ON COGNITIVE BALANCE.

For reasons of conceptual simplicity as well as ease of experimentation, research on cognitive balance has focused almost exclusively upon what is now called the POX triad or the POX unit, i.e., the restricted life space of a perceiver. This restricted life space consists of the perceiver p, another person perceived o, and a perceived impersonal entity x, as well as the relations which hold between the three. The POX triad can be represented in Heiders notation in the following statement pRo pRx oRx. If all three relations between the cognitive entities are positive, or if any two relations between the cognitive entities are negative and the third relation is positive, the triad is balanced if this is not the case the triad is imbalanced.