Beyond the Purely Cognitive: Belief Systems, Social Cognitions, and Metacognitions As Driving Forces in Intellectual Performance

This study explores the way that belief systems, interactions with social or experimental environments, and skills at the “control” level in decision-making shape people’s behavior as they solve problems. It is argued that problemsalvers’ beliefs (not necessarily consciously held) about what is useful in mathematics may determine the set of “cognitive resources” at their disposol as they do mathematics. Such beliefs may, for example, render inaccessible to them lorge bodies of information that are stored in long-term memory and that are easily retrieved in other circumstances. In other cases, individuals’ reactions to an experimental setting (fear of failure. or the desire to “look mathematical” while being videotaped) may induce behavior that is almost pothalogical-and ot the same time, so consistent that it can be modeled. In generol, such “environmental” factors establish the context within which individuals access and utilize the information potentiolly ot their disposal.