When you gaze at the image in FIGURE 3.1, what is your visual system doing? In essence, it is making a choice between which of two visually meaningful interpretations it prefers. In a similar way, our everyday thinking about the social world is largely a matter of choices, many of which are made without our conscious awareness. The difference is that, in our social life, the choices are much more challenging and the consequences are often more important.

A major challenge that we all face in making sense of the social world is the sheer quantity of information that is available at any given moment. To illustrate, imagine that a friend is coming over soon to watch a movie, and she’s asked you to go on Netflix and find a “good one.” Yikes. Now you’re scanning through hundreds of movie titles, most of which you’ve never heard of. You could learn about each one if you read the plot summary and dozens of customer reviews. You might also want to consider your friend’s tastes in movies, the nature of your relationship with this person, how long the movie is and what else you’d like to do tonight, and so on. If you were to weigh all of the relevant pieces of information, you would be so immersed in thought that you would die of starvation before you selected a movie (FIGURE 3.2).

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What’s important in this example is not the choice of a movie per se, but something more fundamental: the choice of when to stop thinking and reach a conclusion that feels certain . . . or certain enough. We make this same basic choice every moment that we navigate our social world. Whether we are forming an impression of a stranger or figuring out how we feel about a political issue, there is always more information that we could consider, but eventually we have to reach a conclusion and move on. According to Arie Kruglanski’s theory of lay epistemology (1989, 2004), three motives influence this choice:

The Need for Accurate Knowledge: This refers to a motivation to achieve an accurate, truthful understanding of a given person, idea, or event. For example, if an employer is looking over a job application, she might be motivated to know for sure whether an applicant is qualified for a job, and so she will invest a lot of time and energy in thinking about the applicant’s résumé. The motive to be accurate may even drive her to stay extra hours at work to gather additional information about the applicant. Most of us would like to believe that if any force is driving the way we think, it is the motivation to be rational and accurate—to strive for the truth rather than folly. But thinking carefully takes time and energy, resources that are in short supply. Further, we often want to reach a particular conclusion. Thus, people are also motivated toward nonspecific and specific forms of closure.

The Need for Nonspecific Closure: We reach closure when we stop the thought process and grab the first handy judgment or decision, quickly and without extensive effort. By nonspecific, we mean that the person does not have a strong preference for one conclusion over another; rather, she desires a conclusion—any conclusion. Why? Because feeling uncertain, confused, or ambivalent can at times feel unpleasant and even frightening. Choosing a movie in the end might be more important than choosing the best movie.

The Need for Specific Closure: This is the motive to reach a conclusion that fits well with the specific beliefs and attitudes that one already prefers. Often these are beliefs and attitudes that enable us to see the world as meaningful and ourselves as valuable. If you held the attitude that The Hangover: Part II is the greatest movie of all time, and you read just one customer review praising the movie, chances are you’ll halt the thinking process right there and confidently declare, “Yup, just as I thought: it’s a great movie.” In contrast, if you hated that movie and read the same review, you would be more likely to continue reading reviews until you found one that affirms your belief that it stinks.

Which of these three motives influences how a person thinks? It depends on his or her situation at the time. The need for accuracy is often active when there is a risk that a false judgment or a poor decision would have negative consequences for the self or others. Returning to our movie choice example, if you were intent on impressing your friend with your fine taste in films, and you felt that a poor movie choice would embarrass you, you would think long and hard about the relevant information until you felt confident that you were making the right choice. Or, to take another example, if during a presidential election season, one candidate advocates aggressive military responses, whereas the other promises peace, you might be particularly motivated to gain an accurate impression of each candidate before voting, because you believe that going to war would affect you and the people you care about.

The need for nonspecific closure usually takes priority in situations where thinking involves a lot of effort or is otherwise unpleasant. If we feel that we are under time pressure to make a decision, if we have a lot of things on our mind, or if we are simply exhausted from a long day at work, we will be more inclined to terminate the thinking process early and reach closure on a “good enough” conclusion. The first recommended movie that pops up might be the one you choose to watch.

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The need for specific closure comes into play when our prior beliefs and values are brought to mind, when those beliefs are central to our sense of meaning in life or personal worth, or perhaps especially when we feel that our beliefs are being challenged by contradictory information. For example, although the potential costs of going to war might activate the need for accurate knowledge, people’s need for specific closure might nudge them to take military action because doing so aligns with their deeply held political views. This can lead them to dismiss strong evidence brought to light by a political opponent.

Which motive influences a person’s thinking also depends on his or her personality traits. Some people have a high need for nonspecific closure, meaning that they seek and prefer simple and clear knowledge and feel especially uncomfortable when confronted with ambiguous or confusing situations (Thompson et al., 2001). By contrast, other people are more tolerant of complexity and ambiguity and are willing to gather more information and deliberate before arriving at a conclusion. In fact, they may view novelty, surprise, and uncertainty to be the very spice of life.

Keep these three motives in mind as you read the rest of this chapter—and indeed, this entire textbook—because you’ll see how they influence social thought and behavior in various ways across a wide range of situations.