Need for Closure Scale[edit]
The need for closure in social psychology is thought to be a fairly stable dispositional characteristic that can, nonetheless, be affected by situational factors. The Need for Closure Scale (NFCS) was developed by Arie Kruglanski, Donna Webster, and Adena Klem in 1993 and is designed to operationalize this construct and is presented as a unidimensional instrument possessing strong discriminant and predictive validity.[7]
People who score high on the need for closure scale are more likely to exhibit impression primacy effects to correspondence bias, make stereotypical judgments, assimilate new information to existing, active beliefs, and, in the presence of prior information, resist persuasion.[7] Someone rating low on need for closure will express more ideational fluidity and creative acts.[8] Items on the scale include statements such as "I think that having clear rules and order at work is essential to success," and "I do not like situations that are uncertain." Items such as "Even after I've made up my mind about something, I am always eager to consider a different opinion," and "I like to have friends who are unpredictable" are reverse scored.[9]
Composed of 42 items, the scale has been used in numerous research studies and has been translated into multiple languages. Although Webster and Kruglanski (1994) treated the Need for Closure Scale as unidimensional (i.e., as measuring a single factor), the scale actually contains two orthogonal factors, decisiveness and need for structure. Thus, using a total scale score can overlook effects for each factor and complicate interpretations.[10] In 2007, Roets and Van Hiel tried to resolve this issue by revising the scale so it would measure only one thing. They came up with a set of new decisiveness items that provided a viable alternative for the old Decisiveness subscale of the NFCS, which was poorly related to the other NFCS facet scales and had questionable validity. The new items were developed with explicit reference to decisiveness but formulated in such a way that they relate to the need rather than to the ability to decide.[11] In 2011, Roets and Van Hiel created an abridged and empirically validated NFC scale consisting of only 15 items from the original NFC.
NFCS items correlate positively with authoritarianism, intolerance of ambiguity, dogmatism, need for order and structure and negatively with cognitive complexity and impulsivity, among several other cognitive tools and personality traits.[2]
High NFC scores consistently correlate with items on the C-Scale (conservatism) as well as other measures of political and social conservatism.[12]
Lack of closure[edit]
The lack of closure leaves a situation in ambiguity. People high in need for closure seek to avoid this ambiguity at all costs where people high in need to avoid closure strive to make situations more ambiguous.[14] Some perceived benefits of cognitive closure may relate to predictability, the basis for action, or social status accorded the possessors of knowledge (i.e., "experts"). Similarly, some perceived costs of lacking closure may relate to the additional time and effort required to attain closure, or the unpleasantness of process whereby closure must be reached. Occasionally, however, lack of closure may be perceived to offer various advantages such as freedom from a constraining commitment, neutrality in an acrimonious dispute, the maintenance of a romantic mystery and so on.[15] Though lack of closure is generally thought of as being negative, it is clear that closure and lack of closure have positive or negative implications depending on the person and situation surrounding them.
In education[edit]
Formal education environments, such as elementary and secondary schools, present opportunities for learners to acquire new knowledge and skills, and to achieve deep, domain-specific conceptual mastery which, through well-designed pedagogical guidance and academic study, may enhance future career readiness, civic engagement, and general well-being. However, although it is understood that the basic principles of learning assert the importance of attending to students' prior knowledge, fostering conceptual understanding, and cultivating metacognitive awareness, students must also become engaged and be willing to tolerate and cognitively work through the intellectual ambiguity often associated with exposure to novel information and tasks.[20][21][22][23]
Yet for students who have high need for cognitive closure, this phenomenon may inadvertently lead to the inhibition of cognitive functions and processes essential to the learning process, so that they can maintain their prior certainty and/or perceived permanence of personally or socially important ideas, even if those ideas or knowledge are distinctly unrelated to any specific content or information being presented in the classroom. In instances such as these, an individual's desire for cognitive closure in another area may outweigh her/his motivation to expend cognitive resources toward learning new information. As a result, the student may appear uninterested and susceptible to under-achieving e.g. poor grades or not performing to expected levels.
In the absence of understanding and consideration of how need for cognitive closure may influence academic and/or achievement motivation, educators may erroneously conclude that a student does not have a desire to learn or that she/he has a cognitive, psychological, intellectual, or behavioral deficiency that is impeding the learning process. This is not to suggest that need for cognitive closure is a suitable explanation for all learning problems; however, in working with students who appear to be experiencing learning challenges manifested through amotivation or low motivation, it would not be unreasonable to explore need for cognitive closure as a potential factor.
Research[edit]
Individuals scoring high on the NFCS are more likely to attempt to draw closure by relying on incipient cues, and the first-encountered apparent fit.[8] The need for closure is also said to predispose a very narrow or shallow information search, along with a higher tendency to use cognitive heuristics, when seeking solutions. (Van Hiel and Mervielde, 2003)
In studies on creativity, individuals with high need-for-closure ratings had low creativity scores. Those low in need-for-closure more frequently produced novel solutions that motivated and inspired others in their groups, and the outcomes of the projects in which they participated were rated as correspondingly more productive.[8]
Most research on the need for closure has investigated its relation to social stimuli. However, recent research suggests that it may also predict responses to non-social stimuli. In particular, the need for closure predicts an evaluative bias against deviant non-social stimuli (e.g., the letter "A" presented in a category of letter "B"s)[24]
"Closure" has also been used more loosely to refer to the outcome of an experience which, by virtue of its completion, demonstrates a therapeutic value. Legal scholars have linked "closure" to "catharsis" and "satisfaction"[25] and at times the legal system may be enlisted into an individual's desire for the cessation of uncertainty. In the case of the death penalty, for example, victims seeking "closure" may adopt effective strategies as diverse as retribution, on one hand, and forgiveness on the other.[26]