Milyavskaya Marina, Inzlicht Michael, Hope Nora, Koestner Richard
Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology, McGill University.
Department of Psychology, University of Toronto.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 2015 Oct;109(4):677-93. doi: 10.1037/pspp0000045. Epub 2015 May 18.
Self-regulation has been conceptualized as the interplay between controlled and impulsive processes; however, most research has focused on the controlled side (i.e., effortful self-control). The present studies focus on the effects of motivation on impulsive processes, including automatic preferences for goal-disruptive stimuli and subjective reports of temptations and obstacles, contrasting them with effects on controlled processes. This is done by examining people's implicit affective reactions in the face of goal-disruptive "temptations" (Studies 1 and 2), subjective reports of obstacles (Studies 2 and 3) and expended effort (Study 3), as well as experiences of desires and self-control in real-time using experience sampling (Study 4). Across these multiple methods, results show that want-to motivation results in decreased impulsive attraction to goal-disruptive temptations and is related to encountering fewer obstacles in the process of goal pursuit. This, in turn, explains why want-to goals are more likely to be attained. Have-to motivation, on the other hand, was unrelated to people's automatic reactions to temptation cues but related to greater subjective perceptions of obstacles and tempting desires. The discussion focuses on the implications of these findings for self-regulation and motivation.
自我调节被概念化为受控过程与冲动过程之间的相互作用；然而，大多数研究都集中在受控方面（即努力的自我控制）。本研究聚焦于动机对冲动过程的影响，包括对破坏目标的刺激的自动偏好以及对诱惑和障碍的主观报告，并将其与对受控过程的影响进行对比。这是通过考察人们面对破坏目标的“诱惑”时的内隐情感反应（研究1和2）、对障碍的主观报告（研究2和3）以及付出的努力（研究3），以及使用经验抽样法实时了解欲望和自我控制的体验（研究4）来实现的。通过这些多种方法，结果表明，“想要”动机导致对破坏目标的诱惑的冲动吸引力降低，并且与在目标追求过程中遇到更少的障碍有关。这反过来解释了为什么“想要”的目标更有可能实现。另一方面，“不得不”动机与人们对诱惑线索的自动反应无关，但与对障碍和诱人欲望的更强主观感知有关。讨论聚焦于这些发现对自我调节和动机的启示。
