Lesson No. 7: Mind Styles: Are You Primarily Concrete or Abstract?

Anthony F. Gregorc, Ph. D., is a phenomenological (this links to Phenomenography-Noel Entwistle) researcher, lecturer, consultant, author and President of Gregorc Associates, Inc.  His career has included positions as a teacher, professor, and lecturer throughout the world. He is internationally recognized for his work in learning styles which began in 1969 with the introduction of his Energic Model of Styles. This work evolved into the Mind Styles Model in 1984. (Cortland)

Perceptual Quality

• Concrete: This quality enables you to register information directly through your five senses: sight, smell, touch, taste, and hearing. When you are using your concrete ability, you are dealing with the obvious, the “here and now.” You are not looking for hidden meanings, or making relationships between ideas or concepts. “It is what it is.”

• Abstract: This quality allows you to visualize, to conceive ideas, to understand or believe that which you cannot actually see. When you are using your abstract quality, you are using your intuition, your imagination, and you are looking beyond “what is” to the more subtle implications. “It is not always what it seems.”

Although all people have both concrete and abstract perceptual abilities to some extent, each person is usually comfortable using one more than the other. The person whose natural strength in the concrete, for example, may communicate in a direct, literal, no-nonsense manner. The person whose natural strength is the abstract may use more subtle ways to get a point across.

Ordering Ability 

• Sequential: Allows your mind to organize information in a linear, step-by-step manner. When using your sequential ability, you are following a logical train of thought, a traditional approach to dealing with information. You may also prefer to have a plan and to follow it, rather than relying on impulse.

• Random: Lets your mind organize information by chunks, and in no particular order. When you are using your random ability, you may often be able to skip steps in a procedure and still produce the desired result. You may even start in the middle, or at the end, and work backwards. You may also prefer your life to be more impulsive, or spur of the moment, than planned.

Both ordering abilities are present in each person, but usually a pattern emerges for using one over the other more comfortably.   There are four combinations of the strongest perceptual and ordering ability in each individual: 

1. Concrete Sequential (CS) 
2. Abstract Random (AR) 
3. Abstract Sequential (AS) 
4. Concrete Random (CR) 

No one is a “pure” style. Each of us have a unique combination of natural strengths and abilities