On the representation of intentions: Do personally relevant consequences determine activation?

• Published in: Memory & cognition 2011-11, Vol.39 (8), p.1487-1495
• Main Authors: Schult, Janette C., Steffens, Melanie C.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Biological and medical sciences; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive Psychology; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Human; Humans; Intention; Laboratories; Learning. Memory; Male; Memory; Memory, Episodic; Mental Recall - physiology; Motivation; Psychological Tests; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Studies; Young Adult
• ISSN: 0090-502X; 1532-5946
• DOI: 10.3758/s13421-011-0110-3

The intention-superiority effect describes shorter latencies for reactions to stimuli intended for future enactment, relative to stimuli associated with no enactment or canceled enactment. Previous attempts to demonstrate an intention-superiority effect for other types of tasks—for instance, observing the experimenter executing actions—have not yielded an intention-superiority effect. A reason for this could be that the typical enactment task was associated with a higher degree of personal relevance than were other laboratory-based tasks and that task importance or its consequences heighten the accessibility of intention-relevant materials. In two experiments, we demonstrate an intention-superiority effect for different types of tasks (e.g., monitoring a video clip) when task realization has personally relevant consequences in terms of a performance evaluation. In contrast, we found no intention-superiority effect when future enactment had no personally relevant consequences for participants. These findings imply that the intention-superiority effect is not restricted to actions but occurs generally for relevant plans.