Abstract
Uncertain interpersonal situations motivate people to seek out information for reducing the uncertainty. A previous study found that low skills to find out what other people really think might cause ruminative thinking to complement information, which resulted in ideas of reference. The previous study only dealt with one major information collecting strategy. However, people use various strategies to collect information and the difference of the effect between the strategies has not been shown. To solve this problem, the present study developed the Information Gathering Style Scale, which was designed to measure the inclination of people to seek information for learning others' real thoughts. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis revealed the scale consisted of four factors: "Communication with the person concerned," "Observation of the person concerned," "Comments by others," and "Utilization of media." Then a path analysis was performed to investigate the relationship between information gathering behavior and ideas of reference mediated by rumination. The results showed "Communication with the person concerned" was negatively related to rumination, whereas "Observation of the person concerned," "Comments by others," and "Utilization of media" were positively related to rumination. Rumination was positively related to ideas of reference. Information value was discussed to explain the contrasting effects of information gathering behavior on rumination.
