<![CDATA[Prior studies examined reasoning, connections, and problem-solving mostly in pairs, rarely within one ethnomathematics-based model, and seldom traced how cognitive style shapes knowledge building from cultural contexts. This mixed-methods study examined how reasoning and connections relate to problem-solving in ethnomathematics-based System of Linear Equations in Two Variables (SLETV) tasks, and how students with different cognitive styles construct SLETV knowledge. With 100 junior high school students in Bengkulu, Indonesia, we tested a structural model in LISREL 8.80 and decomposed direct and indirect effects through path analysis. Task-based interviews with one field-independent (FI) and one field-dependent (FD) student, selected using the Group Embedded Figures Test, were analysed using Action-Process-Object-Schema (APOS) genetic decomposition. The model fitted (χ2 = 12.11, p = 0.150; RMSEA = 0.01). Reasoning affected problem-solving directly (β = 0.418) and indirectly through connections (β = 0.516), jointly explaining 92.9% of its variance. The FI student modelled the Pantai Panjang fishermen problem quickly, ignoring story details. The FD student, slowed by the durian and cempedak narrative, relied on drawings. Both reached a coherent schema using elimination, substitution, and a combined method. Ethnomathematics tasks should build connections explicitly and give FD students more time and scaffolding to move from story to model.]]>
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