Extant strategic management literature provides only partial answer to the important ques tion: What variables affect top managers' ability to process complicated, novel, ambiguous, or dynamic strategic information in a turbulent environment? Drawn upon cognitive psychology, personality theory, management theory, organizational theory, and management information systems literatures, this paper proposes that nine personal attributes and four contextual at tributes affect top managers'

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... processing capability. The nine personal attributes are: cognitive complexity, knowledge, mental model of success, open-mindedness, time orienta tion, personal values, tolerance for ambiguity, locus of control, and time devoted to environ mental scanning. The four contextual attributes are: rewards and incentives, culture, structure of strategic planning process, and executive support systems. Thirteen propositions are postu lated regarding the types of attributes that are conducive for top managers' ability in processing complicated, novel, ambiguous, or dynamic information. 1 Wang and Chan: Top management perception of strategic information processing in Therefore, to have a comprehensive understanding of determinants of top managers' in formation processing capability, it is necessary to integrate all relevant attributes from both the personal and contextual attributes approaches. The characteristics of information in a turbulent environment are discussed next, because it is central to the suggested propositions.