Effects of the commitment and difficulty of a focal goal on the suppression of alternative goals

Abstract

Guided by the Goal Shielding theory, this study examined the effect of the commitment and difficulty of a focal goal on the suppression of alternative goals, controlling for the quality of goals. One hundred and thirty-eight undergraduates (all females, age average = 19.53, SD = 1.2) participated in this experiment. The participants were randomly assigned to two conditions (high or low commitment) and asked to choose one focal goal with high or low commitment from the 15-goal list. They were asked to rate the importance and difficulty of the focal goal. Then, they were asked to choose alternative goals they intended to pursue from the goal list and indicate the importance and intention to pursue them. Consistent with the Goal Shielding theory, the result of ANCOVA indicated that the participants in the high commitment condition had fewer alternative goals and lower intentions to pursue them. In addition, this study newly found that the perceived difficulty of a focal goal was negatively correlated with the number of alternative goals and the intention to pursue them. The implications and limitations of this study were discussed.