Personal need for structure: Individual differences in the desire for simpler structure.

Individual differences in the desire for simple structure may influence how people understand, experience, and interact with their worlds. Studies 1 and 2 revealed that the Personal Need for Structure (PNS) scale (M. Thompson, M. Naccarato, & K. Parker, 1989,1992) possesses sufficient reliability and convergent and discriminant validity. In Studies 3-5, Ss high in PNS were especially likely to organize social and nonsocial information in less complex ways, stereotype others, and complete their research requirements on time. These data suggest that people differ i n their chronic desire for simple structure and that this difference can have important social-cognitive and behavioral implications. A consideration of chronic information-processing motives may facilitate the theoretical integration of social cognition, affect, motivation, and personality. It is nearly trite to make the point that, as social beings, people live in an unimaginably complex, information-rich world. Given the vast amount of information impinging on the senses and the well-documented limits in attentional capacity (e.g., Kahneman, 1973; Norman & Bobrow, 1975; Pashler, 1992), the information-processing task i s quite formidable. Thus, people look for ways to reduce the information load. People lessen their cognitive load in two fundamental ways. First, through avoidance strategies, they limit the amount of information t o which they are exposed. People may create barriers that restrict the likelihood that social and environmental information will intrude unexpectedly on their lives (e.g., by placing walls around their yards, closing the doors of their offices, wearing headphones in the streets). People may choose not to venture beyond their homes and workplaces, thus reducing exposure to unwanted information. Also, when compelled to confront and interact with others, people may actively ignore