Individuality, Relatedness, Or None of the Above? How Thinking Concretely Can Impair the Activation of Self-Relevant Goals

TLDR: This paper showed that individuals are more likely to bring to mind goals linked to a primed self-concept when they are in an abstract mindset (compared to a concrete mindset) compared to participants who are primed with independence.

Abstract: This research shows the importance of mindsets as cognitive processes that can interact with people’s self-representations and impact their interpretations of consumer situations. In four experiments, we show that individuals are more likely to bring to mind goals linked to a primed self-concept when they are in an abstract mindset (compared to a concrete mindset). Participants in an abstract mindset who are primed with independence bring to mind more independence goals whereas those primed with interdependence bring to mind more relatedness goals. In contrast, participants in a concrete mindset focus on concrete experiences from the situation regardless of self-concept priming.