Assessment of the Cognitive Approach. As observed by Xxxxxx (1986, 39-40), the cognitive approach dominated the analysis of the foreign policies of the developing world whereby all social processes are eventually reduced to the perceptions and idiosyncracies of the ‘great man’ (or woman) of utmost power. Why? Xxxxxx first explained that the political institutions of the developing world usually revolve around a politically powerful individual. Secondly, competing models are explicitly contextualized to industrialized countries, if not solely to the United States (Xxxxxxx and Xxxxxxxx 1972). Another facet of the cognitive approach that is worth examining, however, is that its methodology is problematic from the start. The problem lies in the requirement of the approach to acquire information about the ‘minds of men,’ as Xxxxxx Xxxxxxx (1962, 4) stressed. Policy- makers are known, however, to conceal their true thoughts and recollections (White 1989). Hence, information obtained from them must first be calibrated to account for any possible biases. Even with ‘proper’ calibration, there is no sure way to filter out dishonest or errant recollections from subjects. The resulting poor quality of data does affect the results of the investigation. Central to the analysis is the existence of two kinds of factors, one operational and another perceptual. Operational factors are objective factors that are derived from the world as it ‘really’ exists, whereas perceptual factors are subjective factors that are derived from how decision-makers perceive or develop images of the ‘real’ world. How are the two types of factors interlinked? Operational factors will only be relevant contingent upon the attitudes, perceptions, judgments, and purposes of a state’s decision-makers and how they react to various stimuli (Xxxxxx et al. 2002, 60) whereas the reverberation of influence from the environment to the decision-maker is reciprocated only through such an interaction (Sprout and Sprout 1965, 11). The initial stages of decision-making are important, however. Similar to the previous case of analyzing faulty data, in the case of interlinking both operational and perceptual factors the judgments and inferences made at the beginning of a process, though unfounded or skewed and however nobly made, can influence and constrain subsequent decision-making, affecting the quality of the whole process (Xxxxxxxxxxx 1990, 8). Examination of both operational and perceptual factors leads to the surfacing of two concepts and relat...
