Motivation and Action

Heckhausen, Heinz

doi:10.1007/978-3-642-75961-1

Cited by 686 publications

(672 citation statements)

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“…Examples of normalrange goals about acts are the goal to engage in the act-which 6 In the motivation literature, a distinction is made between the phase in which a goal is chosen (goal setting) and the phase in which the goal is implemented, that is, translated into action or processing (goal striving; Gollwitzer, 1990;Heckhausen, 1990Heckhausen, /1991. It should be clear that the present analysis deals only with goal striving.…”

Section: Conceptsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automaticity: A Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis.

Moors

Houwer

2006

Psychological Bulletin

1,200

859

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Several theoretical views of automaticity are discussed. Most of these suggest that automaticity should be diagnosed by looking at the presence of features such as unintentional, uncontrolled/uncontrollable, goal independent, autonomous, purely stimulus driven, unconscious, efficient, and fast. Contemporary views further suggest that these features should be investigated separately. The authors examine whether features of automaticity can be disentangled on a conceptual level, because only then is the separate investigation of them worth the effort. They conclude that the conceptual analysis of features is to a large extent feasible. Not all researchers agree with this position, however. The authors show that assumptions of overlap among features are determined by the other researchers' views of automaticity and by the models they endorse for information processing in general. : automatic, unintentional, uncontrolled, autonomous, unconscious Automaticity is a concept with a long-standing history in psychology (e.g., James, 1890;Wundt, 1903). It has been invoked in domains as diverse as perception (MacLeod, 1991), memory (Jacoby, 1991), social cognition (Wegner & Bargh, 1998), learning (Cleeremans & Jiménez, 2002), motivation (Carver & Scheier, 2002), and emotion (Scherer, 1993). Despite its central nature, there is no consensus about what automaticity means. The aim of this article is to provide an in-depth analysis of the concept and, in particular, the features that have been subsumed under the term. We also discuss implications of this analysis for future research. KeywordsIn the first section, we consider several contrasting views of automaticity. This overview reveals that most scholars analyze automaticity in terms of one or more features. The implication is that automaticity can be diagnosed by looking for the presence of these features in performance or processes. 1 Contemporary approaches to automaticity, moreover, have begun to argue for the separate investigation of automaticity features. In the second section, we discuss the most essential features in greater detail. One purpose is to examine whether they can be separated on a conceptual level. We analyze the features to a point at which the overlap among them is minimized. Another purpose is to show that assumptions of overlap are pervasive in the research literature despite the recent claim that individual features should be investigated separately. These assumptions arise from authors' specific views of automaticity, as well as from the specific underlying information-processing model that they endorse. Approaches to AutomaticityJames (1890), Jastrow (1906), and Wundt (1896/1897, 1903 offered some of the earliest descriptions of automaticity, and many of their ideas have reemerged in contemporary accounts. The views presented below are also based on early studies of skill development (Bryan & Harter, 1899) and early dual-task studies (Solomons & Stein, 1896; see review by Shiffrin, 1988). Automaticity as Processing With No or Minimal AttentionC...

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Section: Conceptsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automaticity: A Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis.

Moors

Houwer

2006

Psychological Bulletin

1,200

859

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Section: Europe Pmc Funders Author Manuscriptsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Further empirical support is given by research documenting that people try to avoid disappointment (from ending up with the worst possible outcome of the chosen gamble) and regret (from obtaining an inferior outcome compared to the alternative not chosen). This motivation to avoid winning nothing (or the minimum amount) is incorporated in regret theory (Loomes & Sugden, 1982), disappointment theory (Bell, 1985), and in the motivation for avoidance of failure (Heckhausen, 1991).…”

Section: Priority Rule: In What Order Are Reasons Examined?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The revival of EU began with von Neumann and Morgenstern (1947), who based EU on axioms. After this landmark book appeared, followed by influential publications such as Edwards (1954Edwards ( , 1962 and Savage (1954) on subjective expected utility (SEU), theories of the mind once again started to model human reasoning and choice in terms of probabilities and the EU framework (e.g., Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975;Heckhausen, 1991).However, it was not long until the first experiments were conducted to test whether people's choices actually follow the predictions of EU. Evidence emerged that people systematically violated EU theory (Allais, 1953;Ellsberg, 1961;MacCrimmon, 1968;Mosteller & Nogee, 1951, Preston & Baratta, 1948, and this evidence has accumulated in the subsequent decades (see Camerer, 1995;Edwards, 1968;Kahneman & Tversky, 2000).…”

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confidence: 99%

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The Priority Heuristic: Making Choices Without Trade-offs

Brandstätter¹,

Gigerenzer²,

Hertwig³

2011

Heuristics

100

182

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Bernoulli's framework of expected utility serves as a model for various psychological processes, including motivation, moral sense, attitudes, and decision making. To account for evidence at variance with expected utility, we generalize the framework of fast and frugal heuristics from inferences to preferences. The priority heuristic predicts (i) Allais' paradox, (ii) risk aversion for gains if probabilities are high, (iii) risk seeking for gains if probabilities are low (lottery tickets), (iv) risk aversion for losses if probabilities are low (buying insurance), (v) risk seeking for losses if probabilities are high, (vi) certainty effect, (vii) possibility effect, and (viii) intransitivities. We test how accurately the heuristic predicts people's choices, compared to previously proposed heuristics and three modifications of expected utility theory: security-potential/aspiration theory, transfer-of-attention-exchange model, and cumulative prospect theory.Conventional wisdom tells us that making decisions becomes difficult whenever multiple priorities, appetites, goals, values, or simply the attributes of the alternative options are in conflict. Should one undergo a medical treatment that has some chance of curing a lifethreatening illness but comes with the risk of debilitating side effects? Should one report a crime committed by a friend? Should one buy an expensive, high-quality camera or an inexpensive, low-quality camera? How do people resolve conflicts, ranging from the prosaic to the profound?The common denominator of many theories of human behavior is the premise that conflicts are mastered by making trade-offs. Since the Enlightenment, it has been believed that weighting and summing are the processes by which such trade-offs can be made in a rational way. Numerous theories of human behavior-including expected value theory, expected utility theory, prospect theory, Benjamin Franklin's moral algebra, theories of moral sense such as utilitarianism and consequentionalism (Gigerenzer, 2004), theories of risk taking (e.g., Wigfield & Eccles, 1992), motivational theories of achievement (Atkinson, 1957) and work behavior (e.g., Vroom, 1964), theories of social learning (Rotter, 1954), theories of attitude formation (e.g., Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975), and theories of health behavior (e.g., Becker, 1974; for a review see Heckhausen, 1991)-rest on these two processes. Take how expected utility theory would account for the choice between two investment plans as an example. The reasons for choosing are often negatively correlated with one another. High returns go with low probabilities, and low returns go with high probabilities. According to a common argument, negative correlations between reasons cause people to experience conflict, leading them to make trade-offs (Shanteau & Thomas, 2000). Europe PMC Funders Author ManuscriptsEurope PMC Funders Author Manuscripts utility, the trade-off between investment plans is performed by weighting the utility of the respective monetary outcomes by their probabilities and...

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“…The solvable anagram was included to increase subjective probability of success and, thus, persistence at the task (Heckhausen, 1991). A bicycle horn was used to produce a startling noise during this task.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The bitter truth: Sensitivity to saccharin's bitterness predicts overactivity in highly arousable female dieters

Craig

Hollis

Dess

2003

Intl J Eating Disorders

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Objective: The interaction between taste sensitivity and emotionality in rats provides a provocative view of hyperactivity. Rats that have been bred selectively for their reactivity to saccharin exhibit characteristic emotionality. When placed on restrictive diets, these rats exhibit excessive activity levels, relative to rats that are not sensitive to saccharin. Because humans who are highly arousable (i.e., reactive to environmental stimuli) also exhibit an increase in sensitivity to saccharin's bitterness, the current study evaluated whether women who are highly arousable, currently dieting, and sensitive to saccharin's bitterness engage in excessive exercise. Method: Participants completed a questionnaire packet, which assessed emotionality, eating patterns, and exercise patterns. On another occasion, they completed a body contour drawings handout, and their weight and height were measured. They also rated saccharin's bitterness and sweetness following a stressful event. Results and Discussion: As hypothesized, sensitivity to saccharin's bitterness predicted overactivity in highly arousable female dieters, which reveals the multidimensionality of activity anorexia.

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Motivation and Action

Cited by 686 publications

References 0 publications

Automaticity: A Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis.

Automaticity: A Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis.

The Priority Heuristic: Making Choices Without Trade-offs

The bitter truth: Sensitivity to saccharin's bitterness predicts overactivity in highly arousable female dieters

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