Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T17:58:03.417Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Relationship of Analytical—Relational and Intuitive—Experiential Information Processing Styles with Adolescent Scholastic and Coping Ability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2016

Tom Cerni
Tom Cerni*
Affiliation:
The Scots College, Sydney, Australia
*
The Scots College, Victoria Road, Bellevue Hill Nsiu 2023, Australia. Email: [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

According to cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST), individuals process information through two conceptual systems, an experiential system and a rational system, each operating by its own rules of inference. The study aimed to investigate adolescent scholastic and coping ability using the recently developed self-report measure of individual differences in intuitive-experiential and analytical-rational thinking, based on the cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST; Epstein, Pacini, Denes-Raj & Heier, 1996). The sample involved 134 adolescent boys from an independent boys' school in Sydney, Australia. As a within-group correlational study, the data were analysed using factor analysis, correlational analysis, multiple regressions and canonical correlation analysis. The analysis was carried out using the SPSS system (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences). The results suggest that while factor analysis had established the independence of the analytical-rational and intuitive-experiential functions among an Australian male adolescent sample, only the analytical-rational function was found to be significantly correlated with both adolescent scholastic and coping ability. No substantial correlations were found between these two measures and the intuitive-experiential function. The findings support the notion that students with high intelligence and effective coping favoured using the rational function. These findings may in part reflect, as suggested by Epstein, Pacini et al., (1996) the developmental aspects of the two modes of information processing among younger participants. Implications for effective student learning and coping are discussed.

Type
Theory and Research
Information
Journal of Psychologists and Counsellors in Schools , Volume 9 , Issue S1: Health, Well-being and Coping in Young People , August 1999 , pp. 75 - 92
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1999

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Board of Studies, New South Wales (1996). Mathematics Years 9-10 Syllabus. Intermediate Course Stage 5. Sydney.Google Scholar
Cacioppo, J.T., & Petty, R.E. (1982). The need for cognition. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42,116–131.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, L., & Manion, L. (1986). Research methods in education. London: Croom Helm.Google Scholar
Curtis, R.C., (Ed.), (1991). The relational self: Convergence in psychoanalysis and social psychology (pp. 140–159). New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Denes-Raj, V., & Epstein, S. (1994). Conflict between intuitive and rational processing: When people behave against their better judgement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66, 819–829.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Epstein, S. (1985). The implications of cognitive-experiential self-theory for research in social psychology and personality. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 15, 283–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Epstein, S. (1992). Coping ability, negative self-evaluation, and overgeneralisation: Experiment and theory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 62, 826–836.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Epstein, S. (1994). Integration of the cognitive and the psychodynamic unconscious. American Psychologist, 49, 709–724.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Epstein, S., Lipson, A., Holstein, C. & Huh, E. (1992). Irrational reactions to negative outcomes: Evidence of two conceptual systems. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 62, 328–339.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Epstein, S., & Meier, P. (1989). Constructive thinking: A broad coping variable with specific components. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57, 332–350.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Epstein, S., Norris, P., & Pacini, R. (1996). The Rational-Experiential Inventory, Short Form. University of Massachusetts at Amherst.Google Scholar
Epstein, S., Pacini, R., Denes-Raj, V., & Heier, H. (1996). Individual Differences in intuitive-experiential and analytical-rational thinking styles. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 390–405.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Frydenberg, E., & Lewis, R. (1993a). Manual: Adolescent Coping Scale. Melbourne, Vic.: Australian Council for Educational Research.Google Scholar
Frydenberg, E., & Lewis, R. (1993b). Boys play sport and girls turn to others: Age, gender and ethnicity as determinants of coping. Journal of Adolescence, 16, 253–266.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goleman, D.Emotional Intelligence. (1995) London: Bloomsbury Publishing.Google Scholar
Hair, J.F., Anderson, R.E., Tutham, R.L., & Black, W.C. (1995). Multivariate data analysis with readings. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Katz, L., & Epstein, S. (1991). Constructive thinking and coping with laboratory-induced stress. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61, 789–800.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kramer, J.J., & Conoley, J.C. (1992). The Eleventh Mental Measurement Yearbook. Lincoln, NE: The University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Montague, M. & Applegate, B. (1993) Mathematical problem-solving characteristics of middle school students with learning disabilities. The Journal of Special Education, 27, 175–201.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, E.P., Chaiken, S., & Hazlewood, J.D. (1993). Need for cognition and desire for control as moderators of extrinsic reward effects: A personx situation approach to the study of intrinsic motivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64, 987–999.CrossRefGoogle Scholar