veloping brain make complex contributions to a
child’s development.
See also: ABSTRACT REASONING; PIAGET, JEAN;
THEORIES OF DEVELOPMENT; THREE
MOUNTAIN TASK; VYGOTSKY, LEV
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Jennifer R. Dyer
COGNITIVE STYLE
How can several people look at one common object
and describe it correctly, yet in so many different
ways? Why is it that people exhibit the same variability
when experiencing identical events? Psychologists be-
lieve that individual biological and psychological dif-
ferences affect the ways in which people perceive
events, objects, sights, sounds, and feelings. Thus,
when several people encounter an identical object or
event, each might experience a different perception
of that object or event. There is no question that the
exposure of infants and children to different experi-
ences shapes their personalities and influences who
they are and how they interpret things. And many ed-
ucators and researchers are now focusing their atten-
tion on these differences to further understand how
individuals in the classroom perceive information
and learn in different ways.
Cognitive style is the manner by which individu-
als perceive information in the environment and the
patterns of thought that they use to develop a knowl-
edge base about the world around them. The concept
of styles of cognition, an area under continuing inves-
tigation, has been discussed and researched in the
psychological community as early as the late 1930s.
Knowledge gained concerning cognitive styles pro-
vides the opportunity to learn more about individual
differences. This knowledge can then be applied to
assist teachers, counselors, and all professionals who
are involved in children’s learning experiences.
There are three very important cognitive styles:
leveling-sharpening, field-dependence/field-inde-
pendence, and reflectivity-impulsivity. Cognitive
styles are distinct from individual intelligence, but
they may affect personality development and how in-
dividuals learn and apply information. And while re-
search has shown that these differences precede
environmental shaping, the effects of cognitive styles
can be accented or mitigated by many outside factors,
such as classroom setting, social experiences, and vo-
cational choices. It is for this reason that research in
this area is so important and that it is critical to train
educational professionals in methods to address these
differences in the classroom.Leveling and Sharpening
Leveling and sharpening is a cognitive style that
represents the way in which an individual uses previ-
ous memories when attempting to assimilate new in-
formation with prior knowledge. This cognitive style
was described in the mid-1950s and was studied by
Philip Holzman and George Klein, among others.
Prior to the 1990s, the Squares Test, which was devel-
oped by the Menninger Foundation, was one of the
methods of identifying levelers and sharpeners.
People who are levelers tend to select many mem-
ories from the past in an attempt to clarify and cate-
gorize newly acquired information. Sharpeners, on
the other hand, seem to select fewer memories when
processing new knowledge. In his 1997 book Cognitive
Styles and Classroom Learning, Harry Morgan contend-
ed that, overall,sharpeners tend to have more accu-
rate identifications of new knowledge and can relate
recently acquired material to old material with more
specificity. This may be due to an ability to selectively
sort and store pieces of memories and to carefully dif-
ferentiate associations between past experiences. By
contrast, levelers inaccurately blend features of mem-92 COGNITIVE STYLE