Conscious and/or non-conscious social motivation Jonathan Schooler University of Pittsburgh

Three questions of this conference –What is the relationship between conscious and non-conscious motivations?  Son Hing et al.  William et al.  Pyszczynksi et al.  Wood & Quinn  Kernis & Goldman –How does self-regulation mediate motivation?  Harackiewicz & Durik  Devine  Weiss & Beal  Forster and Liberman  Gendolla and Wood  Askkanasy & Weiss  Rhodewalt  Forgas-  Strack and Deutsch –What is the role of evolutionarily basic goals in mediating motivation?  Spencer et. al  Aarts & Hassin  Neuberg et al.

Three Levels of Consciousness – Non-conscious-  Information that is entirely outside of awareness – Experiential conscious -  The contents of consciousness – Meta-conscious-  Ones explicit understanding of their conscious experience.

Illustrated by the Example of Daydreaming While Reading –Three components of consciousness  Non-conscious-  The activation of associates of read words  Experiential conscious-  What one is daydreaming about  Meta-conscious-  The recognition that one has been daydreaming instead of reading

A diagrammatic model of the relationship between consciousness and meta-consciousness

Basic Assumptions of a Rudimentary Model of Meta-consciousness (Schooler, 2002) –Continuity of processes  Unconscious tacit monitoring of cognitions occur continuously  Strategy selection, goal monitoring  Conscious experience continues continuously through waking hours  Meta-consciousness only occurs intermittently  Goal failure, request of self-report, natural introspection  Likely that we overestimate frequency of meta-consciousness –Characteristics of meta-consciousness  Limited è simultaneously meta-conscious of one aspect of an experience but not another  Retrospective  Verbal/Symbolic

Temporal Dissociations –Definition  Experience in the absence of meta-consciousness  occur when an individual, who previously lacked meta-consciousness about the contents of consciousness, directs meta-consciousness towards those contents –Examples  Zoning out while reading (Schooler, Reichle, & Halpern, in press)  People can be caught zoning out before they catch themselves  Flow states (Csikszenmihalyi, 1990)  Peak experiences associated with working in deep concentration  Awareness of Emotional States (Lane 1998)  People vary in their awareness of their emotional states  Unwanted negative thoughts (Wegner, 1994)  People have an automatic monitor that searches for unwanted thoughts è Wegner’s ironic search may actually be searching the contents of consciousness rather than pre-consciousness

Translation dissociations –Definition-  Meta-consciousness misrepresents consciousness –Sources  Ambiguity  Effects of monitoring hedonically ambiguous stimuli- Schooler, Ariely, & Loewenstein (2003)  Non-verbalizability  Verbal Overshadowing (Schooler & Engstler- Schooler, 1990)  Analyzing reasons (Wilson & Schooler, 1991)  Faulty Theories  Effects of bogus information (Schooler, Gilbert & Wilson, in prep)  Motivation  Homophobics (Adams et al. 1996)  Change in perspective-  Discovered memories (Schooler, 2002)

–What is the relationship between conscious and non-conscious motivations?

Son Hing et. Al. –Overview  Aversive racism occurs when individuals with high implicit but low explicit racism have an excuse to discriminate against out- group  Explicit measures-conscious  Implicit measures unconscious –Implications of meta-consciousness  Aversive racists are not racist at the meta-conscious level but racists at the experiential level.

Williams, Case, & Warburton –Overview  People sensitive to ostracism  Explicit response  - suck up  Implicit response  - back stab –Implications of meta-consciousness  People may experience a sense of revenge without being meta-aware of this experience.

Pyszczynksi, Greenberg, & Solomon –Overview  Fear of death induces self-esteem striving and allegiance to a cultural world view  Differential responses when implicit vs. explicit  Explicit è individuals rationalize è Implicit standard responses  Placebo reduced effect of mortality salience  MS affects the potential experience rather than the actual experience –Implications of meta-consciousness  MS effects occurs at the experiential level

Wood & Quinn –Overview  Habits and intentions differ in their cognitive, neurocognitive, and behavioral properties  Intentions conscious, habits unconscious  People are able to predict intentional but not habitual behavior. –Relevance of meta-consciousness  Habits are experiential  Intentions are meta-conscious  Absence of meta-awareness of habits leads to the inability to make predictions

Kernis & Goldman –Overview  People differ in the degree to which their motives reflect true intrinsic motivations  Key element of authenticity is people’s awareness of ones motives, feelings, desires, and self-relevant cognitions- –Implications of meta-consciousness  Meta-consciousness may be a critical element of authenticity  Dissociations between experience and meta-consciousness raise issues about use of self-reports in this context

–How do self-regulation strategies mediate motivation

Harackiewicz & Durik –Overview  People differ in the degree to which their performance is regulated by mastery vs. performance goals  Performance predicts performance  Mastery predicts interest –Relevance of meta-consciousness  How do performance goals help  Increased explicit self-regulation  Encourages regular meta-consciousness è Less likely to zone out  Mastery may not work because it encourages an absence of explicit meta-conscious self-regulation

Devine –Overview  People vary in whether their motivation to control the expression of racism is driven by the goal of demonstrating egalitarian views vs. avoiding prejudicial views  Internal motivation leads to engaging in behaviors that will encourage perception of egalitarian views  External motivation leads to engaging in behaviors that reduce perception of bias.  High ems associated with more implicit racism –Implications for meta-consciousness  Implicit racism may be experienced but not meta-aware  People may vary in the degree to which they are meta-aware of their implicit racism  This may impact the strategies they select

Forster and Liberman –Overview  Individuals reduce the accessibility of a goal after they accomplish it –Implications of meta-awareness  Do people have to be meta-aware of a goal in order for this effect to be observed?  Do people need to be meta-aware that goal has been achieved?

Gendolla and Wood –Overview  Perception of goal achievability mediates effort which in turn is reflected by changes in cardio-vascular activity.  Goal achievability is moderated by  Perceived difficulty of the task  Perceived ability of the performer –Implications of meta-awareness  Are people meta-aware of their appraisals?  What happens when one varies the explicitness of these variables?  Stereotype threat studies

Ashkanasy & Weiss –Overview  Emotion fully mediates the hassles and uplifts associated with job attitudes –Implications of meta-awareness  Meta-conscious appraisals of experience based on meta- conscious of appraisals emotion  Important to test tacit measures

Rhodewalt – Overview  Narcissism may involve high explicit w/ low implicit self-esteem  Self-esteem is more linked to social feedback for narcissists –Implications for meta-awareness  Narcissists may be constantly meta-conscious in order to protect and bolster their self-esteem.

Forgas- –Overview  Affect and motivation have reciprocal effects on each other within the context of a homeostatic model of mood regulation  Implicit self-regulation processes serve to restore baseline mood  Must be implicit because why would people deliberately reduce their mood. –Implications for meta-awareness  Model nicely illustrates the implicit monitoring processes implied in the model.

Strack and Deutsch –Overview  Motivation involves the interaction of a reflective and impulsive regulation systems  Reflexive system is knowledge based and allows negation  Impulsive system is automatic and incapable of negation –Relevance to meta-consciousness  Impulsive system typically involves experiential consciousness  Reflexive system more often meta-conscious  Not equivalent however because it is possible to be reflexive without being meta-conscious

–What is the role of evolutionarily basic goals in mediating motivation?

Spencer, Strahan, Fein, & Zana- –Overview  People are sensitive to the activation of implicit goals when in evolutionarily relevant need states  Threat  Thirst –Implication of meta-awareness  Basic evolutionary goal may be experienced w/out meta- awareness.

Aarts & Hassin –Overview  Basic need goals can be implicitly activated (casual sex) by having people read about other people achieving that goal –Implication of meta-awareness  Goal of desiring sex can be experienced w/out meta- awareness

Neuberg et al. –Overview  Goals linked to adaptive outcomes have the most immediate impact  Mating  Arousal causes men to see arousal in attractive women  Threat  Self-protective mind set causes men to see aggression in out groups –Relevance of meta-consciousness  People may not be meta-aware of the activation of adaptive goals  Nevertheless the are likely to be experienced  Could emotions be conceived of as the experiential expression of chronically adaptive goals?