An Exploration of Cognition and Personality Through the Lens of Cognitive Style

This study reappraises cognitive style at the intersection of cognitive development and personality. Traditionally conceptualised as a bipolar continuum contrasting significantly different modes of information processing, cognitive style has often been aligned with personality traits ranging from conscientiousness to openness. Our review, supported by correlational evidence, challenges this duality. Results show that openness is positively associated with nonlinear thinking, while conscientiousness is potentially unrelated to linearity, the latter is related to psychological climate. Moreover, linear and nonlinear measures are positively correlated, suggesting additive rather than opposing processes. When considering Kirton’s cognitive style bipolar framework, originality is aligned with both nonlinearity and openness, while linearity is unrelated to conformity. Drawing on Piaget’s theory, we distinguish the concrete stage, which supports learned, socially adaptive, and linear behaviour, from the formal stage, which enables additively both linear reasoning and nonlinear abstraction. Because fewer than half of adults reach formal cognition, many remain limited to linear thought. A similar position exists with the bipolar configuration, where a normal distribution shows half of the population limited to adaptive (linear) reasoning. These findings indicate that linearity relates to a socially shaped mode of information processing, whereas nonlinearity corresponds with, or is even replaced by, openness. This reconceptualization highlights how education’s emphasis on linear learning may constrain problem-solving, leadership, and the developmental potential of an individual.