Slide 1

ICP2008, July 20-25, Berlin, Germany
IS-008 Tolerance for ambiguity, creativity, and personality

Relation of ambiguity tolerance
to cognitive and affective needs:
A cross cultural content analysis

Katya Stoycheva Todd Lubart
Franck Zenasni Kalina Popova


Slide 2

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

PURPOSE
 examine the relation of ambiguity tolerance
to cognitive and affective individual
difference measures
 carry out a content analysis of these scales’
items

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 3

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

CL1 - CL42

need for closure

ST43 - ST54

need for structure

CG55 - CG99

need for cognition

EV100 - EV115 need for evaluation
PR116 - PR135 need for precision
UN136 - UN162 intolerance of uncertainty
AF163 - AF188 need for affect

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 4

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

JUDGES
10 Bulgarian doctoral students
1 men and 9 women aged 24 to 30

10 French doctoral students
2 men and 8 women aged 26 to 38

ITEMS
188 items
translated into Bulgarian and into French
Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 5

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Judges’ ratings of the 188 items :
 related - not related to the AT construct
 how much related to AT
strongly - moderately - weakly

 coded as 0 - 1 - 2 - 3

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Categories of items
 Items with consensus on relatedness
 Items with consensus on non relatedness
 Items with opposite consensus in the two
groups of judges
 Items with no consensus in both groups

 Items with a consensus in one of the
groups but not in the other
Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 7

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

CL ST CG

EV PR UN AF

Items

42

12

45 16

20

27

26

Related

38

11

13

19

26

4

Non related
Opposite

1

No consensus
Differing

1
3

10

6

10

1

1

8

1

17

5

1

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)

1

11


Slide 8

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

AT relation to cognitive and affective measures
 content analysis of the items strongly related
and unrelated to the AT construct
 summary results for each of the scales in
relation to the AT construct

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 9

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

CL ST CG

EV PR UN AF

Items

38

11

13

10

Strong
above 2,50

17

7

1

1

2

18

0

Moderate
2,00 to 2,50

17

4

4

7

14

6

0

Weak
1,00 to 2,00

4

0

9

2

3

2

4

Unrelated
below 1,00

0

0

6

0

0

0

10

19 26

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)

14


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Items with a complete consensus on relatedness
I become uncomfortable when the rules in a
situation are not clear (ST54).

I like to know precisely what is meant by
information that I learn (PR118).
The ambiguities in life stress me (UN161).

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

42 out of 46 strongly related items
discomfort and frustration

inability to act in ambiguous situation
avoidance of ambiguity in one’s understanding of a
situation, event or idea

avoidance of the encounter with ambiguity

4 out of 46 strongly related items
positive experience in uncertain or ambiguous
situations
preference for exploration
Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Items unrelated to AT
an approach orientation towards experiencing of
emotions
(7 items AF)
the importance assigned to being intellectual and
developing one’s intellectual skills
(6 items CG)
an avoidance approach to emotional experiences (3
items AF)

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Scales’ relation to AT
ST 92 % 2,66 (0,20) RLS (5S,2M) DS (2S, 2M)
UN 96 % 2,53 (0,43)
CL 90 % 2,45 (0,33) Pr Am Or Cm De(4of7)

PR 95 % 2,26 (0,26) 74 % M
EV 63 % 2,26 (0,27) 70 % M

CG 29 % 1,42 (0,85) 77 % reverse scored
AF 15 % 0,68 (0,69)
Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 14

Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Cross cultural comparisons
 discrepancies in judges’ consensus on items’
relation to the AT construct
 differences in judges’ ratings of the items’
relation to the AT construct

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

Cross cultural comparisons

 3 opposite and 38 differing items out of 188
CG(18), AF(12), EV(5), CL(4), PR(1) and UN(1)

French judges - 18 out of 38, 5 YES and 13 NO
Bulgarian judges - 20 out of 38, 15 Yes and 5 NO

 significant differences on 6 out of 137 items
(1, p < 0,001) (5, p < 0,05) e AT construct
Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

CONCLUSIONS
 validity of the AT construct
 cross cultural insights

Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


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Ambiguity tolerance: Cross cultural content analysis

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Marina Vulova, Maria Trifonova, Carolyn GranierDeferre, Tzena Mileva
NATO Research Fellowship

Jacobs Foundation - Short-term exchange grant
Laboratory of Cognition and Development
University Rene Descartes, Paris, France
Institute of Psychology, Academy of Sciences
Sofia, Bulgaria
Stoycheva, Lubart, Zenasni, Popova (ICP 2008)


Slide 18

Katya Stoycheva, Todd Lubart, Franck Zenasni, Kalina Popova
Relation of ambiguity tolerance to cognitive and affective needs
A cross cultural content analysis

THANK YOU
FOR YOUR ATTENTION !

IS-008 Tolerance for ambiguity, creativity, and personality
ICP2008, July 20-25, Berlin, Germany