matching Familar Figures Test, and the Sensation-Seeking Scale. Findings suggest assortative mating for reflection–impulsivity; reasoning–accuracy; field dependence–independence; and sensation-seeking and its subfactors of experience seeking, disinhibition, and boredom susceptibility. Analysis of relationship lengths indicated that the similarities within couples were not the result of increased similarity over time. It is concluded that partner similarities in sensation seeking and cognitive style may play a role in mate selection and in marital quality. (16 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style effects on sex status in student work groups.

Studied the mediating effect of field independence on sex difference in activity and influence in 27 task groups, each composed of 2 male and 2 female 9th-11th graders. All Ss were administered the Group Embedded Figures Test, portable rod-and-frame test, and Extended Range Vocabulary Test, Form B-3. Ss, matched for verbal ability and field independence within groups, were videotaped discussing a decision-making task. Videotapes were coded for individual verbal activity and influence. A hierarchical analysis of variance design was used, with the effects of cognitive style group, sex, and replication assessed in order. Results indicate Sex * Cognitive Style interaction effects, with males more active and influential than females in field-dependent groups, males more active but not more influential than females in middle-range groups, and males and females equally active and influential in field-independent groups. (33 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style and pleasant activities among female adolescent suicide attempters.

Cognitive style and pleasant activities of 77 suicide-attempting female minority adolescents were compared with those of 2 groups of non-suicide-attempting female minority adolescents, 39 who were psychiatrically disturbed and 23 who were nondisturbed. Suicide attempters differed from other groups, even when depression and IQ were statistically controlled. They reported significantly fewer alternatives for solving interpersonal problems, were significantly more focused on problems, and were more likely to report a wishful thinking style of coping in stressful situations than were members of the nondisturbed comparison group. Across groups, depression was associated with significantly more dysfunctional attributions. Interpersonal problem-solving ability and attributional style best distinguished the suicide attempters. Results suggest using different cognitive–behavioral interventions with depressed and nondepressed minority female adolescent suicide attempters. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Nature and functions of belief systems: Humanism and transcendental religion.

Briefly describes some origins, characteristics, and functions of scientific–humanistic and transcendental belief systems, including their effects on the attitudes, values and behavior of their adherents. It is suggested that the paradox that transcendental experiences of the unity of the universe become translated into conflicting dogmas may be due to the possible difficulty of translating a nonverbal, predominantly right-hemisphere experience into words and concepts. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive style and defenses: A longitudinal study of intellectualization and field independence.

Investigated the long-range stability of the defense style of intellectualization (assessed by ratings of Rorschach protocols), and its relation to an analytic field-independent cognitive style (assessed by scores on the Rod and Frame, RFT, test). 28 male Ss had been administered the Rorschach and the RFT at age 14, 17, and 24 (1/2 of the sample was tested at age 10) and the Wechsler-Bellevue at age 17, as part of a broader longitudinal study. Results indicate that individual differences in Rorschach ratings of intellectualization tend to remain stable from childhood to young adulthood. Intellectualization ratings were also positively related to field independence and IQ. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive styles in the context of modern psychology: Toward an integrated framework of cognitive style.

The goals of this article are to elucidate trends and perspectives in the field of cognitive style research and to propose an integrated framework to guide future research. This is accomplished by means of a comprehensive literature review of the major advances and the theoretical and experimental problems that have accumulated over the years and by a discussion of the promising theoretical models that can be further developed, in part, with modern neuroscience techniques and with research from different psychological fields. On the basis of the research reviewed in this article, the author suggests that cognitive styles represent heuristics that individuals use to process information about their environment. These heuristics can be identified at multiple levels of information processing, from perceptual to metacognitive, and they can be grouped according to the type of regulatory function they exert on processes ranging from automatic data encoding to conscious executive allocation of cognitive resources. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attitude change as a function of changes in belief and the evaluative aspect of belief.

Tested the hypothesis that the attitudes of 50 undergraduates could be changed through manipulation of their beliefs and the evaluative aspect of their beliefs. Both manipulations were successful. The belief manipulation produced positive attitude change in Ss whose initial attitudes were relatively negative (p     

The slavery debate in antebellum America: Cognitive style, value conflict, and the limits of compromise.

Explores the relations among value conflict, cognitive style, and policy preferences in pre-Civil War America. Drawing on major historical works, prominent political figures were classified into 1 of 4 political positions: abolitionists, free-soil Republicans who would tolerate slavery in the South but prevent further spread, Buchanan Democrats who would permit slavery in new territories, and advocates of slavery. Results revealed (1) greatest integrative complexity among free-soil Republicans and Buchanan Democrats, with declines in complexity moving either leftward toward abolitionists or rightward toward slavery supporters; (2) integrative complexity was a positive function of endorsing values widely regarded as in conflict in that historical period (property rights, states' rights, and domestic peace vs the threat of "Southern slave power" to free labor and democracy). The results are consistent with the value pluralism model and raise warnings against the tendency to view integratively simple reasoning as both cognitively and morally inferior to complex reasoning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The influence of belief systems on subjects' perceptions of empathy, warmth, and genuineness.

Investigated the relationship between 174 female and 96 male undergraduates' (aged 14–45 yrs) belief systems, gender, and perceptions of a Rogerian counseling session. Belief systems were assessed using a belief system test, after which Ss watched, by means of a sound video recording, a 30-min counseling intervention by C. R. Rogers. Ss rated the counselor using the Relationship Inventory, a client satisfaction scale, and 5 questions composed by the authors. Ss' beliefs influenced their perceptions of therapeutic variables. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acceptance of punishment and change in belief.

Ss were placed in a situation wherein they were led to expect to experience ESP phenomena. To report no ESP reception led to the experience of electric shock. It was hypothesized that to reduce the cognitive dissonance that had been created, S would reject belief in ESP thereby justifying the experience of the shock. Belief in ESP, before and after the experimental conditions, was determined from an attitude scale regarding this phenomenon (Fishbein & Raven, 1959). The results supported the hypothesis, particularly with regard to the females, less so for the males. It was assumed that males had greater tolerance for the shock, hence the divided findings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)