Uncertainty is linked to this need to know what is going to happen next, so that we can anticipate, control ourselves and not be taken off guard. Uncertainty is understood as a human motivation. In particular, the one who encourages us, for example, to confirm that what we think or what others dictate to us is correct.
Although it varies depending on the degree and scope in which it appears, for some people the uncertainty is unbearable, this is where it acquires its motivating character, since the person who suffers with it, we must act to reduce it, at least. until I’m on levels I can accept.
- Some people are more tolerant of uncertainty than others.
- People in situations of great uncertainty devote many cognitive resources to their resolution.
- Especially if their tolerance is low.
- Two people may have attended a job interview.
- Needing it in the same way.
- But if one of them has little tolerance to uncertainty.
- It is most normal to try to know the result as soon as possible.
- For example.
- The person will not wait for the company to contact them: they will contact the company.
On the other hand, uncertainty can also occur when we know a person: we don’t know what it’s like, and that can make us uncomfortable, since our cognitive resources are limited, cognitive and heuristic shortcuts are good tools to reduce them quickly. These ways of reducing uncertainty are effective, but they also have negative consequences, such as the formation of stereotypes about people or the inevitable emergence of prejudices against other individuals or groups.
Here are some of the causes that create this uncertainty, you may feel identified with one of them!
Uncertainty, from the point of view of social psychology, is understood in different ways, is explained as a need for cognitive closure. This need for closure (cognitive) can be defined as the desire to give a quick answer to a question or question whose content is confusing and ambiguous.
The theory of the need for closure is based on an epidemic analysis (a set of knowledge that determines ways of understanding and interpreting the world), in which the motivation for closure or uncertainty plays the essential function of curbing the relentless search for information.
So when we feel uncertainty, we try to look for information that we consider accurate to reduce that uncertainty, when we find it, this information that has reduced uncertainty is established as an indispensable knowledge of daily life.
The need for cognitive closure seeks to crystallize and simplify self-knowledge, this search for knowledge-generating information reveals differences between people, depending on the information each selects.
If I, in order to reduce the uncertainty generated waiting for the results of the job interview, accept the idea that I will not be chosen and that someone else accepts the idea that the company is too slow to make the decision about who should accept, we will have very different and simplistic ideas about how this business works. Our expectations, as the days go by without knowing the result, differ.
This knowledge we create about how the business works may also vary. Even people in great need of closure may, under certain circumstances, have (temporarily) an open mind while looking for a cognitive closure.
If we later go to another company for an interview, we will probably tell the managers that we are in a hurry to know the decision, if the same thing happens again and they take too long to react, we will have uncertainty again and, again, we will try to reduce it.
In this case, our interpretation that we will not be hired does not serve us, because they should have told us, the need to close will lead us to enter a state of “emergency” and look for another plausible interpretation as soon as possible, for example, knowing that the company accepted us, we went through the maintenance phase.
Once cognitive closure is reached, people with a high need for closure tend to see their opinion as “permanent” and are insensitive to new information. The new idea of the company’s behavior is more difficult than the first and we will not change it until new information contradicts it, such as confirmation that the company has accepted us.
The need for cognitive closure, once awake, can affect a wide variety of group phenomena. The function of the need for closure is to create a shared reality consistent with a group. If the knowledge provided by our group does not reduce our needs, we will. look for another group to do so.
Those who need a cognitive fence are also more concerned with rapidly reducing uncertainty than doing it properly. People in great need of fences issue an opinion more quickly and with more limited evidence. They generally base their judgments on common stereotypes and exhibit features such as a fundamental attribution error. They also look for fewer problem-solving alternatives, are less empathetic with those who think differently, and fail to adapt their language when they have to explain their thoughts to others.
Those who have a great need to close overcome uncertainty by accepting the first information they obtain to draw conclusions and subsequently unquestionably accepting that conclusion. These people are looking for orderly, predictable, and familiar social contexts.