Need for closure and dealing with uncertainty in decision making context: The role of the behavioral inhibition system and working memory capacity

The aim of the present study was to investigate the moderated mediation model of the relationship between the behavioral inhibition system (BIS), need for closure (NFC) and working memory capacity (WMC) in the decision making process. It was assumed that NFC works as a motivational mechanism that enables individuals high in BIS to deal with uncertainty; therefore, NFC mediates the effect of BIS on behavior in a decision-making situation. Moreover, as uncertainty management requires cognitive resources, we expected WMC to moderate this relationship. In line with our hypothesis, we found that NFC mediated the relationship between BIS and the information search about the job candidates, and this effect occurred only for individuals high in WMC. We discuss these results in the context of effective self-regulation, as well as motivational and cognitive determinants of effort.     

Factors underlying expectancies of success and achievement: the influential roles of need for cognition and general or specific self-concepts

It has been assumed that task-specific self-concepts are more important than general self-concepts in determining expectancies of success and subsequent achievement. The authors argue here that the influence varies depending on need for cognition (NFC). Findings from Study 1 (N=104) showed that expectancies of success in an academic task could be predicted from specific self-concept for individuals with a high NFC and from general self-concept for individuals with a low NFC. In Study 2 (N=193), where cognitive load was manipulated, given a high cognitive load, only general self-concept was predictive of success expectancies, independent of NFC. In Study 3 (N=197), given a high relevance of correct expectancy ratings, only specific self-concept was predictive of expectancies and actual achievement, independent of NFC. In Studies 4 and 5, the results from Study 1 concerning the prediction of expectancies (as well as achievement) reappeared in a physical and a social domain.     

Ambivalence,conflict, and decision making: attitudes and feelings in Germany towards NATO's military intervention in the Kosovo war

Two hundred and thirty‐four persons were surveyed to assess personality aspects (action versus state orientation, need for cognition, faith in intuition) and emotional aspects of their attitudes towards the NATO military intervention in the Kosovo war in the spring of 1999. Additionally, in an imagined scenario they were asked to decide whether they would sign a petition addressed to the German government protesting against military intervention. Three ways of dealing with this decision were differentiated: (1) decisive action, (2) avoiding the decision conflict, and (3) elaborating the decision problem with the goal of building up feelings to guide action (amplification). Correlations between the variables were evaluated using path analysis in order to predict the decision strategy from personality dimensions and attitude variables (ambivalence, involvement). High action orientation caused low attitude ambivalence and high personal involvement in the topic. Strong ambivalence prevented swift action and supported a tendency towards elaboration and amplification of feelings. Involvement had a favorable effect on action readiness and a negative effect on conflict‐avoiding strategies. Moreover, it moderated the effects of ambivalence on the preference for conflict management strategies. The results confirm theoretical approaches that stress the importance of affect for acting and deciding. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

“When the going gets tough,the tough get going”: Motivation towards closure and effort investment in the performance of cognitive tasks

Previous studies have demonstrated that the need for closure (NFC), which refers to an individual’s aversion toward uncertainty and the desire to quickly reduce it, leads to reluctance to invest effort in judgments and decision making. However, we argue that NFC may lead to either an increase or a decrease in effort depending on the availability of easy vs. difficult means to achieve closure and perceived importance of the task goal. We found that when closure could be achieved via both less and more demanding means, NFC was associated with decreased effort unless the task was perceived as important (Study 1). However, when attaining closure was possible via demanding means only, NFC was associated with increased effort, regardless of the task importance (Study 2). Moreover, NFC was related to choosing a more instrumental strategy for the goal of closure, even if this strategy required effort (Study 3). The results are discussed in the light of cognitive energetics theory.     

Decision‐making in civil litigation: Effects of attorney credibility,evidence strength,and juror cognitive processing

The current study examined the relationship between juror cognitive processing (measured by need for cognition [NFC]), attorney credibility, evidence strength, and civil litigation verdicts (liability, likelihood of causation, and compensatory damages). Participants (N = 446) viewed a videotaped mock civil trial in which the credibility of the attorneys and the strength of the plaintiff's evidence were manipulated. Plaintiff attorney credibility, defense attorney credibility, and strength of evidence interacted with one another for liability verdicts. In the strong evidence condition, the likelihood of a liable verdict was higher for a credible plaintiff attorney than a non‐credible plaintiff attorney when facing a non‐credible defense attorney. In the ambiguous evidence condition, the likelihood of a liable verdict was higher for a credible plaintiff attorney than a non‐credible plaintiff attorney when facing a credible defense attorney. Plaintiff attorney credibility, however, was found to be more influential on jurors’ decision‐making than case evidence for likelihood of causation and compensatory damage award decisions. Participants’ NFC also interacted with plaintiff attorney credibility. High NFC jurors were more influenced by a credible plaintiff attorney than low NFC jurors. Although these findings are counter to common findings in the NFC literature, they conform to a body of literature that supports the notion that jurors view attorney credibility as a piece of case evidence and not a peripheral cue as is often assumed. Thus, the findings indicate that attorneys do matter to the outcomes of cases. Policy and practice implications for attorneys and the courts are discussed.     

Multiple protective and risk factors for drug use and abuse: cross-sectional and prospective findings.

A conceptual elaboration was developed that incorporates many risk and protective factors, and both direct and moderating (buffering) influences on drug involvement were tested. From prospective data, 14 factors related to drug use were selected and assigned empirically to either a multiple protective index (PFI) or a risk factor index (RFI). Analyses examined the relationships of the RFI, PFI, and their interaction on measures of cigarette, alcohol, cannabis, cocaine, and hard drug use cross-sectionally in late adolescence and later in young adulthood. These same variables were used to predict alcohol, cannabis, and cocaine abuse 8 years later. Vulnerability as measured by the RFI, PFI, and their interaction was highly associated with drug use in adolescence, moderately associated with certain types of drug use in young adulthood, and strongly associated with heightened drug problems in adulthood.     

Neurophysiological measures of involuntary and voluntary attention allocation and dispositional differences in need for cognition

Need for cognition (NFC) refers to stable individual differences in the intrinsic motivation to engage in and enjoy effortful cognitive endeavors and has been a useful predictor of dispositional differences in information processing. Although cognitive resource allocation conceptualized as cognitive effort is assumed to be the key mediator of NFC-specific processing, to date no research has systematically addressed its underpinnings. Using a neurocognitive paradigm and recording event-related potentials associated with bottom-up and top-down-driven aspects of attention, the present research contributes to filling this gap. In Study 1, high-NFC individuals showed larger P3a amplitudes to contextually novel events, indicating greater involuntary (automatic) attention allocation. This effect was replicated in Study 2, where NFC also was positively correlated with the P3b to target stimuli, indicating voluntary (controlled) processes of attention allocation. Thus, our findings provide first evidence for neurophysiological correlates of NFC and can improve the understanding of NFC-specific processing.     

Personal need for structure and creative performance: the moderating influence of fear of invalidity

Previous research has suggested that personal need for structure (PNS) is negatively related to creative performance. In this article, it is argued that this relation, in fact, depends on another personality variable: personal fear of invalidity (PFI). When PFI is high, PNS should indeed be negatively associated with creativity. However, PNS should be positively associated with creativity when PFI is low, because this combination enables people to take a structured approach to creative tasks and this can be helpful to overcome their reliance on conventional and accessible task strategies. In four studies, this hypothesis is tested using different measures of creative performance. The expected interaction effect is found for measures of ideational fluency and measures of originality but not for measures of flexibility. Moreover, it is shown that the interaction effect between PNS and PFI is mediated by perseverance within thought categories.     

Motivation to comply with task rules and multitasking performance: The role of need for cognitive closure and goal importance

In three studies, we examined the role task rules play in multitasking performance. We postulated that rules should be especially important for individuals highly motivated to have structure and clear answers, i.e., those high on need for cognitive closure (NFC). High NFC should thus be related to greater compliance with task rules. Specifically, given high goal importance, NFC should be more strongly related to a multitasking strategy when multitasking is imposed by the rules, and to a mono-tasking strategy when monotasking is imposed by the rules. This should translate into better multitasking or mono-tasking performance, depending on condition. Overall, the results were supportive as NFC was related to a more mono-tasking strategy in the mono-tasking condition (Studies 1 and 2 only) and more dual-tasking strategy in the dual-tasking condition (Studies 1–3). This translated into respective differences in performance. The effects were significant only when goal importance was high (Study 1) and held when cognitive ability was controlled for (Study 2).     

Why Do People Watch News They Do Not Trust? The Need for Cognition as a Moderator in the Association Between News Media Skepticism and Exposure

Prior research has found only modest associations between news media trust and exposure. Many news skeptics report moderate to high levels of mainstream news exposure, despite their mistrust of mainstream news. Why do people watch news they do not trust? This study investigates the moderating role played by the psychological construct of "the need for cognition" (NFC) in this association. An NFC × Media Skepticism interaction is hypothesized and tested on survey data (N = 424). Results provide evidence for such an interaction. For those with a reduced NFC, mainstream media skepticism is strongly associated with news exposure. As NFC increases, the association between news skepticism and exposure disappears. It is concluded that people consume news they do not trust when their media skepticism is irrelevant to their motivation for news exposure.     

Winding paths: Ambivalence in consumers' buying processes

This paper investigates ambivalence in the buying process. The existing literature has rarely studied ambivalence in longitudinal processes and has therefore not been able to capture its dynamics. Those studies that have studied ambivalence longitudinally have focused on general attitudinal ambivalence rather than its subtypes (cognitive, affective, and intercomponent ambivalence) and have therefore ignored some of the more detailed dynamics. Hence, this study addresses these different types of ambivalence longitudinally, exploring what these different ambivalences consist of, what their roles are in the buying process, and how they occur under different types of involvement conditions. A longitudinal video diary method is used in conjunction with a multimodal analysis technique to explore not only the verbally expressed aspects of ambivalence but also its nonverbal expression, which further reveals differences between different types of ambivalence. The findings suggest that cognitive ambivalence involves conflicting evaluations of utilitarian brand and product aspects and is resolved through more effortful mechanisms, whereas intercomponent ambivalence involves conflicting evaluations of varying utilitarian, hedonic, and symbolic brand and product aspects and is resolved through both more and less effortful mechanisms. Finally, affective ambivalence involves conflicting anticipations about the outcome of the buying process but is not resolved through similarly clear mechanisms. As the key outcome of the exploration, propositions and a synthesising framework about the different types of ambivalence in the buying process are developed for future research. This paper hence contributes to the ambivalence literature and offers managerial implications especially for marketers of multifaceted and high‐involvement products.     

The role of core self-evaluations in the relationship between religious involvement and subjective well-being: a moderated mediation model

This study examined whether core self-evaluations (CSE), a personality-based construct, mediates the association between religious involvement and subjective well-being (i.e., physical and psychological). Furthermore, investigates whether the indirect relation of religious involvement to well-being through CSE is conditional on age group (elderly vs. adults). Two different samples were examined: an elderly (N?=?300) and an adult community sample (N?=?294). To determine whether the strength of these effects depend on (moderated by) age group, we used multiple regression analyses and bootstrapping framework to probe conditional indirect (i.e., moderated mediation) effects. The results showed that CSE mediates the relationship between religious involvement (i.e., religious attendance and intrinsic religiosity) and both aspects of subjective well-being. However, the moderated mediation models revealed that this mechanism exists only for elderly. Implications of these results for improving the quality of life in elderly are discussed and directions for future research are provided.     

Ambivalence and decisional conflict as a cause of psychological discomfort: Feeling tense before jumping off the fence

It has long been assumed that people experience evaluative conflict or ambivalence as unpleasant. In three studies we provide direct evidence for the assumption that ambivalence is unpleasant, but only when one has to commit to one side of the issue. In those situations ambivalence will be related to outcome uncertainty and feelings of discomfort. We examined this prediction using both self-reports and physiological measures. In a first study we manipulated ambivalence and whether or not participants had to take a clear stand vis-a vis the attitudinal issue and choose a position for or against it. Results indicate ambivalence was only related to physiological arousal when a choice had to be made. Feeling ambivalent about an issue without the necessity to choose did not result in higher levels of arousal. A second study replicated and extended these findings by including a measure of subjective uncertainty about the decision. Results showed the same pattern as in Study 1, and indicate that the relation between ambivalence and arousal is mediated by uncertainty about decisional outcomes. In the third and final study these findings are corroborated using self-report measures; these indicated that ambivalence-induced discomfort is related to specific (negative) emotions.     

Need for Cognition Moderates Responses to Framed Smoking‐Cessation Messages1

Smoking‐cessation messages usually emphasize the costs of continuing to smoke (loss‐framed). However, prospect theory suggests that messages that instead emphasize the benefits of quitting smoking (gain‐framed) could be more effective than loss‐framed messages because smoking cessation is likely viewed as a cancer‐prevention behavior with a certain rather than a risky outcome. In this study, smokers at public events read brochures containing brief gain‐ or loss‐framed smoking‐cessation messages. The influence of framing was moderated by participants' need for cognition (NFC). Individuals lower in NFC had greater intention to quit after reading a gain‐framed message than after reading a loss‐framed message a finding consistent with our predictions whereas framing did not affect the persuasiveness of messages among people higher in NFC.     

Positive mood boosts the expression of a dispositional need for closure

Three studies (N=539) examined the hypothesis that positive mood increases the degree to which epistemic motivation, i.e., the need for closure (NFC), affects the way in which an individual processes information (heuristic vs. systematic processing). In each of the studies, different methods of operationalising mood were used: in Study 1, mood was measured as a state; in Study 2, mood was induced by asking participants to recall emotional events; and in Study 3, mood was induced by emotional pictures. The styles of information processing that were utilised by our participants were operationalised in terms of their preferences for (Study 1) and ability to recall (Studies 2 and 3) schema-consistent and schema-inconsistent information. Taken together, the results of the three studies show that only under positive mood, NFC level of an individual is consistent with his or her style of information processing, that is, only under positive mood is there a negative relationship between the NFC level of an individual and the utilisation of schema-inconsistent information. Our results can be explained in terms of the effect that mood has on an individual's perceived ability to achieve NFC.     

Need for closure and reactions to innovation

In two studies using Italian (N = 852) and American (N = 94) samples, we hypothesized that high NFC individuals would have lower intentions to use new technological developments, and that this relationship would be mediated by anxiety about the new technology. We found support for this hypothesis in Study 1, but not Study 2. In the second study, we found that the closed‐mindedness subscale of the full NFC scale was related to greater anxiety about new technology, which in turn led to lower intentions to use the new technology. This suggests that the closed‐mindedness facet of NFC may have been responsible for our results. A meta‐analytic synthesis of both studies provided some support for our original mediation hypothesis.     

Factor Analytic Structure and Validity of the Parental Feelings Inventory: A Brief Report

Previous research has highlighted the important role of parental emotions in parent–child interactions and child development. The present study presents the Parental Feelings Inventory (PFI), a new rating scale designed to assess parental emotions within the parenting role. The PFI presents emotion adjectives and asks parents to indicate the degree to which they experience that emotion in their role as parents. This study investigates the factor analytic structure and psychometric properties of this scale in a sample of parents with 3-year-old children. Participants included 149 mothers and 107 fathers of preschool-age children. The results provide support for a three-factor solution (Angry, Happy, and Anxious/Sad). This scale demonstrated good reliability and correlated with other measures of parent and child functioning. These findings provide support for the overall utility of the PFI as a measure of emotional experiences in the parenting role.     

Disparate roads to certainty processing strategy choices under need for closure

This paper describes a programme of research addressing an intriguing inconsistency in research findings about cognitive processes under a high need for cognitive closure (NFC). While early studies demonstrated that individuals who seek closure opt for closed-minded cognitive strategies, a growing body of research has identified a number of circumstances in which individuals who are high in NFC engage in effortful, open-minded information processing to an even greater extent than their low NFC counterparts. This has posed the challenge of delineating the circumstances under which people motivated to reduce uncertainty (i.e., attain closure) engage in effortful and open-minded cognition from those situations in which they rely on simplistic, low-effort strategies. This also calls for theoretical advancement in NFC theory. We discuss our proposed solution to this puzzle and the implications of this model for real-world social phenomena.     

Career counseling meets motivational interviewing: A sequential analysis of dynamic counselor–client interactions

Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a client-centered communication style with the aim to resolve client ambivalence within a change-related counseling. Its potential benefit for career counseling has been discussed by several scholars but no empirical research has investigated MI in this context so far. The current study used process measures from MI to investigate dynamic interactions within a career counseling intervention. Overall, we analyzed two videotaped sessions of 14 unique counselor–client dyads. Verbal behavior of counselors and clients were coded with two observational coding schemes from MI (one for counselors and one for clients, respectively). Behavior profiles of counselors were compared with benchmarks of good MI. Furthermore, client verbal ambivalence was compared between sessions. Finally, we conducted lag sequential analyses to analyze temporal dynamics between counselor behavior and immediate client verbal responses across N = 6883 behavioral events. Our results showed, first, behavior profiles of career counselors did significantly differ from recommended counseling benchmarks of good MI practice. Second, as assumed on the basis of past studies, client ambivalence decreased across sessions. Third, MI consistent counselor behaviors showed a positive sequential association with client positive career talk, whereas MI inconsistent counselor behaviors showed the reverse pattern. Our results suggest that counseling behaviors recommended from MI are facilitating career interventions. We discuss how trainings in MI could amend career counseling interventions and provide ethical implications when integrating MI into career counseling programs.