Resisting temptation of unhealthy food: interaction between temptation-elicited goal activation and self-control

Counteractive control theory suggests that the cognitive accessibility of a goal in response to a temptation cue predicts self-regulation of behaviour consistent with that goal. The current study provided a novel test of this effect in the eating domain, exploring the moderating role of trait self-control. A sample of 124 women (18–25 years) completed a lexical decision task to assess cognitive accessibility of the weight-management goal after food temptation priming. Eating self-regulation was operationalised as unhealthy snack food intake measured in a task disguised as a taste-test. Participants completed trait self-control and temptation experience intensity measures. Cognitive accessibility predicted lower food intake, but only among high self-control participants. The relationship was mediated by temptation experience intensity: participants with high cognitive accessibility felt less tempted, and subsequently ate less food. Results suggest that changing the processes underlying the temptation experience, rather than the cognitive accessibility of a goal may more effectively enhance self-regulation among low self-control individuals.     

Lead us not into temptation: Differential associations of religious identification with self-regulatory traits and abilities

While there has been considerable research on the link between religiosity and self-regulation, the directionality of both constructs remains equivocal. Moreover, little is known regarding the association between religiosity and performance-based measures of self-regulatory abilities, given that past studies have predominantly examined self-regulatory traits via self-reports. Drawing from a 9-year longitudinal dataset (Time 1: n = 4836; Time 2: n = 3467), cross-sectional findings indicated that religious identification was positively and negatively correlated with self-regulatory traits and abilities, respectively. Longitudinal findings revealed that self-regulatory abilities predicted negative changes in religious identification, and this effect strengthened from middle to late adulthood. No longitudinal relations between religious identification and self-regulatory traits were found. Our findings highlight the differential associations of religious identification with self-regulatory traits and abilities, and how these associations are modulated by advancing adulthood.     

And deplete us not into temptation: Automatic attitudes, dietary restraint, and self-regulatory resources as determinants of eating behavior

Linking contemporary models of self-regulation to recent research on automatic attitudes, the present study investigated the impact of automatic candy attitudes, dietary restraint standards, and self-regulation resources on eating behavior. Participants were assigned to either an emotion suppression task (low self-regulation resources) or an emotion flow task (high self-regulation resources), and were then given an opportunity to taste candies. When self-regulation resources were high, candy consumption was uniquely related to dietary restraint standards (but not automatic candy attitudes). In contrast, when self-regulation resources were low, candy consumption was primarily predicted by automatic candy attitudes, with dietary restraint standards showing a tendency for counterintentional effects. These results indicate that the behavioral impact of automatic attitudes and personal standards depends on available control resources. Implications for research on automatic attitudes and self-regulation are discussed.     

Pursuing goals for us: relationally autonomous reasons in long-term goal pursuit

People pursue goals for a variety of reasons, including reasons that take into account close relationships (termed relationally autonomous reasons, or RARs). Two longitudinal studies examined the degree to which relational self-construal, RARs, and personally autonomous reasons (PARs) predicted goal attainment. In Study 1, 166 participants rated 7 goals on several goal outcomes at 2 sessions. Results revealed that self-construal was positively associated with RARs and that RARs predicted goal attainment, controlling for PARs. Study 2 (N = 177) added a 3rd follow-up to the Study 1 design, and results showed perceived progress toward one's goals predicted enhanced RARs but not enhanced PARs. Both studies showed that RARs are an effective motivational component in goal pursuit and attainment.     

Seven principles of goal activation: a systematic approach to distinguishing goal priming from priming of non-goal constructs.

Countless studies have recently purported to demonstrate effects of goal priming; however, it is difficult to muster unambiguous support for the claims of these studies because of the lack of clear criteria for determining whether goals, as opposed to alternative varieties of mental representations, have indeed been activated. Therefore, the authors offer theoretical guidelines that may help distinguish between semantic, procedural, and goal priming. Seven principles that are hallmarks of self-regulatory processes are proposed: Goal-priming effects (a) involve value, (b) involve postattainment decrements in motivation, (c) involve gradients as a function of distance to the goal, (d) are proportional to the product of expectancy and value, (e) involve inhibition of conflicting goals, (f) involve self-control, and (g) are moderated by equifinality and multifinality. How these principles might help distinguish between automatic activation of goals and priming effects that do not involve goals is discussed.     

Interactions do not only tell us when,but can also tell us how: Testing process hypotheses by interaction

Hypotheses about psychological processes are often tested using traditional mediation analysis. This analysis relies on measurement of a transmitting variable. Conducting this analysis has become almost synonymous with examining process hypotheses. An alternative strategy to mediation analysis (the Testing‐a‐Process‐hypothesis‐by‐an‐Interaction Strategy, TPIS) is illustrated here. TPIS is based on a fully experimental design whereby a hypothesized process is tested by an interaction between the hypothesized cause of an effect and a contextual variable. In the interaction term, the contextual variable allows comparison of the causal effect observed when the process is uninterrupted to the effect observed when the process is interrupted. Thus, TPIS translates a theoretical process hypothesis into a statistical interaction hypothesis that uses a fully experimental design to directly examine the hypothesized process. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Adaptive memory: Stereotype activation is not enough

Studies have shown that survival processing leads to superior memorability. The aim of the present study was to examine whether this survival recall advantage might result from stereotype activation. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a pilot study and two experiments in which participants were primed with stereotypes (Experiment 1, professor and elderly person; Experiment 2, survival-stereotype). In Experiment 1, 120 undergraduates were randomly assigned to a survival, professor stereotype, elderly person stereotype, or moving scenario and rated words for their relevance to the imagined scenario. In Experiment 2, 75 undergraduates were given a survival, survival-stereotype (based on our pilot study), or moving scenario. Both experiments showed that survival processing leads to a greater recall advantage over the stereotype groups and control group. These data indicate that the mere activation of stereotypes cannot explain the survival recall advantage.     

Whatever does not kill us: cumulative lifetime adversity, vulnerability, and resilience

Exposure to adverse life events typically predicts subsequent negative effects on mental health and well-being, such that more adversity predicts worse outcomes. However, adverse experiences may also foster subsequent resilience, with resulting advantages for mental health and well-being. In a multiyear longitudinal study of a national sample, people with a history of some lifetime adversity reported better mental health and well-being outcomes than not only people with a high history of adversity but also than people with no history of adversity. Specifically, U-shaped quadratic relationships indicated that a history of some but nonzero lifetime adversity predicted relatively lower global distress, lower self-rated functional impairment, fewer posttraumatic stress symptoms, and higher life satisfaction over time. Furthermore, people with some prior lifetime adversity were the least affected by recent adverse events. These results suggest that, in moderation, whatever does not kill us may indeed make us stronger.     

When knowledge is not enough: the phenomenon of goal neglect in preschool children

We argue that the concept of goal neglect can be fruitfully applied to understand children's potential problems in experimental tasks and real-world settings. We describe an assessment of goal neglect developed for administration to preschool children and report data on two measures derived from this task alongside the Dimensional Change Card Sort (DCCS) and an opposite color response inhibition task. The propensity to neglect initial task cues was uniquely linked to response inhibition, whereas neglect of a later cue was uniquely linked to the DCCS. Additional evidence suggests that recovery from neglect can occur and shows that goal neglect varies with the cognitive transparency of the signifying cue. Data demonstrate the importance of, and place constraints on, current theories of information regulation and foreground the notion of graded representations in working memory and executive functioning.     

Faster might not be better: Pictures may not elicit a stronger unconscious priming effect than words when modulated by semantic similarity

It has been suggested that unconscious semantic processing is stimulus-dependent, and that pictures might have privileged access to semantic content. Those findings led to the hypothesis that unconscious semantic priming effect for pictorial stimuli would be stronger as compared to verbal stimuli. This effect was tested on pictures and words by manipulating the semantic similarity between the prime and target stimuli. Participants performed a masked priming categorization task for either words or pictures with three semantic similarity conditions: strongly similar, weakly similar, and non-similar. Significant differences in reaction times were only found between strongly similar and non-similar and between weakly similar and non-similar, for both pictures and words, with faster overall responses for pictures as compared to words. Nevertheless, pictures showed no superior priming effect over words. This could suggest the hypothesis that even though semantic processing is faster for pictures, this does not imply a stronger unconscious priming effect.     

How to stop and change a response: the role of goal activation in multitasking

Multitasking was studied in the stop-change paradigm, in which the response for a primary GO1 task had to be stopped and replaced by a response for a secondary GO2 task on some trials. In 2 experiments, the delay between the stop signal and the change signal was manipulated to determine which task goals (GO1, GO2, or STOP) were involved in performance and to determine whether the goals were activated in series or in parallel. As the delay increased, the probability of responding on stop trials changed very little, but GO2 task reaction times decreased substantially. Such effects are consistent with both a nondeterministic serial model (in which the GO1 goal is replaced by the STOP goal, which is subsequently replaced by the GO2 goal) and a limited-capacity parallel model (in which stopping and GO2 processing occur concurrently) with a capacity-sharing proportion that resembles serial processing.     

A goal activation approach to the study of executive function: an application to antisaccade tasks

We argue that a general control process, responsible for the activation and maintenance of task goals, is central to the concept of executive function. Failures of this process can become manifest as goal neglect: disregard of a task requirement even though it has been understood (Duncan, 1995). We discuss the results of several published and new experiments using various versions of the antisaccade task in order to investigate the circumstances under which goal neglect is likely to occur. Potentially conflicting results in the literature on adaptive control of saccadic eye movements are argued to be attributable to the extent to which different task versions elicit goal neglect. The results suggest an increased susceptibility to goal neglect of high-functioning older adults (Experiment 1) and of first-episode schizophrenia patients (Experiment 2), but not of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (Experiment 3). However, the degree to which such differences in susceptibility become manifest in task performance, is shown to be strongly influenced by manipulations of the relative saliency of task requirements. Theoretical and methodological implications for the study of executive function are discussed.     

Problems with popper: The initial goal is to develop viable theories, not disconfirm them

This paper examines the relation between errors and awareness in two recent theories of error detection in speech: Perceptual Loop theory and Node Structure theory. New data and predictions are discussed, together with some nonobvious limitations of these theories. New paradigms for studying speech error detection are also discussed, together with implications for current theories of the large body of work on error detection in related skills such as reading, typing, and handwriting.     

Implementation intentions do not enhance all types of goals: The moderating role of goal difficulty

Three studies tested whether Gollwitzer and Brandst?tter’s (1997) failure to find an implementation effect for easy goals was due to a ceiling effect, to the moderating effect of previously formed habits, or to a moderating effect of earlier implementation intentions. The studies strongly indicated that easy goals did benefit from forming implementation intentions (i.e., specifying where or when one would perform the action). This suggests that Gollwitzer and Brandst?tter’s failure to find significant implementation effects for easy goals was due to a ceiling effect and not to other moderating effects. However, in the three experiments, we found no positive effect of implementation intentions for the enactment of goal-related behavior corresponding to a certain type of difficult goal. More specifically, when the focus was on the outcome of goal-directed action rather than on the goal-directed actions themselves, implementation intentions specifying when or in what conditions the relevant actions were to be performed did not enhance enactment. When the focus was on the goal-directed actions, we replicated the positive effect of forming implementation intentions. We argue that specifying when or where a goal-directed action should be enacted does not enhance enactment when the actor is not aware of the actions that are required to reach the goal. Possibly, implementation intentions specifying what one should do (rather than where or when) might be more helpful to enhance enactment rates of this type of goal.     

Implementation intentions do not enhance all types of goals: The moderating role of goal difficulty

Three studies tested whether Gollwitzer and Brandstätter’s (1997) failure to find an implementation effect for easy goals was due to a ceiling effect, to the moderating effect of previously formed habits, or to a moderating effect of earlier implementation intentions. The studies strongly indicated that easy goals did benefit from forming implementation intentions (i.e., specifying where or when one would perform the action). This suggests that Gollwitzer and Brandstätter’s failure to find significant implementation effects for easy goals was due to a ceiling effect and not to other moderating effects. However, in the three experiments, we found no positive effect of implementation intentions for the enactment of goal-related behavior corresponding to a certain type of difficult goal. More specifically, when the focus was on the outcome of goal-directed action rather than on the goal-directed actions themselves, implementation intentions specifying when or in what conditions the relevant actions were to be performed did not enhance enactment. When the focus was on the goal-directed actions, we replicated the positive effect of forming implementation intentions. We argue that specifying when or where a goal-directed action should be enacted does not enhance enactment when the actor is not aware of the actions that are required to reach the goal. Possibly, implementation intentions specifying what one should do (rather than where or when) might be more helpful to enhance enactment rates of this type of goal.     

Experiencing activation: energetic arousal and tense arousal are not mixtures of valence and activation

R. E. Thayer (1989) proposed 2 types of activation: energetic arousal (awake-tired) and tense arousal (tense-calm). This view has been challenged by claims that energetic arousal and tense arousal are mixtures of valence and a single activation dimension. The authors present a direct test of this hypothesis by computing the correlation between the residuals of energetic arousal and tense arousal after removing the shared variance with valence. Whereas the valence activation hypothesis predicts a strong positive correlation between the 2 residuals, the authors found that it was not significantly different from 0. This finding reaffirms the view of energetic arousal and tense arousal as 2 distinct types of activation.     

Heightened male aggression toward sexualized women following romantic rejection: The mediating role of sex goal activation

Research from a variety of disciplines suggests a positive relationship between Western cultural sexualization and women's likelihood of suffering harm. In the current experiment, 157 young men were romantically rejected by a sexualized or non‐sexualized woman then given the opportunity to blast the woman with loud bursts of white noise. We tested whether the activation of sexual goals in men would mediate the relationship between sexualization and aggressive behavior after romantic rejection. We also tested whether behaving aggressively toward a woman after romantic rejection would increase men's feelings of sexual dominance. Results showed that interacting with a sexualized woman increased men's sex goals. Heightened sex goal activation, in turn, predicted increased aggression after romantic rejection. This result remained significant despite controlling for the effects of trait aggressiveness and negative affect. The findings suggest that heightened sex goal activation may lead men to perpetrate aggression against sexualized women who reject them.

     

Positive affect and physical activity: Testing effects on goal setting,activation, prioritisation,and attainment

Objective: The present research tested whether incidental positive affect promotes pursuit of physical activity goals. Four key features of goal pursuit were examined – setting physical activity goals (Study 1), goal activation (Study 2), and goal prioritization and goal attainment (Study 3).

Design: Participants (N_s = 80, 81, and 59, in Studies 1–3, respectively) were randomized to positive affect (joy, hope) or neutral affect (control) conditions in each study.

Main Outcome Measures: Questionnaire measures of goal level, goal commitment, and means selection (Study 1); a lexical decision task indexed goal activation (Study 2), a choice task captured goal prioritization and MET minutes quantified goal attainment (Study 3).

Results: Study 1 showed that positive affect led to a greater number of intended physical activities, and that joy engendered greater willingness to try activities. In Study 2, a positive affect induction led to heightened activation of the physical activity goal compared to the control condition. The joy induction in Study 3 led to greater physical activity, and a trend towards greater goal prioritization.

Conclusion: These findings suggest that positive affect enhances the pursuit of physical activity goals. Implications for health behavior theories and interventions are outlined.     

The spider does not always win the fight for attention: Disengagement from threat is modulated by goal set

Stimulus-driven preferential attention to threat can be modulated by goal-driven attention. However, it remains unclear how this goal-driven modulation affects specific attentional components implied in threat interference. We hypothesise that goal-driven modulation most strongly impacts delayed disengagement from threat. A spatial cueing task was used that disentangles delayed disengagement from attentional capture by tightly manipulating the locus of attention at the time of target onset. Different top-down goals were induced by instructing participants to identify bird/fish targets (Experiment 1) or spider/cat targets (Experiment 2) among animal non-targets. Delayed disengagement from a non-target spider was observed only when the spider was part of the target set, not when it was task-irrelevant. This corroborates evidence that threat stimuli do not necessarily override goal-driven attentional control and that extended processing of threatening distractors is not obligatory.