Managing motivational conflict: how self-esteem and executive resources influence self-regulatory responses to risk.
J Pers Soc Psychol
; 103(3): 430-51, 2012 Sep.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-22663349
ABSTRACT
This article explores how self-esteem and executive resources interact to determine responses to motivational conflict. One correlational and 3 experimental studies investigated the hypothesis that high and low self-esteem people undertake different self-regulatory strategies in "risky" situations that afford opportunity to pursue competing goals and that carrying out these strategies requires executive resources. When such resources are available, high self-esteem people respond to risk by prioritizing and pursuing approach goals, whereas low self-esteem people prioritize avoidance goals. However, self-esteem does not influence responses to risk when executive resources are impaired. In these studies, risk was operationalized by exposing participants to a relationship threat (Studies 1 and 2), by using participants' self-reported marital conflict (Study 3), and by threatening academic competence (Study 4). Executive resources were operationalized as cognitive load (Studies 1 and 2), working memory capacity (Study 3), and resource depletion (Study 4). When executive resources were ample, high self-esteem people responded to interpersonal risk by making more positive relationship evaluations (Studies 1, 2, and 3) and making more risky social comparisons following a personal failure (Study 4) than did low self-esteem people. Self-esteem did not predict participants' responses when executive resources were impaired or when risk was absent. The regulatory function of self-esteem may be more resource-dependent than has been previously theorized.
Texto completo:
1
Colección:
01-internacional
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Asunto principal:
Asunción de Riesgos
/
Autoimagen
/
Conflicto Psicológico
/
Función Ejecutiva
/
Motivación
Tipo de estudio:
Etiology_studies
/
Prognostic_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Límite:
Adult
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Idioma:
En
Revista:
J Pers Soc Psychol
Año:
2012
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
Estados Unidos