Revista de Motivación y Emoción 2012, 1, 1 - 11
Richard M. Sorrentino
The University of Western Ontario
Keywords
Uncertainty Orientation
Motivation
Cognition
Affect
Uncertainty Orientation:
A Theory Where the Exception Forms the Rule
Abstract
In this article, the theory of uncertainty orientation, its origins and its current state
are described. The theory was designed to resolve issues regarding its predecessor,
Atkinson & Raynor’s (1974) theory of achievement motivation. Research testing
the theory demonstrated that the affect-driven theory along with cognitively-based
alternatives could both be subsumed under our more general theory. Research on
testing the initial theory of uncertainty orientation revealed that this was the case.
Whereas uncertainty-oriented people follow the general predictions of many extant
theories, certainty-oriented people perform in exactly the opposite manor. This
“exception to the rule” is discussed followed by a brief overview and test of the
formal model within and across cultures.
The theory of uncertainty orientation (Sorrentino &
Roney, 2000; Sorrentino & Short, 1986) emerged
as a by-product in an attempt to resolve several
issues discovered in testing Atkinson’s theory of
achievement motivation (Atkinson, 1964; Atkinson
& Feather, 1966; Atkinson & Raynor, 1974). As
described in his 1964 book, two of Atkinson’s
heroes were Kurt Lewin and Galileo Galilei.
Atkinson described how Lewin’s expectancy-value
formulation of behaviour in one’s life space set the
groundwork for motivational theory. As in physics,
where the force of gravity is determined by the mass
of the attracting object, the mass of the falling
object, and the distance between the two,
motivation tendencies are determined by the
valence of the attracting object, the motivation
within the individual to gravitate toward that object,
and the probability of obtaining that object.
Atkinson also pointed out that the one
problem with the theory is it generally ignored
Galileo’s dictum that the exception forms the rule.
In his work on level of aspiration, Lewin was struck
by the almost universal tendency for people to move
to a more difficult task following success (e.g.,
Lewin, Dembo, Festinger, & Sears, 1944).
Although this eventually became Hypothesis 4 in
Festinger’s (1954) social comparison theory, that is,
there is a unidirectional drive upwards when it come
so evaluating one’s ability, Atkinson questioned this
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and asked what about the exceptions, those who do
not move upward? Working with one of his PhD
committee members, “Doc” Cartwright (Atkinson
& Cartwright, 1964), the theory of achievement
motivation postulated that it is only those who are
success-oriented, that is those who’s motive to
succeed (Ms) is greater than their motive to avoid
failure (MAF), who will be positively motivated to
undertake achievement oriented activity. Failurethreatened persons, or those in whose MAF is
greater than their Ms, will be negatively motivated
to undertake achievement-oriented activity and will
be inhibited in their performance if other incentives
(e.g. money, social pressure) compel them to
undertake such activity.
Thus, it is only those who are success-oriented
who will move to a higher level of difficulty
following success. Following the work of Festinger
(1942) and Escalona (1940) in their work on
incentive value of success (Is) and probability of
success (Ps), Atkinson and his colleagues postulated
that since Is = 1-Ps, success-oriented persons should
be most positively motivated, and failure-threatened
persons most negatively motivated, where a task is
of intermediate difficulty. It is here where the
compromise between Is and Ps will have its
maximum value and where one’s tendency to
succeed or their tendency to avoid shame over
failure will be at its peak. For the former, it is a
All Correspondence can be sent to the author, Richard M. Sorrentino,
Psychology Department, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario,
Canada N6A 5C2
E-mail: [email protected].
My thanks to Yang Ye and Jeff Rotman for their helpful comments and
editing of this manuscript
1
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Revista de Motivación y Emoción
compromise between incentive and likelihood of
success; for the latter, success is less likely than an
easy task (e.g., Ps = .80) and one will feel more
responsible than failing at a difficult task (e.g., Ps =
.20).
Although the theory of achievement
motivation generated several supportive studies (see
Atkinson, 1964; Atkinson & Feather, 1966;
Atkinson & Raynor,1974; Raynor & Entin, 1982),
the theory came under attack in the 1970s with the
resurgence of interest in social cognition (see
Nisbett & Ross, 1980; Weiner, 1972). Whereas the
theory of achievement motivation is affect based,
with success-oriented persons primarily seeking
pride in accomplishment, and failure-threatened
persons primarily avoiding shame over failure,
others argued for a strictly cognitive interpretation.
For them, the primary goal of the success-oriented
person is self- assessment. Weiner (1972), for
example, argued that success-oriented persons show
a preference for activity of intermediate difficulty
(i.e., Ps = .50) because easy or difficult tasks do not
provide good diagnostic data regarding one’s ability.
If one were to succeed or fail at an easy or difficult
task, attributions would more likely be made to task
or chance factors than to one’s actual ability.
Similarly, Trope (1975, 1979) argued that
achievement-related motives were not determined
by the affective experience, but rather by selfassessment, or reducing uncertainty about one’s
ability. As was the case with Weiner, Trope
proposed that a task of intermediate difficulty would
provide the most information about one’s ability.
The role of fear of failure and future goal
orientation in these theories was either ignored or
dismissed (see Weiner, 1972).
This is where our research program came in.
We not only looked at exceptions to the rule for the
theory of achievement motivation, but for selfassessment theories which attacked the original
theory. According to Sorrentino and colleagues,
differences due to achievement-related motives are
affective in nature, as Atkinson and his colleagues
argued. However, task difficulty should be
considered in terms of its uncertainty and not in
terms of its affective consequences. This is because a
Ps of 0.50 is also a condition of maximal
uncertainty; it represents the point where the
chance of succeeding or failing is most uncertain.
As Ps increases from this point, certainty of success
increases. As Ps decreases from this point, certainty
of failure increases. Sorrentino et al. (1984),
therefore, argued that it is the uncertainty of the
situation, and not the task difficulty per se, that is
2012, 1, pp. 1 - 11
affecting the resultant tendency to undertake the
activity. As with Weiner (1972) and Trope (1975),
self-assessment or the reduction of uncertainty
about one’s ability is argued to be important in
achievement-oriented activity. Unlike the earlier
theories, however, self-assessment is considered
within the domain of uncertainty orientation and
not achievement-related motives. Drawing on the
work of Raynor and McFarlin (1986), Sorrentino
and Short (1986) argued that achievement-related
motives involve affective value (feeling good or bad
about the self), while uncertainty orientation is
related to information value (attaining or
maintaining clarity about the self).
In order to test their theoretical notions,
Sorrentino and his colleagues developed measures of
the informational components related to uncertainty
orientation akin to affective components related to
achievement motivation. Just as Atkinson and his
colleagues used a thematic apperception measure of
nAchievement (McClelland, Atkinson, Clark, &
Lowell, 1953, 1958) to infer the motive to succeed,
these investigators developed a measure of
Uncertainty (Frederick, Sorrentino, & Hewitt,
1987; Sorrentino, Hanna, & Roney, 1992) to infer
the motive to resolve uncertainty. Also, just as the
former investigators used test anxiety (Mandler &
Sarason, 1952) to infer the motive to avoid failure,
the latter use an acquiescent-free measure of
authoritarianism (Cherry & Byrne, 1977) to infer
the motive to maintain certainty. Authoritarianism
was chosen because of its association with concerns
for familiarity and dislike for the unknown (see
Cherry & Byrne, 1977; Kirscht & Dillehay, 1967).
The resultant measure of uncertainty orientation
with those high in Uncertainty and low in
authoritarianism deemed to be uncertainty-oriented
and those low in Uncertainty and high in
authoritarianism deemed to be certainty-oriented
has consistently been shown to have high predictive
validity (see Sorrentino & Roney, 2000).
As previously mentioned, by integrating the
affective and informational components (i.e.,
achievement-related motives and uncertainty
orientation, respectively), and by varying the
uncertainty of the situation, Sorrentino et al. (1984)
found support for their theory of uncertainty
orientation. In three studies, they report that the
major predictions from Atkinson and Raynor’s
(1974) theory of achievement motivation do hold,
but only for uncertainty-oriented persons.
Certainty-oriented persons, however, behave in a
manner opposite to uncertainty-oriented persons. In
Study 1, subjective probability of success was varied
R. M. Sorrentino
Uncertain orientation
such that participants were led to believe that their
chances of succeeding were high (Ps=0.80),
intermediate (Ps=0.50) or low (Ps=0.20). Studies 2
and 3 examined the impact of future goals. Study 2
was an experiment where some participants were
informed that they must pass the first mathematical
test in order to move on to each of three subsequent
tests (contingent path). Others were told that
success on the first task did not influence progress
to the other tasks (non-contingent path). Study 3
was a field study that examined grades on final
course examinations as a function of whether
students perceived the course as instrumental or not
instrumental to future goals. Predictions from the
theory of achievement motivation were confirmed
only for persons who were also uncertaintyoriented, across all three studies (Sorrentino, Short,
& Raynor, 1984). That theory predicts that successoriented persons will have higher performance
scores than failure-threatened persons in tasks of
intermediate difficulty (Study 1) and where the
opportunity to engage in future achievementoriented activity (Study 2) or future careers (Study
3) is contingent upon performance at the immediate
activity. That is, these differences will be greater
than in the other experimental conditions.
However, precisely the opposite pattern occurred
for the certainty-oriented group. For this group,
success-oriented persons had higher performance
scores than failure-threatened person in easy or
difficult tasks (Study 1) and where the opportunity
to engage in future achievement—activity (Study 2)
or future careers (Study 3) is not contingent upon
performance at the immediate activity. .
These three studies were consistent with
Sorrentino and Short’s (1986) general hypothesis
that characteristic differences due to achievementrelated motives would be greatest in situations
relevant to one’s uncertainty orientation. In other
words, success-oriented persons will perform best
and failure-threatened persons will perform worst
where the situation matches their particular mode
of uncertainty orientation (i.e., uncertain situations
for uncertainty-oriented persons, certain situations
for certainty-oriented persons).
The Exception Forms the Rule
Having subsumed the theory of achievement
motivation by our higher level theory, it was natural
for us to take a look at its antagonist, selfassessment theory. The leading proponent at the
time was Yaacov Trope, who had recently (Trope,
1975) completed an intriguing study demonstrating
3
that regardless of whether the outcome was likely to
be good (the Ascending condition) or bad (the
Descending condition) his participants chose to
take a test which would resolve uncertainty
regardless of condition. For him this demonstrated
that self-assessment theory was superior to selfenhancement theories (see Shrauger,1975) which
would have predicted uncertainty resolution only in
the Ascending condition. We (Sorrentino &
Hewitt, 1984) replicated this study and found, as
we predicted, that it is the UOs who would attempt
to resolve uncertainty regardless of condition. COs
did not follow either self-assessment or selfenhancement predictions; they chose not to resolve
uncertainty whether the outcome was likely to be
positive or negative.
As we were pondering these results, my
colleague at the time, Tory Higgins was
formulating his ideas regarding self-discrepancy
theory (see Higgins, Strauman, & Klein, 1986).
Briefly, if there is a discrepancy between one’s actual
self and ideal or ought self (held by the person or a
significant other) one should be motivated to reduce
it. If not successful, one would have feelings of
dejection/depression or agitation/anxiety. Given our
results from Sorrentino & Hewitt (1984) that COs
do not seem concerned about resolving uncertainty
regarding the self, it was a simple matter to
postulate that they would also not be terribly
concerned about resolving discrepancies between
the actual self and other selves. In three studies by
Roney & Sorrentino (1995) we demonstrated that
whereas UOs are actively engaged when there is a
self-discrepancy, COs are actively engaged when
there is no discrepancy. By actively engaged, we
mean that those who were also success-oriented
performed better, and those who were failurethreatened performed worse than those less actively
engaged. This was seen on an arithmetic ability test
(Study 1) and actual course grades received seven
months
following
measurement
of
selfdiscrepancies (Study 2). We also showed that when
substituting priming of ideal and ought
discrepancies the primes acted much like
achievement-related motives (success-oriented and
failure-threatened, respectively) interacting with
chronic
self-discrepancies
and
uncertainty
orientation to predict performance (Study 3).
In discussing these results with my class of
second year students in an Honours Social
Psychology course, one of my students, Maria
Gitta, came up with the idea that our theory should
have relevance to dual process theories of
information processing and persuasion such as those
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Revista de Motivación y Emoción
by Petty and Cacioppo’s (1981) and Chaiken and
Eagly (1983). Indeed, in two studies, we found
evidence that COs behave exactly opposite to what
these theories predict. In Study 1, for example, we
found that UOs are more persuaded by strength of
arguments and less persuaded by source expertise
when a diagnostic test is personally relevant than
when it is not. COs, on the other hand, actually
increase their reliance on source expertise and
decrease systematic processing of the arguments
under high than low personal relevance.
Interestingly, they do show evidence of systematic
processing more under low than high personal
relevance. That is, where the task is not diagnostic
of one’s ability than where it is.
Results consistent with the above were found
in testing minority versus majority influence and
ingroup-outgroup favoritism. With regard to
minority-majority influence, both Moscovici (1980,
1985) and Nemeth (1986) have suggested that
influence attempts from majorities induce a very
different pattern of cognitive processing than such
attempts from minorities. Others, however, argued
that both types of influence can be accounted for by
the same single process (e.g., Latane, l996; Latane
& Wolf, 1981; Mackie, 1987, Wolf, 1985). In
support of single process theories, Baker & Petty
(1994) proposed a balance theory, such that people
would process information from a majority or
minority depending upon whether the information
was congruent or incongruent with expectations. To
the extent it was incongruent, such as a majority
espousing a counter-attitudinal viewpoint, or a
minority espousing an attitudinally consistent
viewpoint, then systematic processing would be
more likely to occur. This is what they found.
Shuper and Sorrentino (2004), however, showed
that whereas UOs showed evidence of systematic
processing when the information was incongruent
with expectations, COs exhibited the opposite
pattern, showing evidence of systematic processing
when information was congruent.
Similar results were found by Hodson and
Sorrentino (2003) when testing information
processing from ingroup versus outgroup sources.
Mackie and her colleagues (Mackie, GastardoConaco, & Skelly, 1992; Mackie, Worth, &
Asuncion, 1990) suggested that arguments by an
ingroup category might promote the use of
systematic information processing. That is,
information provided by an in-group source might
be considered to be more relevant to the individual
than information provided by an outgroup source
(e.g., Festinger, 1950; Mackie et al.,1992; Mackie et
2012, 1, pp. 1 - 11
al., 1990). In the study by Hodson and Sorrentino
(2003), Participants were exposed to strong or
weak, ingroup or outgroup messages that were
either expectancy congruent (in-group agreement,
out-group disagreement) or expectancy incongruent
(in­group disagreement, out-group agreement). As
predicted,
uncertainty-oriented
participants
increased systematic information processing under
incongruent conditions relative to congruent
conditions; certainty-oriented individuals processed
systematically only under congruent conditions.
We also tested our exception forms the rule
principle in the field of mental health. Brouwers
and Sorrentino (1993) demonstrated that protection
motivation theory (Rogers, 1983; Maddux &
Rogers, 1983) worked very well only for UOs. As
threat and efficacy increased to its highest point,
that is, high threat/high efficacy, UOs increased
their desire for more information about the disease
and for a kit that would diagnose the disease. COs,
however, actually decreased their desire under high
threat/high efficacy as opposed to either high
threat/low efficacy or low threat/high efficacy. And
when we (Brouwers, Sorrentino, Roney, & Hanna,
2004) tested Pennebaker’s (1989, 1997) socialpenetration theory, UOs did show lower skin
conductance while revealing a traumatic event that
occurred in the past as opposed to a non-traumatic
event, but the COs actually increased their skin
conductance when the event was traumatic—they
did not like doing this at all.
Walker and Sorrentino (2000) carried this
research into the area of depression, looking at
moderately depressed versus non-depressed people.
As opposed to theories which postulate that
moderate depression should increase information
processing and performance, presumably in an
attempt to rid oneself of depression (e.g., Edwards
& Weary,1993; Gleicher & Weary, 1991;
Hildebrand-Saints &Weary, 1989; McCaul, 1983;
Yost & Weary, 1996), we found that this was true
only for UOs. When made to feel control deprived
on one task, moderately depressed UOs desired
more information about the task and performed
better on a subsequent task (Study 1). In Study 2, a
methodology similar to that used by Wong and
Weiner (1981) was employed to assess informationprocessing behavior following a control deprivation
or neutral condition. Wong and Weiner had
participants read about hypothetical negative and
positive outcomes and report any questions they
might ask following such an event. Their results
indicated that people ask more questions following
negative and unexpected hypothetical outcomes in
R. M. Sorrentino
Uncertain orientation
comparison to positive and expected outcomes.
Once again, our control deprived moderately
depressed UOs were more likely to show this
negative outcome bias than when they were nondeprived and non-depressed. Our moderately
depressed, control deprived COs did not; they
“tuned out” and almost asked no questions.
With regard to asking questions, we also
showed that UOs are significantly more likely to
employ counterfactual thinking following negative
outcomes (Haynes et al, 2007) and they are more
likely to socially compare (Roney & Sorrentino,
1995b) than COs. But one may ask, is there
anything prior theories predict that will actually be
done more or only by COs? Why yes, there is. COs
are more likely to follow the symptoms of
Groupthink, that is, doing what the directive leader
said (Hodson & Sorrentino, 1997), show ingroup
bias in the Tajfel & Turner (1979) minimal groups
paradigm, and they are the only ones who attempt
to restore their “optimal identity” (Brewer &
Harasty, 1996) when made to feel dissimilar to the
group (Sorrentino, Seligman, & Battista, 2007). All
of this is explained by the COs tendency to rely on
groups as a heuristic in face of uncertainty (see
Sorrentino et al., 2007).
All of the above studies indicate that
motivation and cognitive processes of UOs and
COs are controlled by their uncertainty orientation
and situational uncertainty. More importantly, for
us, these studies led to a formal theory of
motivation, cognition, and affect which is briefly
presented below. We then present some supportive
research, which tested our theory within a crosscultural context.
The Theory of Uncertainty Orientation
Much of the above research led to a
mathematical reformulation of the theory of
uncertainty orientation (see Sorrentino, Smithson,
Hodson, Roney, & Walker, 2003). This
reformulation of the theory attempted to account
not only for when people should be engaged in a
particular activity, but when they should become
disengaged. Figure 1 illustrates the model in terms
of engagement, disengagement, and the affective
consequences associated with this behavior. Briefly,
UOs are more likely to be actively engaged in a
situation where uncertainty is greater than the
probability of certainty (this is also known as a
matched situation) and as the personal relevance of
the outcome of that uncertain situation increases.
Conversely, COs are more likely to be actively
5
engaged in a situation where certainty is greater (a
matched situation for them) and the personal
relevance of the outcome in that certain situation is
greater. By active engagement, we mean that the
person should increase his or her systematic
processing of information and decrease heuristic or
more non-systematic forms of information
processing. In addition, relevant sources of
motivation such as achievement or affiliation
motives in achievement or social situations,
respectively, should be accentuated. When the
uncertainty of the situation does not match one’s
uncertainty orientation (i.e., it is an unmatched
situation), people become disengaged from the
situation. By disengagement, we mean that the
person should increase non-systematic forms of
information processing and decrease systematic
information processing. In addition, relevant
sources of motivation should be lessened. It is
important to note that engagement can be positive
(+) or negative (-) depending upon the relevant
motives in the situation. For example, if one is
success-oriented (SO), then he or she should be
positively
engaged,
particularly
when
an
achievement-oriented situation matches his or her
uncertainty orientation, and should perform best
under these conditions. If he or she is failurethreatened (FT), then he or she should be
negatively engaged, especially when the situation
matches his or her uncertainty orientation, and
should perform least well under these conditions.
This occurs because a matched situation is
consistent with the person’s uncertainty orientation.
It is his or her way of organizing the world such
that he or she can cope with uncertainty in the best
way
possible.
In
unmatched
situations,
disengagement will occur and should lead to a
relaxing of relevant motives. In turn, this relaxing of
relevant motives can lead, for example, to a decrease
in performance for SOs, and ironically, an increase
in performance for FTs.
This part of the model, as shown in Figure 1,
is empirically based. In fact, in all of the studies
dealing with achievement-related motives described
above, the data fit this description. In addition to
formalizing the model, Sorrentino et al. (2003)
speculated on what should happen when people are
engaged or disengaged from an activity in terms of
affective experiences. They put forward the general
expectation that people's dispositional affect would
be more active than passive when their uncertainty
orientation matched the uncertainty inherent in the
situation at hand than when they did not match. In
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Revista de Motivación y Emoción
mismatched situations, passive emotions should
dominate.
Putting informational influences together with
motivational and affective experiences, uncertainty
orientation can be understood in terms of flow
experiences as shown in Figure 1. Drawing on
Csikszentmihalyi (1975), Sorrentino et al. (2003)
state that flow is feeling good about the self while
2012, 1, pp. 1 - 11
concentrating on the activity at hand. It occurs
when the person engages in a situation that has
positive information value (attaining or maintaining
clarity for uncertainty oriented vs. certainty oriented
persons, respectively) and the person is positively
motivated to undertake the activity; in other words,
when positive information value and positive
motivation are matched.
Figure 1. The theory of uncertainty orientation. Adapted from Sorrentino, R. M., Smithson, M., Hodson, G.,
Roney, C. J. R., & Walker, A. M. (2003). The theory of uncertainty orientation: A mathematical reformulation.
Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 47, 132-149.
One’s uncertainty orientation is neither
domain specific nor is it affectively-based. Rather, it
interacts with the uncertainty of the situation and
with affectively-based motives to predict differences
in flow behavior. For example, SOs or those who
are motivated by anticipating pride in
accomplishment are more actively engaged in and
have more flow experiences in achievementoriented situations that match their uncertainty
orientation than in achievement-oriented situations
that do not match their uncertainty orientation
(Sorrentino et al., 2003). It is in these former
situations that they perform best and enjoy the
activity the most. Failure threatened persons, those
who are motivated by anticipating shame over
failure, are also actively engaged in achievement
situations, although they are likely to have anti-flow
experiences in achievement-oriented situations that
match their uncertainty orientation than in
achievement-oriented situations that do not match
their uncertainty orientation (e.g., Roney &
Sorrentino, 1995; Sorrentino, Short, & Raynor,
1984). Sorrentino et al. (2003, p. 145) describe antiflow as follows: “The person in anti flow feels badly
about the self while acting in or attempting to avoid
a situation that he or she fears. He or she exhibits
the worst performance and the greatest fear of
failure in these situations.”
In matched situations, people are in either flow
or anti-flow. In contrast, in mismatched situations,
people are always in non-flow. Mismatched
situations do not activate the self system, and there
R. M. Sorrentino
7
Uncertain orientation
is no real importance to the self attached to them.
This reasoning is consistent with Raynor and
McFarlin’s (1986) distinction between the self and
the behavioral system. In the self-system, we are
performing an activity because our self-image is
involved, whereas in a behavioral system we are
performing the activity because of extrinsic
incentives that are not considered part of the self.
For example, a professor may view the success or
failure of his or her research to be a reflection of the
self, while he or she views taking out the garbage as
having nothing to do with the self. Non-flow
activity, then, may be aligned with the behavioral
system but not with the self-system.
Sorrentino et al. (2003) cite Russell's (1980)
circumplex model as a way of distinguishing
between the emotions experienced in flow and nonflow situations. In flow states (either flow or antiflow), people are more likely to experience active
emotions (both positive and negative) such as
excited, astonished, alarmed, and angry. In contrast,
when they are in non flow states, people are more
likely to experience passive emotions (both positive
and negative) such as satisfied, content, bored, and
gloomy. Interestingly, the first test of this
hypothesis came with an opportunity to study
differences in affective experiences between people
in Japan and Canada (Sorrentino, et al., 2008). A
second study testing actual performance (Szeto et
al., 2011) followed.
Tests of the Theory Across Cultures
We assume that if UOs and COs from
different cultures are put in identical situations, that
is, where the amount of perceived uncertainty is the
same, then UOs in one culture would act like UOs
in another, and COs in one culture would act like
COs in another (see Yasunaga & Kouhara, 1995,
for example) However, our past research led us to
the notion of Japan being a CO-centric society and
Canada being a UO-centric society (see Shuper,
Sorrentno, Otsubo, Hodson, & Walker, 2004).
This suggested that the people in each society have
somewhat different everyday life experiences. That
is, in their home, their work or program of study,
and in their social activity, people in Japan are more
likely to encounter situations structured for COs,
whereas people in Canada, are more likely to
encounter situations structured for UOs. This being
the case, one could posit that culture can interact
with uncertainty orientation to influence the
outcomes one experiences. If one’s society were
UO-centric, for example, then he or she should
have more active (flow and anti-flow) experiences
than passive or non-flow experiences. The study by
Sorrentino et al. (2008) was a direct test of this
hypothesis. Participants from universities in Japan
and Canada described the frequency of experiencing
various emotions. Results were consistent with our
hypothesis.
Participants
whose
uncertainty
orientation matched that of their country (i.e., UOs
in Canada, COs in Japan), experienced more active
emotions than mismatched participants (i.e., COs
in Canada, UOs in Japan), who experienced more
passive emotions. These findings follow exactly
from what is predicted in Figure 1, when collapsed
across achievement-related motives, supporting
both the theory and the notion that UOs and COs
will differ in each country in their emotional
experiences.
Having tested emotional responses, (Szeto et
al., 2011) went on to test actual performance
differences as predicted in the model. That is, in
matched achievement-oriented situations, SOs
should perform better than FTs because of flow and
anti-flow, but in mismatched situations, FTs may
actually perform better than SOs because of the
reverse effects of non-flow experiences (e.g. relief
versus boredom, respectively). Using actual course
grades as the key performance variable, Szeto and
colleagues found that uncertainty-oriented SOs
received higher grades than FTs and these
differences were greater than for certainty-oriented
students in Canada. However, it was the certaintyoriented SOs in Japan who performed better than
the FTs and these differences were greater than for
uncertainty-oriented students. These researchers
also found that students in Canada felt that the
course better matched their learning preferences if
they were UOs than if they were COs, but again it
was the COs in Japan who felt their course better
matched their learning preferences than did the
UOs.
Conclusions
In this paper, I have tried to show the reader
that uncertainty orientation is a key variable,
moderating the outcomes predicted by many
theories related to information processing, affect,
and performance related to achievement-oriented
activity. This occurs at the individual, group and
cross-cultural levels of analyses. It occurs in the
laboratory and in the real world. And it occurs for
all kinds of behavior, including health-related ones.
A question that one might ask is, why is it that all
these theories where we showed that COs are the
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exception, seem to work without being negated by
those who are COs? Well, we argue that it is
because most of these studies employ university
students who tend to be CO. We found early on, in
fact, that university populations in North America
tend to be uncertainty-oriented relative to the lay
population (see Sorrentino, Holmes, Hanna, &
Sharp, 1995; Sorrentino, Roney, & Hanna, 1992).
It seems that researchers at elite universities, who
likely are uncertainty-oriented, have been testing
their theories on uncertainty-oriented students.
One classic example of this came to mind
recently, when Shinobu Kitayama gave a talk at our
university. He was discussing his research on
showing that the working-class students at Eastern
Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Michigan,
differed markedly from his middle and upper class
students at the University of Michigan. I recalled
that Atkinson, who was at the University of
Michigan, was never able to show that failurethreatened students actually avoid intermediate
levels of difficulty; they simply preferred it less than
success-oriented students. His former student,
Stuart Karabenick, however, did show this result
2012, 1, pp. 1 - 11
(Karabenick & Yousseff, 1968). Karabenick’s
participants were students from that same university
in Ypsilanti, Eastern Michigan. It is not
unreasonable to assume that those students were
COs. We did show in one of our risk taking studies
(Sorrentino, Hewitt & Raso-Knott, 1992) that
indeed it is only failure-threatened COs who show
this effect.
In sum, it seems clear that the theory of
uncertainty orientation needs to be reckoned with.
Our future research, we hope, will deal with a more
dynamical approach to the study of motivation,
cognition and affect. Our research so far is more-orless a static view of motivation. Future research
needs to take account of what has gone on before
performing the current activity, and it must deal
with all the competing tendencies waiting to be
expressed in action. In our mathematical
reformulation paper (Sorrentino et al., 2003) we
show how Atkinson and Birch’s (1970, 1978)
theory, the dynamics of action, can be subsumed by
our own theoretical approach. It is there where a
complete theory of motivation, cognition and
emotion must go.
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R. M. Sorrentino
Uncertain orientation
Richard M. Sorrentino
The University of Western Ontario
Keywords
Orientación hacia la incertidumbre
Motivación
Cognición
Afecto
11
Orientación hacia la incertidumbre:
Una teoría donde la excepción es la regla
Abstract
En este artículo se describe la teoría de la orientación hacia la incertidumbre, sus
orígenes y su estado actual. Esta teoría fue elaborada para resolver los problemas que
presentaba su predecesora, la teoría de la motivación de logro de Atkinson y Raynor
(1974). Los estudios encaminados a probarla demostraron que tanto la teoría del
afecto como las alternativas de base cognitiva podían englobarse bajo esta teoría más
general. Igualmente, la investigación para probar la teoría inicial de la orientación
hacia la incertidumbre reveló que este era el caso. Así, mientras que las personas con
orientación a la incertidumbre siguen las predicciones generales de muchas teorías
existentes, las orientadas a la certidumbre actúan de manera diametralmente
opuesta. Este artículo trata esta "excepción a la regla" y, a continuación, resume y
analiza el modelo formal entre y dentro de diferentes culturas