You Today, Someone Else Tomorrow?
Psychology Today blog: Evolved Primate
by Daniel R. Hawes
November 9, 2009
It is no secret that many of us are better at giving advice to others, than we are at choosing wisely for ourselves. Also, we often seem to be smarter at committing our future-selves than we are at committing for the present. For example, ask yourself when you will start exercising more, and the answer will be "next week" rather than "this week". Ask yourself when you will start eating healthier, and it will be "tomorrow" rather than "today". And ask yourself when you will stop procrastinating and the answer is always "later" and never "now".
Then, of course, when "next week", "tomorrow", or "later" come around, we too often repeat the above decisions, and we end up making choices that do not reflect what we wanted for ourselves last week, yesterday, or even only a few moments back. Why is this the case?
As Princeton University's Emily Pronin, Christopher Olivola and Kathleen Kennedy demonstrate in a recent series of experiments, there is compelling reason to believe that the reason for this type of behavior is a lacking sense of continuity for our current (choosing) self and our future (consequence bearing) self. I.e. we view our current-self very differently from our future-self, and end up making decisions for current-self and future-self as if they were different entities altogether. Indeed, so their hypothesis goes, we make decisions regarding our future-self comparably to how we decide on behalf of others. In both of these cases we tend to be somewhat detached from the affects and emotions of the situational circumstances; contrasting our choices for current-self, which usually show markedly more situational flexibility, and for which responsiveness to emotion and affect are often very pronounced.
To test this hypothesis, the researchers set up a series of experiments that look at the three mentioned targets of our decisions: current-self, future-self, and others (not specified by time).
Choices regarded such things as to how much of a ghastly fluid oneself (future, or current) or another would drink for a science project, how many emails to receive on behalf of charity, how much time to spend tutoring students, and whether or not to defer a small monetary prize today for a larger monetary in the future.
As the following graph shows, when facing a supposedly real choice of how much of a disgusting liquid to drink for the sake of science, participants chose amounts close to half a cup if the choice regards their future-self or another student. When it comes to their current-self, however, the chosen amount drops to way under a quarter cup. Interestingly enough (and shown in right part of the first graph), when the same choice about the ghastly liquid was posed as an explicitly hypothetical question, the current-self was chosen to drink more than either another student, or the future-self. What is important to note, is that neither choices for current-self nor choices for future-self should be labeled as inherently better, or even more compassionate. Instead, the main finding here is that choices for future-self are indistinguishable from choices on behalf of other people.
The general result can also be shown nicely for the task in which people chose between an instant small monetary reward, or a delayed larger reward. As illustrated in the graph below, which shows the frequency in which people chose the delayed option, people clearly see the wisdom of delaying their reward when it comes to future-self or others, but fail to actually make this decision when regarding their current-self (indeed, as I pointed out in one of my very first posts at "ingenious monkey", there is evidence for a strong relationship between future-self continuity and actual savings behavior).
The experiments regarding emails and tutoring show similar likeness of decisions for future-self and others, while maintaining the distinctiveness of decisions made for current-self. The email and tutoring experiments also test further contingencies, and draw connections between the hypothesized temporal distance argument and the known social distance argument. Hence, you might consider this blog post more of a teaser for, than a spoiler against consulting the original study.
One of the conclusions the authors draw in their publications states that
Main Reference:
Pronin E, Olivola CY, & Kennedy KA. (2008) Doing unto future selves as you would do unto others: psychological distance and decision making. Personality and social psychology bulletin, 34(2), 224-36. PMID: 18156588
Psychology Today blog: Evolved Primate
by Daniel R. Hawes
November 9, 2009
It is no secret that many of us are better at giving advice to others, than we are at choosing wisely for ourselves. Also, we often seem to be smarter at committing our future-selves than we are at committing for the present. For example, ask yourself when you will start exercising more, and the answer will be "next week" rather than "this week". Ask yourself when you will start eating healthier, and it will be "tomorrow" rather than "today". And ask yourself when you will stop procrastinating and the answer is always "later" and never "now".
Then, of course, when "next week", "tomorrow", or "later" come around, we too often repeat the above decisions, and we end up making choices that do not reflect what we wanted for ourselves last week, yesterday, or even only a few moments back. Why is this the case?
As Princeton University's Emily Pronin, Christopher Olivola and Kathleen Kennedy demonstrate in a recent series of experiments, there is compelling reason to believe that the reason for this type of behavior is a lacking sense of continuity for our current (choosing) self and our future (consequence bearing) self. I.e. we view our current-self very differently from our future-self, and end up making decisions for current-self and future-self as if they were different entities altogether. Indeed, so their hypothesis goes, we make decisions regarding our future-self comparably to how we decide on behalf of others. In both of these cases we tend to be somewhat detached from the affects and emotions of the situational circumstances; contrasting our choices for current-self, which usually show markedly more situational flexibility, and for which responsiveness to emotion and affect are often very pronounced.
To test this hypothesis, the researchers set up a series of experiments that look at the three mentioned targets of our decisions: current-self, future-self, and others (not specified by time).
Choices regarded such things as to how much of a ghastly fluid oneself (future, or current) or another would drink for a science project, how many emails to receive on behalf of charity, how much time to spend tutoring students, and whether or not to defer a small monetary prize today for a larger monetary in the future.
As the following graph shows, when facing a supposedly real choice of how much of a disgusting liquid to drink for the sake of science, participants chose amounts close to half a cup if the choice regards their future-self or another student. When it comes to their current-self, however, the chosen amount drops to way under a quarter cup. Interestingly enough (and shown in right part of the first graph), when the same choice about the ghastly liquid was posed as an explicitly hypothetical question, the current-self was chosen to drink more than either another student, or the future-self. What is important to note, is that neither choices for current-self nor choices for future-self should be labeled as inherently better, or even more compassionate. Instead, the main finding here is that choices for future-self are indistinguishable from choices on behalf of other people.
The general result can also be shown nicely for the task in which people chose between an instant small monetary reward, or a delayed larger reward. As illustrated in the graph below, which shows the frequency in which people chose the delayed option, people clearly see the wisdom of delaying their reward when it comes to future-self or others, but fail to actually make this decision when regarding their current-self (indeed, as I pointed out in one of my very first posts at "ingenious monkey", there is evidence for a strong relationship between future-self continuity and actual savings behavior).
The experiments regarding emails and tutoring show similar likeness of decisions for future-self and others, while maintaining the distinctiveness of decisions made for current-self. The email and tutoring experiments also test further contingencies, and draw connections between the hypothesized temporal distance argument and the known social distance argument. Hence, you might consider this blog post more of a teaser for, than a spoiler against consulting the original study.
One of the conclusions the authors draw in their publications states that
"the psychological distance we enjoy when making decisions for future selves and others frees us from immediate subjective concerns."
As a consequence, oftentimes when decisions
"must be made for the present self, wiser decisions could be afforded by the simple reminder that the future self will share many of the same feelings, needs, and concerns as the present self or even by a simple nudge to step outside oneself and make the decision from a non-emotional perspective. [...]
The effects of temporal and social distance on decision making suggest potential strategies for addressing other important problems for society, such as issues concerning the impact of human activity on our global environment."
I guess I might give that a try... tomorrow.The effects of temporal and social distance on decision making suggest potential strategies for addressing other important problems for society, such as issues concerning the impact of human activity on our global environment."
Main Reference:
Pronin E, Olivola CY, & Kennedy KA. (2008) Doing unto future selves as you would do unto others: psychological distance and decision making. Personality and social psychology bulletin, 34(2), 224-36. PMID: 18156588
