Anxiety, Cognitive Development, and Correspondence

Abstract

Subjects (N = 261) blocked on their levels of trait anxiety and cognitive development were asked to make causal attributions to account for another person's failure on a task and to prescribe ways to improve the individual's subsequent performance. Subjects at the formal-operational stage and low and moderate levels of trait anxiety showed reliable attribution-behavior prescription correspondence; formal-operational individuals with high trait anxiety and subjects at lower levels of cognitive development showed no consistent relationships between their attributions and subsequent behavioral prescriptions.