Exploring the experience of episodic past,future, and counterfactual thinking in younger and older adults: A study of a Colombian sample

Although extant evidence suggests that many neural and cognitive mechanisms underlying episodic past, future, and counterfactual thinking overlap, recent results have uncovered differences among these three processes. However, the extent to which there may be age-related differences in the phenomenological characteristics associated with episodic past, future and counterfactual thinking remains unclear. This study used adapted versions of the Memory Characteristics Questionnaire and the Autobiographical Interview in younger and older adults to investigate the subjective experience of episodic past, future and counterfactual thinking. The results suggest that, across all conditions, younger adults generated more internal details than older adults. However, older adults generated more external details for episodic future and counterfactual thinking than younger adults. Additionally, younger and older adults generated more internal details, and gave higher sensory and contextual ratings, for memories rather than future and counterfactual thoughts. Methodological and theoretical consequences for extant theories of mental simulation are discussed.     

Mental time travel into the episodic future,episodic past,and episodic counterfactual past in everyday life

To date, studies exploring the relationship of counterfactual thoughts with episodic memories and episodic future thoughts have focused mainly on voluntary mental time travel. We explore mental time travel in everyday life and find that episodic counterfactual thinking occurs to a much lesser extent than thinking about the past or the future (12%, 22%, and 54%, respectively), is used mainly for mood regulation purposes, and the temporal distribution decreases as a function of time. We observe similarities in phenomenological detail: memories and counterfactual thoughts sharing similar ratings of sensory detail, memories and future thoughts sharing similar ratings of positivity, and counterfactual and future thoughts sharing similar ratings of mental time travel. We discuss the implications of episodic counterfactual thinking in everyday life.     

Characteristics of personally important episodic memories,counterfactual thoughts,and future projections across age and culture

We have limited knowledge as to whether the phenomenological differences between episodic memories, counterfactuals, and future projections show the same pattern across age groups and diverse samples. Here we compared the characteristics of these mental events, reported by younger and older participants in a Turkish (Study 1) and in an American sample (Study 2). In both studies, memories contained more sensory-perceptual-spatial details, were easier to bring to mind, and more specific. Future projections were the most positive, whereas counterfactuals were the least emotionally intense. In Study 1, older participants rated the events more positively and experienced them with more perceptual detail, whereas younger participants reported the future to be more voluntarily rehearsed, important, and central. These age differences did not replicate in Study 2. Overall, phenomenological differences between the events are robust and replicate across diverse samples. However, age differences are more sensitive to cultural or individual differences.     

Impact of age-relevant goals on future thinking in younger and older adults

This study investigated how personal goals influence age differences in episodic future thinking. Research suggests that personal goals change with age and like autobiographical memory, future thinking is thought to be organised and impacted by personal goals. It was hypothesised that cueing older adults with age-relevant goals should modulate age differences in episodic details and may also influence phenomenological characteristics of imagined scenarios. Healthy younger and older adults completed the Future Thinking Interview [Addis, D. R., Wong, A. T., & Schacter, D. L. (2008). Age-related changes in the episodic simulation of future events. Psychological Science, 19(1), 33–41. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02043.x] adapted to activate age-appropriate goals. Narratives were scored with an established protocol to obtain objective measures of episodic and semantic details. Subjective features such as emotionality and personal significance showed age differences as a function of goal domain while other features (e.g., vividness) were unaffected. However, consistent with prior reports, older adults produced fewer episodic details than younger adults and this was not modulated by goal domain. The results do not indicate that goal activation affects level of episodic detail. With respect to phenomenological aspects of future thinking, however, younger adults show more sensitivity to goal activation, compared with older adults.     

Influence of outcome valence in the subjective experience of episodic past, future, and counterfactual thinking

Recent findings suggest that our capacity to imagine the future depends on our capacity to remember the past. However, the extent to which episodic memory is involved in our capacity to think about what could have happened in our past, yet did not occur (i.e., episodic counterfactual thinking), remains largely unexplored. The current experiments investigate the phenomenological characteristics and the influence of outcome valence on the experience of past, future and counterfactual thoughts. Participants were asked to mentally simulate past, future, and counterfactual events with positive or negative outcomes. Features of their subjective experiences during each type of simulation were measured using questionnaires and autobiographical interviews. The results suggest that clarity and vividness were higher for past than future and counterfactual simulations. Additionally, emotional intensity was lower for counterfactual simulations than past and future simulations. Finally, outcome valence influenced participants' judgment of probability for future and counterfactual simulations.     

老年人对情绪性事件的情景模拟:回忆过去与想象未来

研究采用自传体访谈技术,首次考察了老年人在对情绪性事件进行回忆和想象中生成的内部细节和外部细节数量,及其对回忆和想象内容的主观评估。结果发现:(1)无论是回忆还是想象任务,老年人都比年轻人提供了更少的内部细节和略多的外部细节;(2)与年轻人相似,老年人在想象未来积极事件时产生了更多的内部细节,表现出对积极信息的加工偏好;(3)老年人比年轻人更倾向于认为想象的事件与过去发生的事件相似度高,表明该群体在想象过程中更多地依赖了过去的记忆。该结果揭示了老年人对情绪性事件的回忆和想象特点,说明在回忆和想象过程中出现的与年龄有关的缺陷同样会体现在情绪性事件中,这很好地支持了建构性情景模拟假说。     

3～5岁幼儿反事实思维的发展研究

该研究采用结果和前提反事实推理任务,选取58名3-5岁幼儿为被试,考察了其反事实思维能力的发展。结果表明:1.3岁儿童在结果反事实推理中的得分显著低于4岁和5岁儿童,而4岁和5岁儿童的得分并不存在显著差异;2.幼儿的前提反事实推理因结构和方向不同而表现出不同的年龄变化趋势;3.幼儿产生的上行和下行反事实论断之间不存在显著差异。如成人一样,幼儿较少产生减法反事实。     

Counterfactual thinking, persistence, and performance: A test of the Reflection and Evaluation Model

The present research extends previous functional accounts of counterfactual thinking by incorporating the notion of reflective and evaluative processing. Participants generated counterfactuals about their anagram performance, after which their persistence and performance on a second set of anagrams was measured. Evaluative processing of upward counterfactuals elicited a larger increase in persistence and better performance than did reflective processing of upward counterfactuals, whereas reflective processing of downward counterfactuals elicited a larger increase in persistence and better performance than did evaluative processing of downward counterfactuals. Moreover, path analyses indicated that whereas the relationship between counterfactual thinking and persistence was accounted for by emotional responses following upward and downward counterfactual generation, the relationship between counterfactual thinking and performance was accounted for by enhanced persistence following reflective processing of downward counterfactuals, but was accounted for by both enhanced persistence and strategic thinking following evaluative processing of upward counterfactuals.     

Emotion matters: The influence of valence on episodic future thinking in young and older adults

In young adults, valence not only alters the degree to which future events are imagined in rich episodic detail, but also how memorable these events are later on. For older adults, how valence influences episodic detail generation while imagining future events, or recalling these details at another time, remains unclear. We investigated the effect of valence on the specificity and memorability of episodic future thinking (EFT) in young and older adults. Among young and older adults, negative EFT was accompanied by less episodic detail generation relative to positive and neutral EFT. A similar reduction in episodic specificity for negative EFT was found two days later when participants recalled their previously imagined events. Notably, while older adults generated less episodically specific future thoughts relative to young adults, age did not influence the effect of valence on episodic detail generation at imagination or recollection.     

Phenomenological characteristics of emotional memories in younger and older adults

Older adults sometimes show a “positivity effect” in memory, remembering proportionally more positive information than younger adults. Using a modified Memory Characteristics Questionnaire, this study examined whether emotional valence impacts the phenomenological qualities of young and older adults’ memories. Ageing did not impact the effect of valence on the qualities of high-arousal memories. However, ageing sometimes impacted subjective memory for details of low-arousal memories: In Experiment 2, older adults reported remembering more thoughts, feelings, and temporal order details about positive low-arousal stimuli, while young adults’ ratings for those dimensions were higher for negative low-arousal stimuli. These findings suggest that valence most readily affects the qualities of young and older adults’ emotional memories when those memories are low in arousal.     

Episodic future thinking: Linking neuropsychological performance with episodic detail in young and old adults

Episodic future thinking (EFT) has been linked with our ability to remember past events. However, its specific neurocognitive subprocesses have remained elusive. In Experiment 1, a study of healthy older adults was conducted to investigate the candidate subprocesses of EFT. Participants completed a standard EFT cue word task, two memory measures (Verbal Paired Associates I, Source Memory), and two measures of executive function (Trail Making Test, Tower Test). In Experiment 2, healthy young adults also completed an EFT task and neuropsychological measures. The link between neurocognitive measures and five characteristics of EFT was investigated. Specifically, it was found that Source Memory and Trail Making Test performance predicted the episodic specificity of future events in older but not younger adults. Replicating previous findings, older adults produced future events with greater semantic but fewer episodic details than did young adults. These results extend the data and emphasize the importance of the multiple subprocesses underlying EFT.     

Divergent thinking and constructing episodic simulations

Divergent thinking likely plays an important role in simulating autobiographical events. We investigated whether divergent thinking is differentially associated with the ability to construct detailed imagined future and imagined past events as opposed to recalling past events. We also examined whether age differences in divergent thinking might underlie the reduced episodic detail generated by older adults. The richness of episodic detail comprising autobiographical events in young and older adults was assessed using the Autobiographical Interview. Divergent thinking abilities were measured using the Alternative Uses Task. Divergent thinking was significantly associated with the amount of episodic detail for imagined future events. Moreover, while age was significantly associated with imagined episodic detail, this effect was strongly related to age-related changes in episodic retrieval rather than divergent thinking.     

Being nice by choice: The effect of counterfactual reasoning on children's social evaluations

The ability to engage in counterfactual thinking (reason about what else could have happened) is critical to learning, agency, and social evaluation. However, not much is known about how individual differences in counterfactual reasoning may play a role in children's social evaluations. In the current study, we investigate how prompting children to engage in counterfactual thinking about positive moral actions impacts children's social evaluations. Eighty-seven 4-8-year-olds were introduced to a character who engaged in a positive moral action (shared a sticker with a friend) and asked about what else the character could have done with the sticker (counterfactual simulation). Children were asked to generate either a high number of counterfactuals (five alternative actions) or a low number of counterfactuals (one alternative action). Children were then asked a series of social evaluation questions contrasting that character with one who did not have a choice and had no alternatives (was told to give away the sticker to his friend). Results show that children who generated selfish counterfactuals were more likely to positively evaluate the character with choice than children who did not generate selfish counterfactuals, suggesting that generating counterfactuals most distant from the chosen action (prosociality) leads children to view prosocial actions more positively. We also found age-related changes: as children got older, regardless of the type of counterfactuals generated, they were more likely to evaluate the character with choice more positively. These results highlight the importance of counterfactual reasoning in the development of moral evaluations.

Research Highlights

• Older children were more likely to endorse agents who choose to share over those who do not have a choice.
• Children who were prompted to generate more counterfactuals were more likely to allocate resources to characters with choice.
• Children who generated selfish counterfactuals more positively evaluated agents with choice.
• Comparable to theories suggesting children punish willful transgressors more than accidental transgressors, we propose children also consider free will when making positive moral evaluations.

     

On Becoming What We Might Have Been: Counterfactual Thinking and Self-efficacy

Three experiments examined the hypothesis that, in the aftermath of a performance event, upward counterfactuals reinforce feelings of self-efficacy toward similar future events, whereas downward counterfactuals decrease feelings of self-efficacy. Using a scenario methodology, the first two experiments confirmed this hypothesis: upward counterfactual thinking enhanced feelings of self-efficacy relative to downward counterfactual thinking. In a third experiment, conducted in a more real-world context, upward counterfactuals again led to greater feelings of self-efficacy than downward counterfactuals. However, there were important limiting conditions: the effect of counterfactual thinking on self-efficacy was more or less pronounced depending on both situational and dispositional factors. Whereas the pattern of results provided little support for a self-protection explanation for these limiting conditions, the results were consistent with a depth of processing explanation.     

Emotional intensity in episodic autobiographical memory and counterfactual thinking

Episodic counterfactual thoughts—imagined alternative ways in which personal past events might have occurred—are frequently accompanied by intense emotions. Here, participants recollected positive and negative autobiographical memories and then generated better and worse episodic counterfactual events from those memories. Our results suggest that the projected emotional intensity during the simulated remembered/imagined event is significantly higher than but typically positively related to the emotional intensity while remembering/imagining the event. Furthermore, repeatedly simulating counterfactual events heightened the emotional intensity felt while simulating the counterfactual event. Finally, for both the emotional intensity accompanying the experience of remembering/imagining and the projected emotional intensity during the simulated remembered/imagined event, the emotional intensity of negative memories was greater than the emotional intensity of upward counterfactuals generated from them but lower than the emotional intensity of downward counterfactuals generated from them. These findings are discussed in relation to clinical work and functional theories of counterfactual thinking.     

情节式未来思考的年龄差异及其脑机制

情节式未来思考是将自我投射到未来以预先经历某事件的能力。本文探讨情节式未来思考的年龄差异及其脑机制,重点阐述情节式未来思考的个体发生发展及其现象学特征的年龄差异,探究其年龄差异的脑机制主要涉及颞叶及楔前叶、海马以及额叶等脑区。未来研究应扩大正常人与特殊群体的年龄范围,关注情节式未来思考年龄差异的研究角度及纵向交叉方法,同时需结合内外部影响因素进行研究,这在认知老化中有重要的社会应用价值。     

Future thinking improves prospective memory performance and plan enactment in older adults

Efficient intention formation might improve prospective memory by reducing the need for resource-demanding strategic processes during the delayed performance interval. The present study set out to test this assumption and provides the first empirical assessment of whether imagining a future action improves prospective memory performance equivalently at different stages of the adult lifespan. Thus, younger (n?=?40) and older (n?=?40) adults were asked to complete the Dresden Breakfast Task, which required them to prepare breakfast in accordance with a set of rules and time restrictions. All participants began by generating a plan for later enactment; however, after making this plan, half of the participants were required to imagine themselves completing the task in the future (future thinking condition), while the other half received standard instructions (control condition). As expected, overall younger adults outperformed older adults. Moreover, both older and younger adults benefited equally from future thinking instructions, as reflected in a higher proportion of prospective memory responses and more accurate plan execution. Thus, for both younger and older adults, imagining the specific visual–spatial context in which an intention will later be executed may serve as an easy-to-implement strategy that enhances prospective memory function in everyday life.