Exploration and self-control: Differences in regulatory focus and need support

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leigh Ann Vaughn ◽  
Patricia Burkins ◽  
Janak Judd
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Published Data ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Need Support

Exploration and effortful self-control are promotion and prevention-focused experiences. This research examined how exploration and self-control differ in support for autonomy, competence, and relatedness, and it compared them to experiences of pursuing hopes and duties, which are common ways to define promotion and prevention focus. It randomly assigned participants (N = 704) to describe a personal experience of exploration or self-control and rate their need support. Analyses compared need support between exploration and self-control conditions, and with the hopes, duties, and “your day yesterday” conditions (N = 867) of previously published data. Need support generally was higher in exploration than self-control. Relationships with the “yesterday” condition were similar to earlier findings on hopes versus duties. The differences in each type of need support between exploration and hopes, and between self-control and duties, were small. This research shows what could be typical need-support differences in episodes of promotion and prevention focus.

scholarly journals Contents of hopes and duties: A linguistic inquiry

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leigh Ann Vaughn
Keyword(s):  
Social Relationships ◽  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Regulatory Fit ◽  
Positive Outcomes ◽  
Word Count ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Promotion Focus ◽  
Linguistic Inquiry ◽  
A Current

People in a prevention focus tend to view their goals as duties and obligations, whereas people in a promotion focus tend to view their goals as hopes and aspirations. The current research suggests that people’s attention goes to somewhat different experiences when they describe their hopes versus duties. Two studies randomly assigned participants (N = 953) to describe a hope versus duty. Specifically, Study 1 asked participants to describe a personal experience of pursuing a hope versus duty, and Study 2 asked participants to describe a current hope versus duty they had. I analyzed these descriptions with Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count 2015. Consistent with earlier research on regulatory focus, participants wrote more about positive outcomes when describing hopes and social relationships when describing duties. The current research suggests that the effectiveness of common regulatory focus and regulatory fit manipulations could depend on participants’ freedom to choose the experiences they bring to mind when they describe their hopes and duties.

Exploration Versus Self-control: A Linguistic Analysis

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janak Judd
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Negative Emotion ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Word Count ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Function Words ◽  
Emotion Words ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Linguistic Inquiry ◽  
Written Descriptions

Research on regulatory focus has often used hopes versus duties to operationalize promotion and prevention focus, respectively. The current research examined regulatory focus in terms of exploration versus self-control to determine whether people tend to bring different types of experiences to mind when thinking about these experiences. I used Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count software to analyze written descriptions of exploration and self-control and used t-tests to examine between-condition differences on word categories that participants used at least 0.5% of the time. Across two studies, descriptions of exploration had more positive emotional tone and used more insight words. In contrast, descriptions of self-control used more function words, more negative emotion words, including anger, more words about ingestion, and more words about power.

Need Support and Regulatory Focus in Responding to COVID-19

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leigh Ann Vaughn ◽  
Chase A. Garvey ◽  
Rachael D. Chalachan
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Psychological Needs ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Promotion Focus ◽  
Social Distancing ◽  
Need Support

Prevention focus is a self-regulatory orientation that serves the need for security, and promotion focus is a self-regulatory orientation serves the need for growth. From mid-March to early April 2020, did people judge prevention focus to be more useful than promotion focus for responding to COVID-19? Our study tested this hypothesis with 401 American and Canadian participants, who we sampled in 100-person waves in the first four Thursdays of the pandemic. For this study, we developed a new measure of the judged usefulness of promotion and prevention focus. Results supported this hypothesis. Additionally, results showed that the judged usefulness of promotion and prevention focus related positively to support of the psychological needs for autonomy and relatedness, respectively, in responding to COVID-19. Day-to-day differences in autonomy, competence, and relatedness support and in promotion and prevention focus suggest that people were remarkably resilient in the early weeks of the pandemic. Our research could be useful for crafting persuasive advocacy and narrative communications that encourage social distancing to protect others about whom people care most.

scholarly journals Promoting Water Conservation Based on the Matching Effect of Regulatory Focus and Emotion

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 1680
Author(s):  
Xiaomei Wang ◽  
Lin Zhang ◽  
Xiaoyu Jiang ◽  
Jia Wang
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Information Dissemination ◽  
Interactive Effect ◽  
Water Saving ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Matching Effect ◽  
Promotion Focus ◽  
Cognitive Motivation ◽  
Willingness To Engage

This study aimed to examine the effects of regulatory focus and emotions on water-saving information dissemination. The findings revealed that when water-saving information is framed with a prevention focus, sad emotion fosters more active willingness to engage with the information dissemination than cheerful emotion. However, a promotion focus coupled with cheerfulness is slightly more persuasive than a promotion focus coupled with sadness. Furthermore, compared to the individuals in the nonfit group of emotions who had a regulatory focus, the individuals in the fit group formed a more favorable water-saving attitude and demonstrated a slightly higher willingness to disseminate water-saving information. This article is the first to contribute to exploring the dissemination of water-saving information from the perspective of the interactive effect of individual cognitive motivation and emotion.

scholarly journals The influence of regulatory focus and self-discrepancy on cognition in younger and older adults

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leann K. Lapp
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Cognitive Aging ◽  
Regulatory Focus Theory ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Motivated Cognition ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Motivational Systems ◽  
Cognitive Correlates ◽  
Self Discrepancy ◽  
Focus Theory

There exists substantial literature describing how the two motivational systems of promotion and prevention (Regulatory Focus Theory; Higgins, 1997) influence behaviour. However, the specific cognitive correlates of regulatory focus remain unclear. Furthermore, how regulatory focus may influence the course of cognitive aging is unknown. Experiment 1 compared healthy older and younger adults on Higgins' measure of self-discrepancy and explored relationships with cognition. Experiment 2 compared younger adults induced into either a promotion or prevention focus relative to a no-induction control condition on measures of cognition. The results from Experiment 1 revealed that while the magnitude of self-discrepancy remains constant across the lifespan, the evaluation and content of self goals changes with age. The results from Experiment 2 suggest that the effects of the regulatory focus induction are limited but specific to particular aspects of memory and perception. Overall, these findings may contribute to our understanding of aging and motivated cognition.

scholarly journals The influence of regulatory focus and self-discrepancy on cognition in younger and older adults

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leann K. Lapp
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Cognitive Aging ◽  
Regulatory Focus Theory ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Motivated Cognition ◽  
Younger Adults ◽  
Motivational Systems ◽  
Cognitive Correlates ◽  
Self Discrepancy ◽  
Focus Theory

There exists substantial literature describing how the two motivational systems of promotion and prevention (Regulatory Focus Theory; Higgins, 1997) influence behaviour. However, the specific cognitive correlates of regulatory focus remain unclear. Furthermore, how regulatory focus may influence the course of cognitive aging is unknown. Experiment 1 compared healthy older and younger adults on Higgins' measure of self-discrepancy and explored relationships with cognition. Experiment 2 compared younger adults induced into either a promotion or prevention focus relative to a no-induction control condition on measures of cognition. The results from Experiment 1 revealed that while the magnitude of self-discrepancy remains constant across the lifespan, the evaluation and content of self goals changes with age. The results from Experiment 2 suggest that the effects of the regulatory focus induction are limited but specific to particular aspects of memory and perception. Overall, these findings may contribute to our understanding of aging and motivated cognition.

The mediational effect of regulatory focus on the relationships between mindfulness and job satisfaction and turnover intentions

2014 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 494-507 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martha C. Andrews ◽  
K. Michele Kacmar ◽  
Charles Kacmar
Keyword(s):  
Job Satisfaction ◽  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Turnover Intentions ◽  
Equation Modeling ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Snowball Sampling ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Relationship

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of mindfulness as a predictor of the two components of regulatory focus theory (RFT): promotion and prevention focus. It further examines promotion focus and prevention focus as mediators of the mindfulness-job satisfaction and mindfulness-turnover intentions relationships. Finally, job satisfaction is also examined as a mediator of the mindfulness-turnover intentions relationship. Design/methodology/approach – The model was tested using data collected via a snowball approach. Online surveys were distributed to undergraduate students enrolled in a business course. Students were then given the opportunity to earn extra credit by sending the survey to potential respondents. The relationships were tested using structural equation modeling. Findings – Support was found for four of the six hypotheses. Prevention focus did not negatively mediate the relationship between mindfulness and job satisfaction as well as the relationship between mindfulness and turnover intentions. Research limitations/implications – One limitations of this research is the placement of mindfulness as an antecedent to promotion and prevention focus. Another plausible alternative is to consider mindfulness as a consequence. An additional limitation is the use of a snowball sampling technique. Future research should examine these findings using employees of a single organization. Originality/value – This research theoretically and empirically links RFT and mindfulness. This study also adds to the limited research empirically linking RFT and turnover intentions, both directly and indirectly via job satisfaction. Finally, this research extends previous research that established the positive relationship between mindfulness and job satisfaction by examining the mindfulness-job satisfaction-turnover intentions relationship.

Impacts of regulatory focus and institutions on innovation

2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (5) ◽  
pp. 939-954 ◽  
Author(s):  
Birton J. Cowden ◽  
Joshua S. Bendickson
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
New Ventures ◽  
New Venture ◽  
Institutional Setting ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Institutional Settings ◽  
Cognitive Motivations ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Shed Light

Purpose Many factors influence entrepreneurs, some of which influence the level of innovation (i.e. innovative or imitative) of new products or services pursued. The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of the psychological motivations of the entrepreneurs and their institutional setting on the innovativeness of the new venture they pursue. Through this exploration, we can gain a better understanding of how innovative new ventures still occur in varying institutional environments. Design/methodology/approach In order to deliver the authors’ propositions as they pertain to innovation, the authors review the literature on entrepreneurs’ default regulatory focus (i.e. promotion or prevention seeking) and the strength of the institutions in which they are operating. Findings The authors theorize that promotion focus enhances innovativeness of ventures while prevention focus enhances imitativeness of ventures. The authors also provide a conceptual framework for the interplay among institutions and regulatory focus and provide a typology for how these varying combinations impact innovativeness or imitativeness of venture type. Originality/value In this study, the authors discuss and unpack the entrepreneurial mindset in order to bridge gaps between institutions and cognitive motivations of entrepreneurs as they pertain to innovativeness of venture type. By synthesizing several areas of research, the authors shed light on entrepreneurs’ innovativeness by proposing how these factors work together in determining whether an entrepreneur’s venture is more or less innovative based on regulatory disposition and in different institutional settings.

Workplace resources and employee resilience: the role of regulatory profiles

2017 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 419-435 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joana Kuntz ◽  
Philippa Connell ◽  
Katharina Näswall
Keyword(s):  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Joint Effects ◽  
Main Effects ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Practical Implications

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the independent and joint effects of regulatory focus (promotion and prevention) on the relationship between workplace resources (support and feedback) and employee resilience. It proposed that, at high levels of resource availability, a high promotion-high prevention profile would elicit the highest levels of employee resilience. Design/methodology/approach An online survey was completed by 162 white collar employees from four organisations. In addition to the main effects, two- and three-way interactions were examined to test hypotheses. Findings Promotion focus was positively associated with employee resilience, and though the relationship between prevention focus and resilience was non-significant, both regulatory foci buffered against the negative effects of low resources. Employees with high promotion-high prevention focus displayed the highest levels of resilience, especially at high levels of feedback. Conversely, the resilience of low promotion-low prevention individuals was susceptible to feedback availability. Practical implications Employee resilience development and demonstration are contingent not only on resources, but also on psychological processes, particularly regulatory focus. Organisations will develop resilience to the extent that they provide workplace resources, and, importantly, stimulate both promotion and prevention perspectives on resource management. Originality/value This study extends the research on regulatory focus theory by testing the joint effects of promotion and prevention foci on workplace resources, and the relationship between regulatory foci and employee resilience.

Achievement vs avoidance

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 14-16
Keyword(s):  
Emotional Exhaustion ◽  
Regulatory Focus ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Work Performance ◽  
Reading Time ◽  
Prevention Focus ◽  
Promotion Focus ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Pertinent Information ◽  
Practical Implications

Purpose This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies. Design/methodology/approach This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context. Findings The effects of a promotion focus, prevention focus, and a dual regulatory focus on work performance, sickness, and emotional exhaustion were investigated for managers and non-managers in The Netherlands. The dual focus relates more to managers, who have more complex roles and are called on to be able to act in flexible ways on a continual basis. It was tentatively found that a dual focus is not as beneficial as previously expected, and perhaps enhancing a promotion focus for managers and non-managers is more advantageous for an organization. Practical implications The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world’s leading organizations. Originality/value The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent, information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

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