In their research on decision under uncertainty, Kahneman and Tversky (1982a) examined whether, given the same negative outcome, there is any difference in the experience of regret, depending on whether the outcome follows action or inaction. This study attempted to replicate Kahneman and Tversky's (1982a) finding of greater regret for action than inaction and to determine whether this pattern extends to the parallel case of joy over happy outcomes, to different life domains, and to both genders. Through a vignette experiment, the previousfinding of a strong tendency to imagine greater regret following action than inaction was replicated. The same pattern was observed in the case of joy over positive outcomes. In two of the three vignettes presented, this "actor effect "was stronger for negative than for positive outcomes. In a third vignette, explicit knowledge of a missed negative outcome seems to have magnified the usual joy over having made a good decision, causing the expected joy over acting and succeeding to rise to the typically high level of regret over acting and failing. Suggestions regarding the future study of these issues are offered.
A sample of the original set of psychotherapy outcome studies analyzed by Smith and Glass was randomly selected for reanalysis to address criticisms of the methodological quality of the studies in the original sample. Each study was evaluated to see whether it had a no-treatment or placebo control group formed through random assignment. The subsample of studies judged to be appropriately controlled was then reanalyzed using Smith and Glass' meta-analytic procedures. The potential influence of statistical nonindependence of results on the overall findings reported by Smith and Glass was also examined by: (a) comparing the results obtained using Smith and Glass' procedures, in which each outcome measure is treated as an independent unit of analysis, with the results obtained when the study serves as the unit of analysis and (b) calculating separately the results obtained at each of three possible points in time. The results of the present study, in which these potential artifacts were examined, uphold the positive conclusions regarding psychotherapeutic efficacy originally drawn by Smith and Glass.
Counterfactual thinking entails the process of imagining alternatives to reality--what might have been. The present study examines the frequency, content, and emotional and cognitive concomitants of counterfactual thinking about past missed opportunities in midlife women. At age 43, nearly two-thirds of the sample of educated adult women reported having missed certain opportunities at some time in their lives. Most of the counterfactual thoughts concerned missed opportunities for greater challenge in work. Emotional distress at age 33 did not predict later counterfactual thought. Instead, counterfactual thinking at age 43 was associated with concurrent emotional distress. However, acknowledging counterfactual thinking about the past was also associated with envisioning ways to change things for the better in the future. This suggests the possibility that the negative appraisal often entailed in counterfactual thinking may be associated with emotional distress in the short run but with motivational benefits in the long run, at least for middle-aged women.KEY WORDS: Counterfactual thought; emotion; midlife women; motivation; work.I think I don't regret a single "excess" of my responsive youth--I only regret, in my chilled age, certain occasions and possibilities I didn't embrace.Henry James INTRODUCTIONPossible but unactualized states, or alternatives to reality, are called counterfactuals, thinking about counterfactuals is called counterfactual thought (Goodman, 1973;Kahneman & Tversky, 1982a;Kripke, 1980;Lewis, 1973 (Hampshire, 1983). In the present study, we examined the frequency and content of counterfactual thoughts about missed opportunities in midlife women. We also examined the relationship between counterfactual thought and past and present emotional distress as well as the relationship between counterfactual thoughts about the past and the future. Although a relatively new area for systematic empirical inquiry, counterfactual thought has already been implicated in a variety of psychological processes, including causal attribution , self-esteem (Roese & Olson, 1993), emotional reactions to life events (Davis, Lehman, Wortman, Silver, & Thompson, 1995;Gleicher et al., 1990;Kahneman & Tversky, 1982a, Landman, 1987Landman, 1995; Lehman, 87 (Macrae, 1992;Miller, Turnbull, & McFarland, 1990;Roese & Olson, 1995), and motivation (Johnson & Sherman, 1990;Markman, Gavanski, Sherman, & McMullen, 1993;Ruvolo & Markus, 1992).With the exception of the work on possible selves by Markus and Nurius (1986) as well as that on personally relevant counterfactual thought by Landman and Manis (1992) and very recently by Davis et al. (1995), virtually all the research targeting counteffactual thought to date has been carried out in the laboratory, typically employing written vignettes describing hypothetical decision makers, events, and outcomes. Therefore, many questions remain about the nature and implications of personal counterfactual thought.Markus and Nurius' (1986) notion of "possible selves," or cognitive/affecti...
Counterfactual thinking entails the process of imagining alternatives to realitywhat might have been. The present study explores the incidence and content of counterfactual thinking about personal decisions in three samples of adults. The results indicate, first, that counterfactual thought occurs frequently among normal adults, with approximately half of each sample reporting that they would do something differently if they had their lives to live over. Secondly, there appear to be common themes to the counterfactuals reported in various real-life domains. For example, it is common to imagine states counter to the realities of having married early, having curtailed one's education, and having experienced unsatisfactory interpersonal relationships. In general, it appears that decisions and events that were unusual, that have proved less than ideal, or that have prematurely closed off important life options most often generate counterfactual thinking.The process of imagining alternatives to reality -what might have been -is sometimes referred to as counterfactual thought. Because of the inevitability of choice, misfortune, and conflict between choices, claims, or ways of life, counterfactual thought may be inevitable (Hampshire, 1983). The present study turns this presupposition into a set of empirical questions : How common is counterfactual thought? What sorts of matters are people most likely mentally to alter?The mental simulation of counterfactuals has been implicated in a variety of psychological processes, including causal reasoning (Dunning & Parpal, 1989 ;Gavanski & Wells, 1990;Goodman, 1973;Wells, Taylor & Turtle, 1987), emotional reactions to life events (Gleicher, Kost, Baker, Strathman, Richman & Sherman, 1990; Kahneman & Tversky, 1982a, 6; Landman, 1987a, b; Landman, in press;Lehman, Wortman & Williams, 1987), and social perception (Miller,' Turnbull & McFarland, 1990). However, nearly all the research has been carried out in the laboratory with hypothetical events as stimuli. The extent to which people engage in counterfactual thinking in real life, and its nature, remain * Requests for reprints.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.