Chapter 13

The Self-Regulation Perspective

Modified: 2022-09-05 6:25 pm

This approach emphasizes negative feeback processes as they may relate to personality. Those processes are couched in terms of intentions, goals, and feedback.

• Learning Objectives:
• •13.1 Summarize how thinking leads to intentions, goals, and from them to behavior
  •13.2 Explain how self-regulation reflects a process comprising the elements involved in feedback control
  •13.3 Identify further themes in self-regulation
  •13.4 Assess self-regulatory qualities and goals
  •13.5 Outline how problems in behavior reflect problems in self-regulation
  •13.6 Outline problems and challenges related to the self-regulation perspective
• This approach borrows from:
  • Systems theory
  • Robotics
  • Artificial intelligence
  • Cognition
  • Motivation
• 13.1 From Cognition to Behavior (p. 201)
  • What is the link between thinking and doing?
  • Is it one schema or more than one?
    • Scripts such as dining out apply to others and to self
  • How does physiology enter these questions?
    • Example: What is the role of mirror neurons?
      
    • 13.1.1 Intentions (See Figure 13.1 below)
      • Intentions follow after:
        • Weighing several types of information
          • Desirability
          • Outcomes
        • Attitudes are formed from both of the above
      • Intentions have a social meaning
        • Your family and friends notions figure into your intentions creating a subjective norm
          

• 13.1.2 Goals (See Figure 13.2 below)
  • Goals:
    • Energize activities
    • Direct movements
    • Provide meaning
  • The self is made up (partly) of goals and their organization
  • Goals:
    • Come from intentions
    • Vary
    • May be incompatible
    • Shift over time

• 13.1.3 Goal Setting
  • Many goals do not imply or demand a standard of excellence
    • Example: Grocery shopping
  • But, when the goal is to "do well" (a higher goal) they:
    • Lead to higher performance
    • Make people try harder
    • Make people more persistent
    • Make people concentrate
  • What about totally unrealistic goals?
    • Not adopted
    • As if the goals don't exist
      
• 13.1.4 Implementation Intentions and the Importance of Strategies
  • Goal intentions: reach an outcome
  • Goal implementations: Mechanisms to reach goal, they include:
    • How
    • When
    • Where
    • If...then thinking
    • More concrete
    • Get process started
    • Prevent straying off course
    • Intending to perform a hard task
      • Focused implementations have worked for:
        • Stopping smoking
        • Preventing unwanted pregnancies
        • Getting regular exercise
  • Goal failures come from:
    • Distractions
    • Fatigue
  • Intentions can relate to one's possible self
    
• 13.1.5 Deliberative and Implemental Mindsets
  • Deliberative mindsets:
    • Weigh possibilities
    • Assess pros and cons
    • Juggle options
    • Is open-minded
    • Careful
    • Cautious
  • Implemental mindsets:
    • Are optimistic
    • Minimize problems
    • Generate persistence
  • These mindsets may use different parts of the brain
• 13.2 Self-Regulation and Feedback Control (p. 204)
  • How do intentions become behavior? That is where feedback control enters the picture.
    
    • 13.2.1 Feedback Control (See Figure 13.3 below)
      • Feedback is a dynamic mechanism involving:
        • A value, goal, standard of comparison, or reference value (all of these terms are equivalent)
        • An input
          • Can vary from a bit of consciousness to careful thinking
          • Need not be conscious
        • A comparator
          • This "decides" whether behavior should remain or change
        • Output function
          • If no change needed, old behavior continues
          • If change needed, behavior modified
          • (You might note the similarity to Piaget's assimilation and accommodation)
          • Also note that different people will have different standards
            • Example (from text): "A" students and "C" students use the same feedback mechanism but they may have different standards

  
  

  • 13.2.2 Self-Directed Attention and the Action of the Comparator
    • Human use feedback control
    • Those who are self-focused compare their goals to their current behavior
    • Those who engage with a comparator regulate their behavior more closely
      
  • 13.2.3 Mental Contrasting and Goal Matching
    • Mental contrasting is being aware of the present and the future simultaneously
    • Mental contrasting can:
      • Energize behavior
      • Make good use of poor performance
        
    13.2.4 Hierarchical Organization
    • Feedback loops can be hierarchical (See Figure 13.4 below)
    • Powers (1973) posited three levels (from highest to lowest):
      • System Concepts
        • Abstract qualities (e.g., my ideal self)
      • Principle Control
        • Broad qualities similar to traits or values (e.g., thoughtfulness)
      • Programs
        • Strategies for action
        • Only programs are executed
        • In the figure below, buying flowers satisfied the two higher levels

• 13.2.5 Issues Concerning Hierarchical Organization
  • The levels above are rarely active simultaneously
  • The lowest level, programs, is often the most active and in charge
    • Routine behaviors are usually run by this level:
      • Driving
      • Washing dishes
      • Buying groceries
  • But, lower levels may cause higher levels to be affected
    • Buying on sale and frugality principle match
    • But, eating fatty snacks at a party conflicts with principle of health consciousness
  • Programs may be identical but motivated by different principles
    • The figure above would not change if Richard was buying flowers to manipulate her instead of being thoughtful
      
• 13.2.6 Evidence of Hierarchical Organization 
  • People think hierarchies
    • Most of the time in higher levels
      • "Attending class" instead "going to a building, sitting in a room, and writing 
    • But, when having trouble they may revert to a lower level
      • Instead of "summarizing the lecture" they may revert to "writing down everything the instructor said"                                                            
        
• 13.2.7 Construal Levels
  • Psychological distance (Trope & Liberman):
    • Distant events are seen abstractly
    • Nearer events are seen concretely
    • Distance may be inferred by:
      • Time
      • Space
      • Social distance
      • Third person vs first person viewpoint
• 13.2.8 Emotions
  • Emotions may arise when there is a conflict in a goal
  • Simon's goals: get gas, eat lunch, drive to beach, study, sun, drive home, and do laundry may arouse emotions when changed
  • For example, if getting gas is skipped then anxiety may develop from the thought of running out of gas on way home
  • More generally when things are going:
    • Very well, people may feel joy or ecstasy
      • FYI: once I coached a team and they were executing at a high level, I felt such joy
    • Well, people feel good
    • Poorly, negative feelings may show up
  • Negative feelings may lead to increased effort
  • Positive feelings may lead to coasting
    
• 13.2.9 Expectancies Influence Effort versus Disengagement
  • Obstacles:
    • Can cause negative feelings
    • Disrupt effort
    • Cause disengagement
      • Temporary or permanent
  • While different theorists term the effect differently, the consensus is:
  • Confident people are more persistent and perform better
    
• 13.2.10 Partial Disengagement
  • Trying harder and giving up are not the only possible responses
    • Partial disengagement:
      • May substitute for an original goal
      • May result in scaling back but staying in the same domain
        • Example: loss of legs, can't play basketball, but could switch to wheelchair basketball
    • However, sometimes giving up is the right response:
      • Pursuing an unwelcome relationship
      • Attempting to reach an unreachable goal
        • Example: Playing shortstop in the major leagues
• Box 13.1 Theoretical Issue: Feedback versus Reinforcement (p. 205)
  • Is feedback akin to reinforcement?
    • Theorists disagree
      • Some argue that reward is important
      • Others argue that the event and the goal are more important
    • Behaviorists, themselves, disagree over over the term reinforcement
      • Tolman believed that reinforcement provided information
      • Social reinforcement works best when it is rare
• Box 13.2 Confidence about Life: Effects of Generalized Optimism (p. 210)
  • There are more general expectancies: optimism and pessimism are two examples
    • Optimists
      • Are more liked
      • Form social relationships better
      • Adapt to new environments better
      • Are more supportive of their partners
      • Deal with adversity better
      • Have less distress
      • Are less likely to withdraw from usual activities
      • Are more prepared to see situations as real
    • Physically:
      • Pessimists are more likely to be rehospitalized after heart surgery
      • Optimists are less likely to die from cancer
      • Optimists live longer
      • Health and personality are being studied more now
• 13.3 Further Themes in Self-Regulation (p. 211)
  • Three complications make the self-regulation picture less clear.
    
    • 13.3.1 Approach and Avoidance
      • Any overt action may be motivated by:
        • Approaching success
        • Avoiding failure
        • Emotions are involved in both of the above
          
    • 13.3.2 Intention-Based and Stimulus-Based Action
      • People mimic others, often without realizing it
        • Laboratory experiments confirm that priming can cause such mimicry
          • Reading hostile content and then punishing more
          • Reading about the elderly and walking more slowly
      • Many behaviors show automaticity sometimes via subliminal cues
      • Outside events can also influence behavior without awareness, so the following may influence behavior:
        • Radio program
        • Newspaper article
        • Conversations
        • Random stimuli
      • Such data make it difficult to see whether behavior is directed or self-organizing
      • The dual process model of cognition may be at play (see chapter 12)
      • Recall it had two parts:
        • Intuitive
          • Works automatically
          • Can handle complex events
          • Is impulsive
          • Is rapid
        • Rational
          • Governed by intentional behavior
          • Top-down
          • Planful
          • Used for situations requiring thought
            
    • 13.3.3 Self-Regulation as Self-Control
      • Very often, self-regulation entails self-control
      • Self-control situations:
        • Always involve conflicts
        • Are usually practical problems
        • Examples include:
          • Dieting
          • Substance Abuse
          • Domestic violence
        • Note the additional conflict between immediate and long-term goals
      • Dual process models may explain this conflict
• 13.4 Assessment from the Self-Regulation Perspective (p. 213)
  • Relative new area
    
    • 13.4.1 Assessment of Self-Regulatory Qualities
      • Measures
        • Private self-consciousness
          • Those high it it are:
            • Careful and thorough self-regulators
          • Those low in it are:
            • More random and less guided in their behavior
        • The Rumination-Reflection Questionnaire assesses:
          • Rumination: not being able to put something behind you
            • Correlated with neuroticism
          • Reflection: being fascinated or inquisitive
            • Correlated with openness to experience
        • The Behavior Identification Form measures the extent of higher or lower level viewpoints of behavior
          • Those at high levels look at the big picture
          • Those at low levels focus more on the machinery of behavior
        • Impulsiveness and Self-Control
        • There are several measures of each
          • Self-control is an important concept, it predicts:
            • GPA
            • Adjustment
            • Alcohol abuse
            • Interpersonal skills
    • 13.4.2 Assessment of Goals
      • Self-regulation emphasizes goals
        • Emmons asks participants their personal goals in four areas (I have inserted a few of mine):
          • Work/School
            • Keep working while I can
          • Home/Family
            • Transition into being a grandparent
          • Social Relationships
            • Keep up with long-standing friendships (most of which are online)
          • Leisure/Recreation
            • Swim for exercise
            • Target practice for fun
• Box 13.3 Reduction of Self-Regulation: Deindividuation and Alcohol (p. 214)
  • Again, the dual process view may explain deindividuation and the effects of alcohol
    • The idea is that reduced self-focus leads to poor behavioral regulation
      • Deindividuation
      • Alcohol abuse
• 13.5 Problems in Behavior, and Behavior Change, from the Self-Regulation Perspective (p. 214)
• Despite its relative newness, there are some therapeutic methods for the self-regulation perspective
  • 13.5.1 Problems as Conflicts among Goals and Lack of Strategy Specifications
    • Having two conflicting goals causes conflict
      • Having a career and maintaining a close relationship
    • One solution is to alternate between the goals but this will usually not work out
    • Another is pick the goal that satisfies the higher-order need and reduce the other one
    • Sometimes, abtract goals are desired but persons may not know how to attain them
      • Examples are:
        • Being fulfilled
        • Successful
        • Well liked
        • Not arguing with spouse
        • Being more assertive
      • In these cases people should learn and develop concrete strategies
  • 13.5.2 Problems from an Inability to Disengage
    • Many people find they are unable retreat from a goal they fail to reach
    • Hiearchical view sees giving up as affecting one's central self
    • The pattern of disengagement is:
      • Sporadic effort, doubt, distress, disengagement, reconfronting the goal
    • Dwelling on failure:
      • Can cause loss of self-worth
      • Major distress
      • Depression
      • Rumination
        
  • 13.5.3 Self-Regulation and the Process of Therapy
    • Kanfer views therapy as breaking down automatic unwanted behaviors
    • In their place, people should substitute controlle and monitored thinking
    • Building new automatic responses should follow
    • Therapy itself is a long-term and dynamic process of continual feedback
      
  • 13.5.4 Therapy Is Training in Problem Solving
    • One way to think of therapy is as a form of problem solving
      • Means-end-analysis is one such form, it:
        • Identifies the present state
        • Identifies the goal state
        • Defines the "path" between the two as therapy
          • In that path long-term goals are identified
          • Then broken down into nearer term goals
          • At some point, concrete solutions should emerge
          • Accurate feedback is required
• 13.6 Problems and Prospects for the Self-Regulation Perspective (p. 216)
  • Mixed response to self-regulation approach
    
    • Is robotics and AI a suitable model?
      • Not now, but hard to bet against both in the long run
    • Feedback was developed by Cannon for physiological processes, so it is a plausible mechanism for personality
    • Homeostasis as model?
      • Homeostasis does not necesarily rule against change
    • Homunculus problem
      • Need to avoid its infinite regress
    • Built-in goals (survival, personal coherence) may reside outside consciousness
    • Empty shell
      • The model does not really describe personality itself
    • Not a theory of personality
      • Self-regulation was created to explain other aspects of psychology
• Points to Remember
  • In self-regulation models, behavior is sometimes specified by interpretive schemas, if an interpretation is closely tied to an action quality.
  • Sometimes, actions follow from intentions: products of a mental algebra in which personally desired outcomes and social considerations are weighed to yield an intent to act or not act.
  • Theory concerning self-regulation emphasizes goals.
  • The goals underlying behavior have a variety of labels, including life tasks, personal strivings, personal projects, and current concerns.
  • This view treats the structure of the self as an organization among goals. Some goals are fairly neutral, but others imply a standard of excellence. In the latter case, setting specific high goals results in higher performances. This is because committing oneself to a more demanding goal focuses one’s efforts more fully. If the goal is too high, though, people don’t adopt it.
  • Some intentions concern attaining end goals; others are about implementing action plans to reach those end goals. The latter are important for ensuring that behavior actually gets done.
  • Implementation intentions constitute the linking of strategies to the contexts in which the person wants to engage them. Intentions are formed in a deliberative mindset, but once the person starts to pursue them, he or she is in an implementational mindset.
  • Once a goal for behavior has been evoked, self-regulation reflects a process of feedback control. A reference value (or goal) is compared against present behavior. If the two differ, behavior is adjusted, leading to a new perception and comparison.
  • Given that many goals are dynamic and evolving, this view emphasizes that self-regulation is a never-ending process. A single feedback loop is too simple to account for the diversity in people’s actions alone, but complexity is provided by the fact that feedback systems can be organized in a hierarchy, in which one system acts by providing reference values to the system directly below it.
  • The concept of hierarchy accounts for the fact that a goal can be attained by many kinds of actions, along with the fact that the same action can occur in service to diverse goals.
  • Within this framework, emotions have been viewed as calls for reprioritizing one’s goals. Emotions are viewed as giving a subjective reading of how well you’re progressing toward a goal. Emotions, thus, convey important information that has a strong influence on behavior.
  • When people encounter obstacles in their efforts, self-regulation is interrupted, and they consider whether success or failure is likely.
  • If their expectancies are positive enough, they will keep trying; if not, they may disengage effort and give up.
  • Disengagement is sometimes the adaptive response, but people sometimes give up too quickly. In some cases, disengagement is only partial—goal substitution or scaling back. This keeps the person engaged, in one way, while disengaging in another.
  • Although much of this chapter concerns conformity to goals, self-regulation models also include discussions of avoidance. Avoidance means creating distance instead of conformity.
  • Another issue is that some behavior occurs via intentions, but some actions are triggered fairly automatically, even without the person’s awareness. This difference between sources of influence is sometimes dealt with by dual-process models resembling those discussed in Chapter 12.
  • An intuitive system promotes behaviors that are triggered by cues of the moment; a rational system promotes behaviors that are thought out and intentional. Self-regulation sometimes entails self-control: the prevention of pursuing one goal, in service of another more important goal.
  • Assessment, from this view, is partly a matter of assessing individual differences in self-regulatory functions, such as self-reflectiveness, self-control, and the level of abstraction at which people view their goals.
  • This view also suggests the value of assessing goals themselves. There are several ways to conceptualize problems from this view. One possibility focuses on conflict between incompatible goals. Another points to a lack of specification of midlevel behavioral reference values to guide behavior. Yet another emphasizes that people are sometimes unable to disengage from behaviors that are necessary for the attainment of higher-order goals.
  • There’s evidence that people who are depressed display an exaggerated inability to disengage.
  • Just as behavior can be construed in terms of self-regulatory systems, so can the process of behavior change induced by therapy.
  • People in therapy use feedback from decisions they’ve put into practice to make further decisions. They monitor the effects of changes in behavior to determine whether the changes have produced the desired effects.
  • One long-term goal of therapy is to make people better problem solvers through techniques such as means–end analysis, so that they can make their own adjustments when confronting new problems.
• KEY TERMS
  • Action identification: The way one thinks of or labels whatever action one is performing.
  • Attitude: A personal evaluation of the likely outcome of an action and the desirability of that outcome.
  • Comparator: A mechanism that compares two values to each other.
  • Deliberative mindset: A careful mindset that is used while deciding whether to take an action.
  • Disengage: To cease and put aside self-regulation with regard to some goal.
  • Feedback hierarchy: An organization of feedback loops, in which superordinate loops act by providing reference values to subordinate loops.
  • Goal intention: The intention to attain some particular outcome.
  • Homeostasis: Regulation around a constant steady state.
  • Implemental mindset: A positively biased mindset used while implementing an intention to act.
  • Implementation intention: The intention to take specific actions in specific contexts.
  • Means–end analysis: The process of creating a plan to attain an overall goal (end) by breaking it into successively more-concrete goals (means).
  • Negative feedback loop: A self-regulating system that maintains conformity to some comparison value.
  • Principle: A broad, abstract action quality that could be displayed in any of several programs.
  • Program: A guideline for the actions that take place in some category of events (as a script).
  • Subjective norm: A person’s impression of how relevant others value an action and your interest in pleasing them.
  • Subliminal stimuli: Stimuli presented too quickly to be consciously recognized.
  • System concept: A very abstract guide for behavior, such as an ideal sense of self.

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