Cognitive Structures and
Entitled Belief Systems
Cognitive science represents an amalgam of human thought and its attendant processes. Cognitive psychology represents the study of people's mental machinations. It includes perception, learning, memory, language efficiency, problem solving, decision-making, and reasoning (Kellogg, 1995). In processing perceptions, humans construct fluid, active mental models of the external, physical world. Kellogg (1995) described schemas as cognitive mechanisms that furnish people [with expectations about our environment and continually undergo modification through maturation and learning. Schemas direct the construction of all conscious experience in perceiving, remembering, imagining, and thinking] (p. 20).
Before reviewing the literature of sexual aggression, it is first necessary to briefly outline the framework of cognitive psychology, insofar as it pertains to the current study. In addition, two tenets of this work should be pointed out here:
1. People tend to construct worldviews, or schemas,
that can affect behavior.
2. Machiavellianism and narcissism, and ultimately
entitlement are learned and incorporated into
schemas. Furthermore, the current study will examine
the notion that entitlement is a cognitive structure
that justifies, rationalizes or promotes sexually