A Cognitive Perspective for Understanding and Training Assertiveness

Abstract

Abstract. Assertiveness has for long been considered an optimal way of expressing oneself while at the same time maintaining and/or enhancing social rewards, leading to the conclusion that it should be promoted as an intra and interpersonal protective factor. Yet, few researchers have tried to provide a comprehensive model on assertiveness that may better sustain why and how to train it. We propose a cognitive model for explaining how assertiveness comes to be enacted and maintained, considering the activation of previous individual schemas, how they influence the processing of social cues, which in turn influence the interactive activation of cognitive, emotional, and behavioral assertive products. The assertive behavior in turn prompts reactions from the interaction partner. This interpersonal exchange will serve to confirm previous schemas and make them more accessible when facing future social events. We further review previous findings on several assumptions involved in this model and propose how these findings can sustain cognitive-behavioral approaches to assertive training, building on the premises that the intrapersonal psychological functioning is manifested in interpersonal observed behaviors. Subsequently, new directions for the study and training of assertiveness based on a social information-processing framework are discussed, also considering the current social challenges and contexts that we, as human beings, must face.