Narrow Categorizers Research Articles

Communication models in a foreign language in relation to cognitive style category width and power distance.

Understanding how category width of cognitive style and power distance impact language use in cultures is crucial for improving cross-cultural communication. We attempt to reveal how English foreign language students, affected by high-context culture, communicate in English as a foreign language. What models of foreign communicative competence do they create? We applied association rule analysis to find out how the category width of cognitive style affects the foreign communication competence in relation to culture and language. The requester tends to be more formal and transfers conventional norms of the culture of the mother tongue into English, which mainly affects the use of alerters and external modifications of the head act of request. A broad categorizer, regardless of social distance, prefers to formulate the request in a conditional over the present tense form, contrary to narrow categorizers who, in a situation of social proximity, prefer the request form in the present tense. A similar finding was shown in the case of external modifications of the head act, where we observed the inversion between broad and narrow categorizers, mainly in the use of minimizers and mitigating devices.

Language Processing Dependence on Cognitive Style “Category Width”

The paper focuses on social situation (requests) where we describe a novel approach to computational modelling of specific elements of request based on cognitive style “Category width”. For this purpose, transaction/sequence model was formulated and the data - requests in social situations, among students and their teachers in a university environment, were collected. The research was focused on the investigation of frequency and combination of factors of request as they appear in the “category width”, in socially proximal situation without social power. Cross-tabulation analysis and association rules were applied. The results indicated that the broad categorizers began with social factors, continued with expressive, language, and finish with social. The narrow categorizers began with expressive, continued with social, and finished with language factors.

Cognitive Style and Perception: The Relationship between Category Width and Speech Perception, Categorization, and Discrimination

Category width, as defined by Pettigrew's (1958) Category Width Scale, is a cognitive variable that purportedly reveals individual differences in categorization strategy. Subjects differ in terms of broadness and narrowness of judgments of category width--to what extent they will accept exemplars as good instances of a category. We tested the hypothesis that category width would be related to how subjects behave in different speech perception tasks. Differences found between extremely broad and narrow categorizers on such tasks would be helpful in understanding the nature of the perceptual and cognitive processes underlying the category width distinction. No effects attributable to category width were found when results were analyzed in terms of subjects' (a) discrimination and feature evaluation of auditory and visual information in speech events, (b) integration of these sources of information, (c) the process of decision, and (d) subjective preference for a two-choice versus a nine-choice response method. The results from both male and female and broad and narrow categorizers supported the predictions made by a fuzzy logical model of perception (FLMP). In the FLMP, people have access to continuous information about each feature of a stimulus, they make independent evaluations of each feature based on this information, the various features are integrated, and a decision is made based on the relative support for the viable alternatives. Given the common processes involved in speech and other pattern perceptual-recognition tasks, we conclude that fundamental processes involved in pattern recognition are unlikely to vary with personality measures, such as category width.

INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN CATEGORY WIDTH AND FAIRNESS PERCEPTION OF SELECTION DECISIONS

The study examined the effect of individual differences in category width on fairness perception of selection decisions. The hypothesis was that narrow categorizers would have more exaggerated perceptions of fairness than broad categorizers. Subjects completed Pettigrew's (1958) Category-Width Scale and a questionnaire designed to assess fairness perceptions of selection outcomes. Although the results of individual differences in fairness perception were consistent and were in the same directions as hypothesized, the main effect of “categorizer” did not reach statistical significance. The results also showed that merit-based selections were perceived as fair. Selections involving preferential treatment were perceived as equally unfair as conventional discrimination against minority candidates.

Extremity of Judgment and Personality Variables: Two Empirical Investigations

Summary The purpose of these studies was to examine the relationships between extremity of judgment and certain personality variables related to information processing: cognitive differentiation, cognitive style, discrimination, dogmatism, and information processing self-confidence. Two independent samples (673 and 498 female heads of households drawn from a major metropolitan area in the U.S.) rated product advertisements and department stores. The hypotheses—that individuals with less differentiated cognitive structure, the simplifiers, narrow categorizers, dogmatics, and those with greater information-processing self-confidence would make more extreme judgments—received statistically significant, although weak, support from the analysis using Pearson product-moment correlation.

Category width and differentiation in semantic categories

The hypothesis that the judgemental categorizing behaviour measured by Pettigrew's Category‐Width scale is linked to semantic categorization is investigated. Individual differences in broad vs. narrow categorizing behaviour measured by the C‐W scale are reconceptualized within the framework of Rosch's (1977) theory of human categorization. Two extreme groups on the C‐W scale, broad categorizers and narrow categorizers, were selected as subjects. One experiment employed a short‐term release‐from‐proactive‐inhibition paradigm. The amount of discrepancy in recall between the preshift and the shift trials was used as an index to perceived semantic distance. The result showed that narrow categorizers perceived the same fuzzy items in a semantic category as less similar to the good exemplars of that category than broad categorizers did. In a further experiment using a semantic‐categorization technique, narrow categorizers judged the same fuzzy items as category members less frequently than broad categorizers did, indicating that narrow categorizers possess more differentiated semantic categories than do broad categorizers. These findings are seen as an extension of the differential categorizing behaviour on artificial categories in the C‐W scale to semantic categorization for which there is a pre‐existing system.

Category Width and Individual Differences in Information Processing Strategies

Summary The performances of broad and narrow categorizers identified by Pettigrew's C-W Scale were compared on a task involving memory for artificial designs. The first experiment employed an unintentional learning instruction set. It was found that whereas more common features of the designs were remembered by broad categorizers, more variable features were recalled by narrow categorizers. In a second experiment when both groups were instructed to attend to the common features, the differences between the two groups disappeared. The implication of the finding is discussed in terms of differential information processing strategies between broad and narrow categorizers.

The cognitive style of breadth of categorization: Longitudinal consistency of personality correlates.

Four tasks measuring breadth of categorization in different ways were administered to 128 4-year-old children. Independent personality data were available on these children at ages 3,4, and 7 in the form of behavior ratings by independent sets of teachers using the California Child Q-Set and in the form of behavior ratings by independent sets of examiners. The four category breadth measures were standard-scored and composited to generate a domain-representative index of category breadth. This index was then correlated with the independent personality ratings available at each of the four ages. A core set of relationships, common across both age and sex, indicated that broad categorizers, relative to narrow categorizers, had difficulty in stimulus exclusion, lacked autonomous structuring, and generally behaved with few internal constraints. Boys were significantly broader in their categorization than girls, although there was appreciable overlap between the sexes. Personality correlates of breadth of categorization observed as early as 3 years of age were also observed at age 7. Results were placed in a larger theoretical context by introducing the concept of underand overperceptualization. The act of categorizing objects and events is a way of structuring information about the world. Categorization provides an efficient strategy for managing inputs because it permits dealing with classes of objects rather than single entities, allows the specification of salient criterial features of categories according to which newly encountered events or objects can be classified, and facilitates information retrieval. Individuals differ in their categorizing proclivities: Category definitions may not be incisively formulated; criteria for category membership may be applied inconsistently or shift as a function of context; categories may be overly narrow and restrictive, resulting in the overexclusion of reasonably includable exemplars; and categories may be excessively broad, resulting in overinclusion of dissimilar exemplars.

Cognitive style and lateral eye movements.

The lateral eye movement paradigm was employed to test the hypothesis that narrow categorizers, who are believed to be more analytic in information processing, make characteristic use of the left hemisphere, while broad categorizers, being more holistic, depend more on the right hemisphere. Data for narrow categorizers confirmed the hypothesis in that they tended to produce a majority of right shifts. Results from broad categorizers turned out to be less clear, although there was a tendency in the direction of left eye shift. Additionally, narrow categorizers made significantly more total LEMs than did broad categorizers. The results are discussed in terms of cerebral specialization underlying cognitive style.

Category width, confidence, expectancies, and perceptual accuracy

The relation of category width to accuracy of visual discriminations and estimates of expected performance and confidence were investigated for 55 student volunteers. Feedback (reported at 70% of actual performance accuracy) was provided to 28 subjects. Narrow categorizers were found to be more accurate, regardless of feedback. Feedback affected accuracy as well as expectancy and confidence. However, there were no differences in confidence or expectancy for different category width groups nor was category width a significant main effect in the analysis of changes in confidence and expectancy from pre- to postfeedback measures. Contrary to the findings of Phares and Davis (1966), there were no differences in generalization of expectancies between narrow and broad categorizers.

Interference in a Paired-Associate Transfer of Training Paradigm as a Function of Breadth of Categorization

It was hypothesized that category width could differentially predict interference in an (A-Br) transfer of training paradigm. Pettigrew's Estimation Questionnaire was the measure of category width. 18 college students were tested in each of the three category-width levels of the experimental group (A-B; A-Br), 9 Ss were tested in each of the three category-width levels of the control group (C-D; A-Br). Broad categorizers had significantly fewer correct responses and significantly more errors of intrusion on the second list than did either the narrow or the medium categorizers. There were no significant differences between narrow and medium categorizers on number of correct responses or errors of intrusion.

Category width and decision making in perception.

The cognitive dimension called category width may be related to decision-making behavior in the following way: broad categorizers tend to make more Type I errors while narrow categorizers are more inclined to make Type II errors. This contention was investigated using measures of decision-making performance on an auditory detection task. No correlations obtained between category-width measures and decision measures for 43 female Ss. However, for 38 male Ss, the correlation between category-width score and Type I error rate was significant as predicted. The correlation between category-width scores and over-all correct decision rate was also significant. A substantial relationship was also found between quantitative aptitude and category-width scores and factor scores for the two category-width factors for males. For women, quantitative aptitude did not seem to be related to category-width measures.

Category width and expectancies: Risk conservatism or generalization?

To compare interpretations of category width as an equivalence range and as a risk-taking dimension, an experiment by Phares and Davis (1966) was replicated and extended to examine the effects of unexpected failure and success on expectations for subsequent task performance. High scoring subjects on Pettigrew's (1958) Category Width Scale showed less generalization of expectancy following success and greater generalization following unexpected failure. A measure of similarity between tasks failed to differentiate from narrow categorizers and suggests that broad categorizers may adopt more conservative expectancies following unexpected outcomes of any favorability.

Category Width and the Learning of Multiattribute Paired Associates

Summary The hypothesis of this study was that measurable differences between broad and narrow categorizers in certain forms of learning would be obtained. Support for this hypothesis in the data from the present design was clearly evident. In the multiattribute learning task which was utilized, the broad categorizers were able to recall a significantly larger number of attributes than were the narrow categorizers, whereas the number of trials to criterion was virtually the same for each group. In sum, the learning task which provides opportunity for the utilization of varying quantities of input information, as in the multiattribute paired-associate task, appears to be subject to the influence of such variables as differences in category width. The data of this study suggest the possibility that individual differences in cognitive categorization may be consistently reflected in the person's preferred manner of orienting himself to, and processing, the stimuli presented by his world. The extent to which th...

Width of the latitude of acceptance as a determinant of attitude change.

In a study examining the implications of social judgment theory for predicting individual differences in attitude change, a subject received a message advocating a position on birth control either mildly, moderately, or strongly discrepant from his own. For all three levels of discrepancy, the subjects with wide of acceptance on the issue showed greater attitude change than did subjects with either narrow or medium of acceptance. Since a mildly discrepant message was in the lattitude of acceptance even for narrow latitude subjects and a strongly discrepant message in the latitude of rejection even for wide latitude subjects, this finding cannot be reconciled with social judgment theory. Since correlations between latitude widths on birth control and two irrelevant issues were low and latitude width on the irrelevant issues did not relate to attitude change on birth control, width of the latitude of acceptance was interpreted as an issue-specific index of influenceabil ity. Category width, though independent of latitude of acceptance width, also predicted attitude change: narrow categorizers changed their attitudes more than did either medium or broad categorizers. Central to the social judgment approach to attitude change (Sherif, Sherif, & Nebergall, 1965; Sherif & Hovland, 1961) is the assumption that the structure of an individual's attitude is a determinant of receptivity to a persuasive communication. Social judgment theory specifies attitude structure by dividing the attitude dimension into latitudes or regions: a latitude of acceptance, which is the range of positions that an individual accepts, and a latitude of rejection, which is the range of positions that he rejects.4 According to the major hypothesis of

THE RELATION BETWEEN BREADTH OF CATEGORY AND DECISION TIME

Twenty‐four subjects were presented with a series of stimuli, all of equal length (5 in.), and asked to classify each as being or not being 5 in. long. The subjects were then divided into three groups (broad, middle and narrow categorizers) according to the number of including and excluding responses that they gave.It was found that: (a) the decision times of both extreme groups were considerably shorter than those of the middle group; (b) there was a tendency for the extreme groups to have shorter decision times for their preferred type of response; but this tendency did not reach statistical significance.

COGNITIVE STYLES AND MEMORY FOR FACES.

Accuracy in the incidental recall of photographed human faces can be predicted from the S's cognitive styles and biases: (a) Ss who were field dependent on an embedded-figures test recalled more faces correctly than did the field independent; (b) Ss who were narrow categorizers on the Pettigrew Cate

COGNITIVE STYLES AND MEMORY FOR FACES1

ABSTRACTAccuracy in the incidental recall of photographed human faces can be predicted from the subject's cognitive styles and biases: (a) Subjects who were field‐dependent on an embedded figures test recalled more faces correctly than did the field‐independent; (b) subjects who were narrow categorizers on the Pettigrew Category‐Width Test had better recall than had broad categorizers; and (c) subjects who thought the photographed persons were relatively young did better than those who thought they were older. These three kinds of stylistic consistency were mutually independent. Some of these styles may determine memory for all sorts of stimuli and some may be relatively specific to memory for faces.