Customer Reviews

Thinking Styles

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Robert J. Sternberg is IBM Professor of Psychology and Education at Yale University. His publication, Thinking Styles, is a study of how and why homosapiens think and could be classified as interactive and reciprocal mental self-government psychology. Its major objective is to show how different thinking styles affect learning preferences and how individual abilities to learn should be recognized and respected. In so doing, Sternberg manages to criticize many accepted views on intelligence testing. These, so called, standards of the day provide only part of an answer to why people learn and perform differently. His criticism of these standards provides us an insight into the special character of his concerns. Sternberg's theory of styles differs from established intelligence and motivational evaluational technique in that he explores the possibility of mental self-government. "The basic idea of the theory of mental self-government is that the forms of government we have in the world are not coincidental. Rather, they are external reflections of what goes on in people's minds. They represent alternative ways of organizing our thinking." Sternberg's theory of mental self government is as follows, "That the kinds of governments we have in the world are not merely arbitrary and perhaps random constructions, but rather in a certain sense are mirrors of the mind. In other words, they reflect different ways in which people can organize or govern themselves. On this view, then, governments are very much extensions of individuals: They represent alternative ways in which collectivities, like individuals, can organize themselves." Societies and individuals both need governmental guidelines. With this definition in mind, Sternberg's theory of thinking styles begins with three different governmental functions, legislative, executive and judicial which he attributes to three classifications of people and how they think. Legislative style people do things their own way, executive style people are implementers, and judicial style people are evaluators. Sternberg then proceeds to four different governmental forms, Monarchic, Hierarchic, Oligarchic and Anarchic, which he attributes to people and how they think. Monarchic style people tend to be motivated by a single goal. Hierarchic people tend to be priority setters, some goals are more important. Oligarchic style people tend to be motivated by several competing goals, without priority. Anarchic style people tend to be concerned with a wide assortment of goals, which they find difficult to sort out. At this point, Sternberg presents us with four different governmental concerns, global, local, internal, and external and two governmental persuasions, liberal and conservative, which he applies to people and how they think. Global style people prefer to address large abstract issues. Local style people prefer to address detail or concrete issues. Internal style people are often more introverted. External style people are often more extroverted. The liberal style people prefer to maximize change, and the conservative style people prefer to minimize change. With his government analogy firmly in place, Sternberg enumerates fifteen points needed to understand thinking styles. I have condensed them as follows: Styles are preferences not abilities; a match between styles and abilities creates a synergy; life choices should fit styles and abilities; people have patterns not just one single style; styles vary across tasks and situations; people's preferences differ; people's stylistic flexibility's differ; styles are socialized; life span styles can very; styles are measurable; styles are teachable; styles value is variable; styles are not universal; styles are not usually good or bad, they should fit; and styles must not be confused with abilities. Sternberg then explains that the thinking styles we develop as individual-thinking styles can be influenced by four variables. These variables are culture, where and how the individual is educated; gender, different sex-different expectations; age, less or more freedom of individual choice; and parenting style, degree of strictness. These four variables can affect an individual's mental self-governmental styles such as legislative or executive, internal or external, global or local, and liberal or conservative. These variables are consistent with Sternberg's fifteen points and both are needed in order to understand his thinking styles. Sternberg has supplied us with a theory of mental self-governmental and its styles, how to understand them and how they might vary. Sternberg then explains how an educator can apply styles. He suggests that "we need to teach and assess to a variety of styles." To accomplish this end we need to use a thinking styles test, a thinking styles tasks test that measures styles via performance, a questionnaire for teachers to assess their teaching styles, and a thinking styles evaluation of each student by their teacher. Our schools need to be aware of thinking styles because schools are, more often than not, too rigid and authoritarian, and to regimented and non-creative. Our schools should be more flexible. Students and teachers would both do a better job if styles, as well as ability levels, styles, as well as intelligence, were considered. I agree, with Sternberg, that teachers could be more affective if they considered the different thinking styles of their students, that they should recognize their stylistic strengths and not try to force them to be something that they are not. We need to assist students in being what they are and becoming who they are. Dr. Sternberg's Thinking Styles, from my perspective, is informative, provocative, and relevant. An awareness of Sternberg's styles should create better educators. I have always felt uncomfortable with the limits of the intelligence quotient evaluation and other traditional forms of ability measurement. Thinking Styles resolves questions I have queried and worried about. I am convinced that students who have been considered difficult to teach, in the past and today, can only be helped by knowledge of their thinking styles.

This book will be of interest to diverse audiences: educators, psychologists, managers. Thinking styles are of interest ptimarily to educators because they can help teachers to improve instruction and assessment. They are related with age, gender, experience, self-esteem. Sternberg say that learning styles might be used to characterize how one prefers to learn, cognitive styles might be used to characterize ways to cognizing the information and, thinking styles might be used to characterize how one prefers to think about material as one is learning it or after one already knows it. I learned more about my own styles and how these styles affect my life.

This book gives you the knowledge of how to evaluate your own thinking styles and the thinking styles of those that you deal with so that you can best place your thinking style to your best advantage. As the book shows, thinking styles that are out of place are a disaster and thinking styles in place are a success. Sadly, creative, or as the author calls it, legislative thinking styles are punished in the public fool system, government and most of the business world. If you are a creative person you have to understand that most of what passes for education and business is out to punish and destroy your creativity. The status-quo is the executive style of thinking and is rewarded by most schools and businesses except at the very highest levels which very few will ever attain. So, if you are a creative person plan on a life of punishment in the school or corporate world. Of course if you are creative you don't need the school or corporate world anyway and you know it. If you're not having fun, you're doing something wrong.

Following on the heels of Edward de Bono's series on thinking (although only de Bono's "Lateral Thinking" is cited) these management consultants, take up where de Bono left off.

Their thesis is that throughout our lives we tend to fall back on one, or at most, two strategies of thinking, when in fact there are at least five or six common styles available to us.

These overlooked styles and strategies greatly limit the power and range of our thinking and thus also limit the range and power of our problem-solving abilities. Including them in our repertoire can prove valuable in extending the range, power and quality of our thinking and problem solving.

Five strategies are examined and analyzed in this book. We are taught to understand our own style of thinking; how to use our existing strengths more productively, ways to augment them, as well as how to identify our own blind spots and the limitations of our own thinking style.

At the end of the book an inventory questionnaire is devised as a checklist so that problem-solvers and decision-makers may use it to ensure that they have broadened the context of their decision-making to include the widest possible variety of thinking styles.

This is a very practical and useful book, that works.

Five stars

As always, Sternberg discusses his topic in a way that readers can understand. His inclusion of the assessment of thinking styles helps to clarify reasons individuals may look at the world differently. This is a must for leadership classes.