Latest News

This week, the Wikipedia entry for Cognitive Style was updated to reflect our research.  The updated text can be reviewed below:

A popular, multi-dimensional instrument for the measure of cognitive style is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or MBTI. In recent times, scholars have questioned the construct validity of some of the scales associated with this instrument. Similar to MBTI but more frequently used in America is the Herrmann Brain Dominance Indicator (HBDI). Both of these instruments, however, do not take into account modern medical findings due to the invention of MRI, PET and EEG technology.

A more accurate view of cognitive style is presented by Dr. Katherine Benziger in her Benziger Thinking Styles Assessment. The BTSA takes into account extraversion and introversion along a chemical path, distinct from MBTI which considers it to be binary (a person is either Extraverted or Introverted); a challenge to the validity of one of the MBTI scales. This is in line with Hans Eysenck's later work on the topic where he found the Reticular Activation System to be the biological basis for brain arousal and our personal preferred 'set-point' or extraversion-introversion level.

Similarly the HBDI does not take into account Falsification of Type as proposed by Carl Jung. It, and other similar instruments look to describe a snapshot of where a person is now. This snapshot does not describe where they should or could be depending upon the amount of stress in their daily lives and the extent to which they're using parts of their brain most of the time that are not preferred and thus causing themselves to activate their stress system chronically in some cases.

Another difference is the idea that we change our cognitive style over a life-time. Again, this is not presented in any other instruments as clearly as the BTSA. Whilst Dr. Benziger's tool describes periods of life where we develop competence in a variety of tasks, her theory shows that our preferred cognitive style remains the same irrespective of these complimentary competency development stages. One remains with a preference for learning a specific set of brain functions and is enabled to develop other functions (one of four in Dr. Benziger's model) through the acknowledgement and embrace of the natural preference.

Many papers are appearing that substantiate and challenge the model. Most useful to date is the work of Richard Haier on metabolic glucose rates and their connection to neuronally efficient areas of the brain, plus the historic work of Karl Pribram on regional cortical function. Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi's work on flow points toward a thriving state when engaged in certain tasks. Dr Benziger's model describes this thriving state as when a person is engaged in tasks that suit their preferred thinking style or in tasks that suit their current developing competency.

Contrary to the theory are arguments about brain plasticity meaning that any part of the brain can theoretically develop any competency where there is a trauma to the preferred regional task. Norman Doidge's work on this shows that we continue to learn until our dying days and a ripe old age and that we can recover brain function where a pathology of some sort has led to functional loss if we take the brain through the same activity to learn the function as it originally went. However, this speaks more to the brain's ability to recover from injury rather than it's primary regional specialisation. Doidge's work, as well as many neuroscientists in the field has established the function of specific lobes for specific tasks: the frontal lobes for conceptualisation as distinct from the somatosensory cortex including the parietal, occipital and temporal lobes. The occipital is accepted broadly in its preferred specialisation for initial visual processing, the temporal for audio and the parietal for, amongst other tasks, spatial sense and navigation. Thus, Pribram's work on regional, cortical function stands as a sensible construct for the primary localisation of tasks in the healthy, human brain.

More work needs to be done to create a concrete link between brain physiology and cognitive style. Dr Benziger's work to date has proven her theory by application of her assessment over 25 years. Younger than MBTI somewhat, or fresher some would say. Daryle Abrahams of Teetch Ltd has proven her model to be legitimate amongst the most senior levels of business in Europe, far more so than any other instrument found. This is, however, not prima facie evidence of the tool's effectiveness in a scientific sense.