Retrospectively perceived parental attitudes and the need for cognition in people with high academic achievements

Abstract

This article is a study of the relationship between the need for cognition (PP) and retrospectively perceived parental attitudes in people with high academic achievements. First, it presents concepts of psychological theories explanting the nature of the need for cognition and reviews theoretical outlines of parental attitudes. Secondly, the paper presents a description and analysis of the results of a study aimed at validating hypotheses on the relationships between the need for cognition and perceived parental attitudes. The study covered 207 people (102 beneficiaries of a scholarship granted by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education for scientific achievements and 105 people from a control group, who did not have high academic achievements). The results did not confirm the hypothesis, indicating a lack of relationships between the measures variables in people with high academic achievements, and only one statistically significant relationship between the need for cognition and inconsistency of the father’s attitude in the control group.