Abstract
Recent research on goal effects has indicated that conscious and unconscious goals share similar characteristics and functions. However, the extent to which these 2 forms of goal pursuits differ, and under what conditions, is unclear. In the present study, 2 experiments utilizing a suppression paradigm were conducted to demonstrate the difference between suppression that is induced consciously via instructions, and suppression induced unconsciously via egalitarian goal priming. Experiment 1 demonstrated that unconscious suppression did not lead to paradoxical effects, a by-product accompanying conscious suppression. Those participants who were instructed to avoid stereotyping foreigners during a writing task engaged in more stereotyping in a subsequent impression-formation task. This result was not found in the unconscious suppression group. In Experiment 2, based on the assumption that unconscious suppression is more efficient than conscious suppression, it was predicted that unconscious suppression would be less resource-consuming. A self-report measure after the suppression task indicated that only the participants in the conscious suppression condition reported increased fatigue. However, performance on a subsequent anagram task indicated that the performance of both groups was equally degraded, and no difference was observed between the 2 groups in the amount of ego-depletion.
