Dialectical Thinking

What it measures

A four-item scale measuring an individual's chronic tendency to perceive and hold contradictory beliefs, positions, and perspectives simultaneously. Items assess awareness of contradictions in the world, the presence of unresolvable contradictions in one's environment, the tendency to find merit in opposing arguments, and the experience of holding contradictory beliefs. Drawn from the contradiction dimension of the Dialectical Self Scale, the subscale captures the cognitive openness to paradox and ambiguity that characterises East Asian dialectical thinking styles, though it has been applied cross-culturally in consumer research.

Representative items

• I often find that things will contradict each other.
• When I hear two sides of an argument, I often agree with both.
• I sometimes believe two things that contradict each other.

Citation

Spencer-Rodgers, Julie, et al. (2015). The dialectical self scale: Contradiction, change, and holism in the East Asian self-concept. Unpublished manuscript. [Applied by: Su, Lujun, et al. (2021). Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 49(3), 578–596.]