psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

, rigidity, or mental rigidity, refers to an obstinate inability to yield or a refusal to appreciate another person's viewpoint or emotions and the tendency to perseverate, which is the inability to change habits and modify concepts and attitudes once developed. A specific example of rigidity is

functional fixedness Functional fixedness is a cognitive bias that limits a person to use an object only in the way it is traditionally used. The concept of functional fixedness originated in Gestalt psychology, a movement in psychology that emphasizes holistic proces ...

, which is a difficulty conceiving new uses for familiar objects.

History

Rigidity is an ancient part of our human cognition. Systematic research on rigidity can be found tracing back to

Gestalt psychologists Gestalt psychology, gestaltism, or configurationism is a List of psychological schools, school of psychology and a theory of perception that emphasises the processing of entire patterns and configurations, and not merely individual components. ...

, going as far back as the late 19th to early 20th century with

Max Wertheimer Max Wertheimer (; April 15, 1880 – October 12, 1943) was a psychologist who was one of the three founders of Gestalt psychology, along with Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang Köhler. He is known for his book ''Productive Thinking'' and for conceiving the ...

Wolfgang Köhler Wolfgang Köhler (; 21 January 1887 – 11 June 1967) was a German psychologist and phenomenologist who, like Max Wertheimer and Kurt Koffka, contributed to the creation of Gestalt psychology. During the Nazi regime in Germany, he pro ...

, and

Kurt Koffka Kurt Koffka (; March 12, 1886 – November 22, 1941) was a German psychologist and professor. He was born and educated in Berlin, Germany; he died in Northampton, Massachusetts, from coronary thrombosis. He was influenced by his maternal unc ...

in Germany. In the early stages of approaching the idea of rigidity, it is treated as "a unidimensional continuum ranging from rigid at one end to flexible at the other.” This idea dates back to the 1800s and was later articulated by

Charles Spearman Charles Edward Spearman, FRS (10 September 1863 – 17 September 1945) was an English psychologist known for work in statistics, as a pioneer of factor analysis, and for Spearman's rank correlation coefficient. He also did seminal work on mod ...

, who described it as mental inertia. Prior to 1960, many definitions for the term rigidity were afloat. One example includes

Kurt Goldstein Kurt Goldstein (November 6, 1878 – September 19, 1965) was a German neurologist and psychiatrist who created a holistic theory of the organism. Educated in medicine, Goldstein studied under Carl Wernicke and Ludwig Edinger where he focused on ...

's, which he stated, "adherence to a present performance in an inadequate way", another being Milton Rokeach saying the definition was, " heinability to change one's set when the objective conditions demand it". Others have simplified rigidity down to stages for easy defining. Generally, it is agreed upon that it is evidenced by the identification of mental or behavioral sets. Lewin and Kounin also proposed a theory of cognitive rigidity (also called Lewin-Kounin formulation) based on a Gestalt perspective, using it to explain particular behavior in people with

intellectual disability Intellectual disability (ID), also known as general learning disability (in the United Kingdom), and formerly mental retardation (in the United States), Rosa's Law, Pub. L. 111-256124 Stat. 2643(2010).Archive is a generalized neurodevelopmental ...

that is inflexible, repetitive, and unchanging. The theory proposed that it is caused by a greater "stiffness," or impermeability between inner-personal regions of individuals, which influence behavior. Rigidity was particularly explored in Lewin's views regarding the degree of differentiation among children. He posited that an intellectually disabled child can be distinguished from the normal child due to the smaller capacity for dynamic rearrangement in terms of his psychical systems.

Mental set

Mental sets represent a form of rigidity in which an individual behaves or believes in a certain way due to prior experience. It's a type of cognitive bias that can lead people to make assumptions about how they should solve problems without taking into account all the information available. The opposite of this is termed cognitive flexibility. These mental sets may not always be consciously recognized by the bearer. In the field of psychology, mental sets are typically examined in the process of problem solving, with an emphasis on the process of breaking away from particular mental sets into formulation of

insight Insight is the understanding of a specific causality, cause and effect within a particular context. The term insight can have several related meanings: *a piece of information *the act or result of understanding the inner nature of things or of se ...

. Breaking mental sets in order to successfully resolve problems fall under three typical stages: a) tendency to solve a problem in a fixed way, b) unsuccessfully solving a problem using methods suggested by prior experience, and c) realizing that the solution requires different methods. Components of high executive functioning, such as the interplay between

working memory Working memory is a cognitive system with a limited capacity that can Memory, hold information temporarily. It is important for reasoning and the guidance of decision-making and behavior. Working memory is often used synonymously with short-term m ...

and inhibition, are essential to effective switching between mental sets for different situations. Individual differences in mental sets vary, with one study producing a variety of cautious and risky strategies in individual responses to a reaction time test.

Causes

Rigidity can be a learned behavioral trait; for example, if the subject has a parent, boss, or teacher who demonstrated the same form of behavior towards them. Rigidity also has a genetic component and is commonly associated with

autism Autism, also known as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by differences or difficulties in social communication and interaction, a preference for predictability and routine, sensory processing d ...

Stages

Rigidity has three different main "stages" of severity, although it never has to move to further stages. The first stage is a strict perception that causes one to persist in their ways and be close-minded to other things. The second involves a motive to defend the ego. The third stage is that it is a part of one's personality and you can see it in their perception, cognition, and social interactions.

Traits

We often see traits that occur alongside rigidity.

Accompanying externalizing behaviors

They could be external behaviors, such as the following: * Insistently repetitious behavior (

perseveration Perseveration, in the fields of psychology, psychiatry, and speech–language pathology, is the repetition of a particular response (such as a word, phrase, or gesture) regardless of the absence or cessation of a stimulus. It is usually caused by ...

) * Difficulty with unmet expectations * Perfectionism * Compulsions (as in OCD)

Accompanying internalizing behaviors

Internalizing behaviors also are shown: * Perfectionism * Obsessions (as in OCD)

Associated conditions

Cognitive closure

Mental rigidity often features a high need for cognitive closure, meaning that they assign explanations prematurely to things with a determination that this is truth, finding that resolution of the dissonance as reassuring as finding the truth. Then, there is little reason to correct their unconscious misattributions if it would bring uncertainty back.

Autism

Cognitive rigidity is one feature of

autism spectrum Autism, also known as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by differences or difficulties in social communication and interaction, a preference for predictability and routine, sensory processing d ...

disorder (ASD). It is included in what's called the Broader Autism Phenotype, where a collection of autistic traits still fail to reach the level of ASD. This is one example of how rigidity does not show up as a single trait, but comes with a number of related traits.

Obsessive–compulsive disorder

Effects

Ethnocentrism

Rigidity may be a cause of

ethnocentrism Ethnocentrism in social science and anthropology—as well as in colloquial English discourse—means to apply one's own culture or ethnicity as a frame of reference to judge other cultures, practices, behaviors, beliefs, and people, instead o ...

. In one study, M. Rokeach tested for ethnocentrism's relatedness to mental rigidity by using the California Ethnocentrism Scale (when measuring American college students' views) and the California Attitude Scale (when measuring children's views) before they were given what is called by cognitive scientists "the water jar problem." This problem teaches students a set pattern for how to solve each one. Those that scored higher in ethnocentrism also showed attributes of rigidity such as persistence of mental sets and more complicated thought processes.

Consequences of unfulfillment

If a person with cognitive rigidity does not fulfill their rigidly held expectations, the following could occur: * Agitation * Aggression * Self-injurious behavior * Depression * Anxiety * Suicidality