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Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been
Counterfactual information, information about what might have been, forms the content of counterfactual thoughts and emotions like regret and relief. Recent research suggests that human adults and children, as well as rhesus monkeys, demonstrate ‘counterfactual curiosity’: they are motivated to seek...
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
The Royal Society
2022
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9620751/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36314158 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2021.0340 |
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author | Fitzgibbon, Lily Murayama, Kou |
author_facet | Fitzgibbon, Lily Murayama, Kou |
author_sort | Fitzgibbon, Lily |
collection | PubMed |
description | Counterfactual information, information about what might have been, forms the content of counterfactual thoughts and emotions like regret and relief. Recent research suggests that human adults and children, as well as rhesus monkeys, demonstrate ‘counterfactual curiosity’: they are motivated to seek out counterfactual information after making decisions. Based on contemporary theories of curiosity and information seeking and a broad range of empirical literature, we suggest multiple heterogeneous psychological processes that contribute to people's motivation for counterfactual information. This includes processes that are identified in the curiosity literature more generally—the potential use of counterfactual information for adaptive decision making (its long-term instrumental value) and the drive to reduce uncertainty. Additionally, we suggest that counterfactual information may be particularly alluring because of its role in causal reasoning; its relationship with prediction and decision making; and its potential to fulfil emotion regulation and self-serving goals. Some future directions have been suggested, including investigating the role of individual differences in counterfactual curiosity on learning and wellbeing. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Thinking about possibilities: mechanisms, ontogeny, functions and phylogeny’. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9620751 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | The Royal Society |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-96207512022-11-14 Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been Fitzgibbon, Lily Murayama, Kou Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci Part II: Ultimate Questions: Functions and Phylogeny Counterfactual information, information about what might have been, forms the content of counterfactual thoughts and emotions like regret and relief. Recent research suggests that human adults and children, as well as rhesus monkeys, demonstrate ‘counterfactual curiosity’: they are motivated to seek out counterfactual information after making decisions. Based on contemporary theories of curiosity and information seeking and a broad range of empirical literature, we suggest multiple heterogeneous psychological processes that contribute to people's motivation for counterfactual information. This includes processes that are identified in the curiosity literature more generally—the potential use of counterfactual information for adaptive decision making (its long-term instrumental value) and the drive to reduce uncertainty. Additionally, we suggest that counterfactual information may be particularly alluring because of its role in causal reasoning; its relationship with prediction and decision making; and its potential to fulfil emotion regulation and self-serving goals. Some future directions have been suggested, including investigating the role of individual differences in counterfactual curiosity on learning and wellbeing. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Thinking about possibilities: mechanisms, ontogeny, functions and phylogeny’. The Royal Society 2022-12-19 2022-10-31 /pmc/articles/PMC9620751/ /pubmed/36314158 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2021.0340 Text en © 2022 The Authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Part II: Ultimate Questions: Functions and Phylogeny Fitzgibbon, Lily Murayama, Kou Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
title | Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
title_full | Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
title_fullStr | Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
title_full_unstemmed | Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
title_short | Counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
title_sort | counterfactual curiosity: motivated thinking about what might have been |
topic | Part II: Ultimate Questions: Functions and Phylogeny |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9620751/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36314158 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2021.0340 |
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