Cognition and the Planning Process: An Investigation of Stability of Effects and Decision Makers' Insights

According to Hartman, White, and Crino (1986), planning situations differ in environmental volatility, system adaptation, and the nature of planning requirements, different combinations of which can generate 12 distinct planning situations and 8 information processing aids to be used as planning tools. Each information processing aid has been prescribed to be more appropriate for use in some planning situations than in others (Hartman et al.). In the first part of this study, we tested the hypothesis that a planner in a specific situation would prefer to use the information processing aid(s) prescribed for that situation. We developed 12 different cases and used 456 student subjects. Results indicated that preference did not correspond closely to the Hartman et al. theory but that some other form of implicit theory may be operating. The second part of the research replicated the first part and also examined how 57 subjects viewed their planning problems and weighed the factors involved. Part 2 was also designed to determine the nature of any implicit theory the subjects may have used. Results suggest that the pattern of preferences, although not corresponding to available theory, represents a stable phenomenon.