Title: Cognitive Rigidity: The 8-Ball from Hell | Psychology Today
Headings: Cognitive Rigidity: The 8-Ball from Hell
James Coplan MD
Cognitive Rigidity: The 8-Ball from Hell
Cognitive rigidity is one element in a suite of challenging traits.

Content: The technical definition of cognitive rigidity is “difficulty changing mental sets.” Simply put, this means switching from thinking about things one way to thinking about them a different way. ( People who can do this easily are said to have "cognitive flexibility" — the opposite of cognitive rigidity.) Let’s say I give you a pile of red and blue blocks of different sizes and ask you to sort them by "first by size, then by color." Then I repeat the task, with different colors or shapes. Each time, your task is to sort by size, then by color. By the way, this is a timed task, and you’ll earn extra points for speed, and at the end, you get to cash in your points for a prize. You’ve been doing this task for 10 or 15 minutes, and you’re getting pretty good at it; your times are coming down. Then I throw you a curveball: