Showing papers by "Roy F. Baumeister published in 2014"

Yes, But Are They Happy? Effects of Trait Self‐Control on Affective Well‐Being and Life Satisfaction

Abstract: Does trait self-control (TSC) predict affective well-being and life satisfaction—positively, negatively, or not? We conducted three studies (Study 1: N = 414, 64% female, Mage = 35.0 years; Study 2: N = 208, 66% female, Mage = 25.24 years; Study 3: N = 234, 61% female, Mage = 34.53 years). The key predictor was TSC, with affective well-being and life satisfaction ratings as key outcomes. Potential explanatory constructs including goal conflict, goal balancing, and emotional distress also were investigated. TSC is positively related to affective well-being and life satisfaction, and managing goal conflict is a key as to why. All studies, moreover, showed that the effect of TSC on life satisfaction is at least partially mediated by affect. Study 1's correlational study established the effect. Study 2's experience sampling approach demonstrated that compared to those low in TSC, those high in TSC experience higher levels of momentary affect even as they experience desire, an effect partially mediated through experiencing lower conflict and emotional distress. Study 3 found evidence for the proposed mechanism—that TSC may boost well-being by helping people avoid frequent conflict and balance vice-virtue conflicts by favoring virtues. Self-control positively contributes to happiness through avoiding and dealing with motivational conflict.

Making choices impairs subsequent self-control: A limited-resource account of decision making, self-regulation, and active initiative.

Abstract: The current research tested the hypothesis that making many choices impairs subsequent self-control. Drawing from a limited-resource model of self-regulation and executive function, the authors hypothesized that decision making depletes the same resource used for self-control and active responding. In 4 laboratory studies, some participants made choices among consumer goods or college course options, whereas others thought about the same options without making choices. Making choices led to reduced self-control (i.e., less physical stamina, reduced persistence in the face of failure, more procrastination, and less quality and quantity of arithmetic calculations). A field study then found that reduced self-control was predicted by shoppers' self-reported degree of previous active decision making. Further studies suggested that choosing is more depleting than merely deliberating and forming preferences about options and more depleting than implementing choices made by someone else and that anticipating the choice task as enjoyable can reduce the depleting effect for the first choices but not for many choices.

Free Will and Punishment A Mechanistic View of Human Nature Reduces Retribution

Abstract: If free-will beliefs support attributions of moral responsibility, then reducing these beliefs should make people less retributive in their attitudes about punishment. Four studies tested this prediction using both measured and manipulated free-will beliefs. Study 1 found that people with weaker free-will beliefs endorsed less retributive, but not consequentialist, attitudes regarding punishment of criminals. Subsequent studies showed that learning about the neural bases of human behavior, through either lab-based manipulations or attendance at an undergraduate neuroscience course, reduced people’s support for retributive punishment (Studies 2–4). These results illustrate that exposure to debates about free will and to scientific research on the neural basis of behavior may have consequences for attributions of moral responsibility.

Dieting and the self-control of eating in everyday environments: an experience sampling study.

Abstract: Objective. The literature on dieting has sparked several debates over how restrained eaters differ from unrestrained eaters in their self-regulation of healthy and unhealthy food desires and what distinguishes successful from unsuccessful dieters. We addressed these debates using a four-component model of self-control that was tested using ecologicalmomentaryassessment,long-termweightchange,andalaboratorymeasureof inhibitory control. Design. A large sample of adults varying in dietary restraint and inhibitory control (as measured by a Stroop task) were equipped with smartphones for a week. They were beeped on random occasions and provided information on their experience and control of healthy and unhealthy food desires in everyday environments. Main outcome measures. The main outcome measures were desire strength, experienced conflict, resistance, enactment of desire, and weight change after a 4-month follow-up. Results and conclusions. Dietary restraint was unrelated to desire frequency and strength, but associated with higher conflict experiences and motivation to use selfcontrol with regard to food desires. Most importantly, relationships between dietary restraint and resistance, enactment of desire, and long-term weight change were moderated by inhibitory control: Compared with dieters low in response inhibition, dieters high in response inhibition were more likely to attempt to resist food desires, not consume desired food (especially unhealthy food), and objectively lost more weight over the ensuing 4 months. These results highlight the combinatory effects of aspects of the self-control process in dieters and highlight the value in linking theoretical process frameworks, experience sampling, and laboratory-based assessment in health science.

Free to punish: a motivated account of free will belief.

Abstract: Belief in free will is a pervasive phenomenon that has important consequences for prosocial actions and punitive judgments, but little research has investigated why free will beliefs are so widespread. Across 5 studies using experimental, survey, and archival data and multiple measures of free will belief, we tested the hypothesis that a key factor promoting belief in free will is a fundamental desire to hold others morally responsible for their wrongful behaviors. In Study 1, participants reported greater belief in free will after considering an immoral action than a morally neutral one. Study 2 provided evidence that this effect was due to heightened punitive motivations. In a field experiment (Study 3), an ostensibly real classroom cheating incident led to increased free will beliefs, again due to heightened punitive motivations. In Study 4, reading about others’ immoral behaviors reduced the perceived merit of anti-free-will research, thus demonstrating the effect with an indirect measure of free will belief. Finally, Study 5 examined this relationship outside the laboratory and found that the real-world prevalence of immoral behavior (as measured by crime and homicide rates) predicted free will belief on a country level. Taken together, these results provide a potential explanation for the strength and prevalence of belief in free will: It is functional for holding others morally responsible and facilitates justifiably punishing harmful members of society.

Action Versus State Orientation and Self-Control Performance After Depletion

Abstract: Three studies investigated the role of action versus state orientation in how people deal with depletion of self-control resources. Action-oriented persons were expected to continue allocating resources and hence to perform better than state-oriented persons who were expected to conserve strength. Consistent with this, action-oriented persons performed better on the d2 test of attention than state-oriented persons after a strenuous physical exercise (Study 1), showed higher acuity on the critical fusion frequency test after a test of vigilance (Study 2), and performed better on the Stroop test after a depleting sensorimotor task (Study 3). No differences emerged between action- and state-oriented persons in their initial performance and in a non-depleting context. The impact of depletion on subsequent performance is thus not fixed, but moderated by personality.

Recent Research on Free Will: Conceptualizations, Beliefs, and Processes

Abstract: This chapter summarizes research on free will. Progress has been made by discarding outmoded philosophical notions in favor of exploring how ordinary people understand and use the notion of free will. The concept of responsible autonomy captures many aspects of layperson concepts of free will, including acting on one's own (i.e., not driven by external forces), choosing, using reasons and personal values, conscious reflection, and knowing and accepting consequences and moral implications. Free will can thus be understood as form of volition (action control) that evolved to enable people to live in cultural societies. Much work has shown that belief in free will (as opposed to disbelief) is associated with actions that are conducive to functioning well in culture, including helpfulness, restraint of aggression, learning via counterfactual analysis, thinking for oneself, effective job performance, and appropriate gratitude. Belief in free will increases in response to misdeeds by others, thus emphasizing the link to personal responsibility. Research on volition indicates that self-regulation, intelligent reasoning, decision making, and initiative all deplete a (common) limited energy source, akin to the folk notion of willpower and linked to the body's glucose supplies. Free will is thus not an absolute or constant property of persons but a variable, fluctuating capability—one that is nonetheless highly adaptive for individuals and society. The notion that people have free will has been invoked in multiple contexts. Legally and morally, it explains why people can be held responsible for their actions. Theologically, it was used to explain why a supposedly kind and omniscient god would send most of the people he created to hell ( Walker, 1964 ). Yet, for such an important concept, there remains wide-ranging disagreement and confusion over its existence and its nature. For example, philosophers still debate whether humans truly have free will and, if so, under what conditions human volition deserves to be considered free ( Kane, 2011 ). In psychology, most theorists believe that humans engage in self-control, rational choice, planning, initiative, and related acts of volition. The debate is not whether these things occur but merely whether these should be called free will. This chapter will provide an overview of recent psychology experiments concerned with free will. There are three main and quite distinct sets of problems, each with associated lines of research. The first is concerned with how people understand the idea of free will. The second concerns the causes and consequences of believing in free will. The third focuses on the actual volitional processes that guide human action.

You Didn’t Have to Do That Belief in Free Will Promotes Gratitude

Abstract: Four studies tested the hypothesis that a weaker belief in free will would be related to feeling less gratitude. In Studies 1a and 1b, a trait measure of free will belief was positively correlated with a measure of dispositional gratitude. In Study 2, participants whose free will belief was weakened (vs. unchanged or bolstered) reported feeling less grateful for events in their past. Study 3 used a laboratory induction of gratitude. Participants with an experimentally reduced (vs. increased) belief in free will reported feeling less grateful for the favor. In Study 4, a reduced (vs. increased) belief in free will led to less gratitude in a hypothetical favor scenario. This effect was serially mediated by perceiving the benefactor as having less free will and therefore as being less sincerely motivated. These findings suggest that belief in free will is an important part of being able to feel gratitude.

Self-control and its relation to emotions and psychobiology: evidence from a Day Reconstruction Method study

Abstract: This study aimed to ascertain whether self-control predicts heart rate, heart rate variability, and the cortisol slope, and to determine whether health behaviors and affect patterns mediate these relationships. A sample of 198 adults completed the Self-Control Scale (Tangney in J Pers 72:271–322, 2004), and reported their exercise levels, and cigarette and alcohol use. Participants provided a complete account of their emotional experiences over a full day, along with morning and evening salivary cortisol samples and a continuous measure of cardiovascular activity on the same day. High trait self-control predicted low resting heart rate, high heart rate variability, and a steep cortisol slope. Those with high self-control displayed stable emotional patterns which explained the link between self-control and the cortisol slope. The self-controlled smoked less and this explained their low heart rates. The capacity to sustain stable patterns of affect across diverse contexts may be an important pathway through which self-control relates to psychophysiological functioning and potentially health.

Conscious and unconscious: Toward an integrative understanding of human mental life and action.

Abstract: Human consciousness is one of the wonders of the world. It integrates sensation, perception, emotion, and interpretation, often understanding events in sequences that include causal analyses and extended narrative structures. How inert bits of lifeless physical matter, such as protons, neutrons, and electrons, combine and organize so as to make conscious experience possible remains one of the most unassailable mysteries in the scientific understanding of the universe. Yet consciousness itself is, of course, no mystery for the billions of human beings who have and use it all day, every day. We, the authors of this chapter, have found ourselves on opposite sides of debates about several important questions, including the efficacy of conscious thought and the scientific viability of free will. Still, we have followed each other's work over the years with interest, respect, and admiration, and this has enabled our programs of research to benefit and to be informed by each other's work. Moreover, we actually agree on far more than our periodic debates might suggest. Our purpose in this chapter is to explore and elucidate these areas of agreement.

Meaning in life: nature, needs, and myths

Abstract: The authors first discuss the nature of meaning with a focus on three broad functions of meaning and two levels of meaning. Next, the authors discuss the need for meaning with a focus on the four needs for meaning (Baumeister 1991). Finally, the authors discuss some myths related to meaning, particularly the expectation that everything in life does (or will) make sense and have a reason. Throughout the chapter, the authors discuss ideas where the existential perspective and positive psychology perspective differ and could be integrated. Meaning in life likely serves several different functions. First, meaning helps individuals detect patterns in their environment. Such patterns can exist in the physical or social environment. The second function is communication. The third function is related to self-control. Meaning enables one to refer to cultural standards and think about long-term goals and therefore facilitates self-control. Meaning can exist on multiple levels (Vallacher and Wegner 1985). A high level of meaning involves complex and abstract relationships that span out across a large time frame. A low level of meaning is concrete and is in the present moment. The implications of moving to and from different levels of meaning are also discussed. The authors break down the need for meaning in life into four basic needs: purpose, values, efficacy, and self-worth. If all four needs are satisfied it will engender a sense of meaning in life. If one or more of the four needs is unfulfilled, one will be motivated to adjust their life in such a way that all four needs are covered. These four needs can be seen as unique motivations that facilitate making sense of and finding meaning in life.

Grief Functions as an Honest Indicator of Commitment

Abstract: Grief is a puzzling phenomenon. It is often costly and prolonged, potentially increasing mortality rates, drug abuse, withdrawal from social life, and susceptibility to illness. These costs cannot be repaid by the deceased and therefore might appear wasted. In the following article, we propose a possible solution. Using the principles of social selection theory, we argue that an important selective pressure behind the human grief response was the social decisions of other humans. We combine this with insights from signaling theory, noting that grief shares many properties with other hard-to-fake social signals. We therefore contend that grief was shaped by selective forces to function as a hard-to-fake signal of (a) a person’s propensity to form strong, non-utilitarian bonds and (b) a person’s current level of commitment to a group or cause. This theory explains many of the costly symptoms of grief and provides a progressive framework for future research.

Obedience, Self-Control, and the Voice of Culture

Abstract: Milgram's obedience studies dramatically demonstrated how obeying authority can have grim consequences. Nevertheless, we propose that obedience to legitimate authority is a vital aspect of human culture. Among other things, obedience to authority can encourage individuals to set aside their selfish desires for the good of their group. Often, such selfish desires are violent in nature. Thus, obedience can function to limit violence. We challenge the notion that people typically respond to the commands of authority with blind obedience. Last, we suggest that the implications of Milgram's findings have in some cases been overstated.

The inner world of rejection: effects of social exclusion on emotion, cognition, and self-regulation

Abstract: By expanding dissonance theory to include collectively shared conceptions of self, this chapter predicts that dissonance can be experienced on behalf of other people that is, and it can be experienced vicariously. Arousal caused by uncertainty about the outcomes of one's own behavior is aversive. The chapter conducts four studies that explored the vicarious dissonance concept: Its goal is to establish the conditions that simulate the scenario described in the chapter. The chapter explores the position that group identification expands the social self and that the occurrence of vicarious dissonance depends on this expanded sense of self. In the research described in the chapter, attitude change by vicarious dissonance was not related either to attitude similarity or to liking for the speaker, two common markers of interpersonal closeness. The chapter develops support for the proposition that the fusing of the individual self with one's social group causes an individual to experience what other members of the group are experiencing.

Satisfaction–Adaptation Principles in Sexual Desire: Exploring Gender Differences Across the Life Span

Abstract: Sexual desire may change according to two principles: the satisfaction principle (high sexual opportunity/frequency decreases sexual desire) and the adaptation principle (high sexual opportunity/frequency increases sexual desire). We explore the workings of these opposing principles separately for both genders across the adult life span. Two tests within a large (N = 181,546) and cross-cultural (11 countries) data set revealed that the satisfaction principle accounts for sexual desire in men throughout the entire life and it accounts for sexual desire in women until their mid-30s. From that point onward, however, the pattern of female sexual desire becomes increasingly consistent with the adaptation principle. What sets older women apart from younger women and men of all ages? We discuss several mechanisms, with a focus on the satisfaction principle’s evolutionary value in life phases of high reproductive capacity and the adaptation principle’s evolutionary value in life phases of low reproductive capacity.

Constructing a scientific theory of free will

Abstract: Baumeister discusses determinism and reductionism with emphases on self-regulation and conscious and meaningful causation of behavior. Baumeister concludes that freedom exists but can only be seen by looking at the proper level of analysis. In their comments, Holton questions some of Baumeister's philosophical moves, and then Payne and Cameron suggest new psychological methods (centrally the process dissociation procedure) to better understand conscious intentions and their causal roles. Baumeister responds appreciatively but defends his claim that “rational choice deserves a role in a psychological theory of free will.”

Maybe it helps to be conscious, after all.

Abstract: Psychologists debate whether consciousness or unconsciousness is most central to human behavior. Our goal, instead, is to figure out how they work together. Conscious processes are partly produced by unconscious processes, and much information processing occurs outside of awareness. Yet, consciousness has advantages that the unconscious does not. We discuss how consciousness causes behavior, drawing conclusions from large-scale literature reviews.

Having used self-control reduces emotion regulation—emotion regulation as relying on interchangeably used “self-control energy”

Abstract: Four studies tested and confirmed the hypothesis that having used self-control reduces subsequent emotion regulation. Participants first completed a task that either did or did not require self-control (attention control, overriding one’s accustomed writing style, or breaking a habit). They later encountered situations designed to activate emotions that typically are downregulated. Participants either met someone new (anxiety), anticipated speaking publicly (anxiety), or recalled times when they felt sad or romantically jealous. Compared to participants who had not completed a self-control task, those who had used self-control task reported feeling of the target emotion to a greater extent. The results from a final study supported the idea that having used self-control reduces emotion regulation rather than increasing the strength of emotion generally.

Relevance of Willpower Dynamics, Self-Control, and Ego Depletion to Flawed Student Decision Making

Abstract: Students make decisions with far-reaching consequences. This manuscript applies recent advances in understanding decision processes to illuminate several sources of bias and error in student decisions. Decision making uses an energy resource (willpower) also involved in selfcontrol, and so when people experience depleted resources, their decisions may be less effective than usual. We review factors that contribute to depleted willpower (e.g., decision fatigue, poor diet, lack of sleep), as well as well as results of decision making in depleted state (decision avoidance and postponement, irrational bias, passive endorsement of status quo and default options, lack of integrative compromise, heeding of irrelevant criteria).

The Value of Marriage in the Era of the Glorified Self

Abstract: Among nonhuman animals, selfhood is rudimentary: perhaps a sense of bodily integrity, a bit of competitiveness, simple decision making, membership in some group, and perhaps quasi-ownership of some...