The purpose of this study is to examine whether individual's difference in A-E style, one of the cognitive style constructs, is a factor influencing how individuals perform on the task of solving insight problems, how individuals apply past experience to solving similar problems, and the extent to how much set effect or fixation that individuals will encounter. The A-E (assimilator-explorer) style suggests that individuals with a tendency to follow rules and search for past experience when solving problems can be labeled as assimilators; while individuals with a tendency to use the trial-and-error method can be labeled as explorers. Subjects were 87 undergraduate students and were classified as either assimilators or explorers according to their scores on the A-E Inventory, an instrument used to measure the A-E style construct. Then three insight problem-solving tests were administrated to all subjects. All the problems used in the three tests share the surface similarities, features which make two problems look like a similar one, but only the problems in the first two tests also share the structural similarities, features which allow two problems to be solved by the same strategies. It was predicted that: (a) the explorers would do better than the assimilators on test 1 because the explorers were more prone to think from different perspectives and thus more likely to come up with correct answers for novel problems; (b) the assimilators would do better than the explorers on test 2 because the assimilators were more capable of applying past experience to similar situations; while the explorers were less capable of doing so; and (c) the explorers would perform better than the assimilator on test 3 because the assimilator were more likely to rely on past experience thus prone to encounter set effects and fixation which degraded problem solving performance. / However, the findings showed that the performance of two groups was comparable and, therefore, none of the three hypotheses were supported. Possible reasons for why the hypotheses were not supported are discussed. Recommendations for future research are also presented. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 56-08, Section: A, page: 3054. / Major Professor: Walter Wager. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1995.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_77513 |
| Contributors | Cheng, Shiu-Shan., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 86 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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