Do it
The Self-Control Irony: Desire for Self-Control Limits Exertion of Self-Control in Demanding Settings
Liad Uziel & Roy Baumeister
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Self-control is a highly adaptive human capacity. Accordingly, development of self-control is widely encouraged. Whereas the benefits of having self-control are well documented, little is known about the impact of wanting self-control. The present investigation fills this void by exploring the effect of desire for self-control on the ability to exert self-control. It was expected that in the context of demanding self-control challenges, a desire for self-control will highlight a discrepancy between one's goals and perceived performance potential, leading to reduced efficacy beliefs and task disengagement. Four studies (N = 635) supported the prediction. Study 1 showed that a strong desire impaired performance on a demanding task but not on a simple task. Study 2 conceptually replicated the decrement in performance and established causality by experimentally manipulating desire for self-control. Studies 3 and 4 showed that reduction in efficacy beliefs mediate the effect. Implications of the findings are discussed.
Rituals Improve Children's Ability to Delay Gratification
Veronika Rybanska et al.
Child Development, forthcoming
Abstract:
To be accepted into social groups, individuals must internalize and reproduce appropriate group conventions, such as rituals. The copying of such rigid and socially stipulated behavioral sequences places heavy demands on executive function. Given previous research showing that challenging executive functioning improves it, it was hypothesized that engagement in ritualistic behaviors improves children's executive functioning, in turn improving their ability to delay gratification. A 3-month circle time games intervention with 210 schoolchildren (Mage = 7.78 years, SD = 1.47) in two contrasting cultural environments (Slovakia and Vanuatu) was conducted. The intervention improved children's executive function and in turn their ability to delay gratification. Moreover, these effects were amplified when the intervention task was imbued with ritual, rather than instrumental, cues.
The interactive effects of bitter flavor and mood on the decision to spend or save money
Fengyan Cai et al.
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, May 2017, Pages 48-58
Abstract:
People are more inclined to spend money when they are happy than when they are sad. However, unobtrusive situational factors that activate the concepts of a bitter life can reverse these effects. In line with this reasoning, our research shows that drinking a bitter beverage increases happy participants' inclination to save money but decreases unhappy participants' disposition to do so. These effects were confirmed in three lab experiments. Moreover, two field studies provided evidence that the results generalize to actual savings decisions and to impulsive purchases in an actual shopping situation.
High monetary reward rates and caloric rewards decrease temporal persistence
Bowen Fung, Stefan Bode & Carsten Murawski
Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, 22 February 2017
Abstract:
Temporal persistence refers to an individual's capacity to wait for future rewards, while forgoing possible alternatives. This requires a trade-off between the potential value of delayed rewards and opportunity costs, and is relevant to many real-world decisions, such as dieting. Theoretical models have previously suggested that high monetary reward rates, or positive energy balance, may result in decreased temporal persistence. In our study, 50 fasted participants engaged in a temporal persistence task, incentivised with monetary rewards. In alternating blocks of this task, rewards were delivered at delays drawn randomly from distributions with either a lower or higher maximum reward rate. During some blocks participants received either a caloric drink or water. We used survival analysis to estimate participants' probability of quitting conditional on the delay distribution and the consumed liquid. Participants had a higher probability of quitting in blocks with the higher reward rate. Furthermore, participants who consumed the caloric drink had a higher probability of quitting than those who consumed water. Our results support the predictions from the theoretical models, and importantly, suggest that both higher monetary reward rates and physiologically relevant rewards can decrease temporal persistence, which is a crucial determinant for survival in many species.
Next Week, Next Month, Next Year: How Perceived Temporal Boundaries Affect Initiation Expectations
Marie Hennecke & Benjamin Converse
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
To move from commitment to action, planners must think about the future and decide when to initiate. We demonstrate that planners prefer to initiate on upcoming days that immediately follow a temporal boundary. For example, aspiring dieters who considered a time horizon from Thursday, February 27th to Tuesday, March 4th showed expectation increases from Days 4 to 5 (Sunday to Monday) when induced to think of weekdays and from Days 2 to 3 (February 28th to March 1st) when induced to think of calendar dates. Using both causal steps- and moderation-based approaches, we demonstrate that this occurs (in part) because planners neglect situational constraints when evaluating initiation opportunities after (vs. before) temporal boundaries. A field experiment demonstrated a costly consequence: Aspiring dieters were more likely to sacrifice 1 week of access to an expensive weight-loss program if it allowed them to start on a day they perceived to follow a temporal boundary.
Glucose increases risky behavior and attitudes in people low in self-control: A pilot study
Michaela Pfundmair, Eva Lermer & Dieter Frey
Social Psychology, January/February 2017, Pages 47-53
Abstract:
People low in self-control have a strong proclivity toward risk-taking. Risk-taking behavior provides an opportunity to obtain some form of reward. Glucose, on the other hand, seems to facilitate reward and goal-directed behavior. In a pilot study executed in the laboratory, we investigated whether consuming a glucose drink would increase risky behavior and attitudes in people low in self-control. Our findings revealed that a dose of glucose compared to placebo increased risk-taking on a behavioral and cognitive level in participants low in self-control but not in participants high in self-control. The findings may shed some light on the psychological underpinnings of glucose: By showing glucose's association with high-risk behavior, they support the assumption of glucose driving a goal-directed motivation.