People are remarkably optimistic in their personal predictions. Hozwver, people occasionally will be pessimistic, bracing themselves for negative feedback, if they anticipate that their optimistic out-look might be challenged. The authors examined the effects of event severity, testing, and feedback timing on personal predictions. Participants believed they would or would not be tested for a medical condition with or without severe consequences. At the beginning of the experiment, participants who anticipated being tested believed they would receive their test results in 3 to 4 weeks. At the end of the experiment, these participants learned that they would receive their test results in anew moments. As predicted, participants who were tested were most pessimistic when anticipating immediate feedback for a deficiency with severe consequences. Further analyses revealed that participants' personal predictions were related to their affect.
Expectancy value theory holds that goal-directed behavior is a function of (a) expectations-the belief that performance depends on effort, (b) instrumentality-the belief that outcome depends on performance, and (c) outcome value-the value attached to achieving the outcome. The present research provides a direct test of two factors involved in the instrumentality component: the contingency between individual performance and group performance and the contingency between group performance and group outcome. Experiment 1 revealed that collective participants worked hard when they perceived a contingency between individual performance and group performance. Experiment 2 revealed that collective participants worked hard when they perceived a contingency between group performance and the group outcome. Taken together, the results confirm the importance of high instrumentality in eliminating social loafing.
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