Goal Relevance Research Articles

Modulatory effects of goal relevance on emotional attention reveal that fear has a distinct value

ABSTRACT Threat-related stimuli can capture attention. However, it remains debated whether this capture is automatic or not. To address this question, we compared attentional biases to emotional faces using a dot-probe task (DPT) where emotion was never goal-relevant (Experiment 1) or made directly task-relevant by means of induction trials (Experiments 2–3). Moreover, the contingency between the DPT and induction trials was either partial (Experiment 2) or full (Experiment 3). Eye-tracking was used to ascertain that the emotional cue and the subsequent target were processed with peripheral vision. Experiments 1 and 2 both showed that negative faces captured attention, with faster target processing when it appeared on the same side as the preceding fearful face (i.e. fear-valid trials) compared to the opposite side where the neutral face was shown (i.e. fear-invalid trials), but also when it appeared on the side of the preceding neutral face (i.e. happy-invalid trials) compared to the happy face (i.e. happy-valid trials). Importantly, this preferential spatial orienting to negative emotion was not observed in Experiment 3, where the goal relevance of emotion was high. However, in that experiment, fearful faces produced a specific attentional bias during the DPT, which was mostly driven by the induction trials themselves.

Politics and dinner tables do mix! exploring the role of consumers’ political orientation in plant-based food promotion at restaurants

Plant-based food refers to a diet focused on consuming primarily plant-derived ingredients for health, environmental, and ethical reasons. Since there is a growing recognition regarding the significant correlation between sustainable consumption and consumers' political inclinations, this study aimed to identify effective ways to promote plant-based food in a restaurant setting by analyzing the relative persuasiveness of advertisements in terms of three variables: consumer political orientation (liberal vs. conservative), regulatory focus (promotion vs. prevention), and message type (health vs. taste). This study confirms that there is a significant two-way effect between political orientation and regulatory focus on consumers’ attitude and purchase intentions toward plant-based food. Additionally, this two-way effect between political orientation and regulatory focus varies depending on the type of message. The mediating role of goal relevance was confirmed as well. The study provides implications for effective marketing communication in the context of plant-based food promotion in the foodservice industry.

How foodstagramming posts influence restaurant visit intention: the mediating role of goal relevance and mimicking desire

PurposeThis study aims to explore the role of social media visual posts (known as foodstagramming) on restaurant visit intention. Drawing on the heuristic–systematic model and normative focus theory, this research introduces a framework that assesses the effects of key foodstagramming attributes – vicarious expression, aesthetic appeal and post popularity – and the mediating roles of goal relevance and mimicking desire, in the process.Design/methodology/approachStructural equation modelling was performed to test the proposed model using a sample of tourists (n = 377) and residents (n = 341). Multi-group analysis was performed to compare the differences between these groups.FindingsResults reveal that mimicking desire and goal relevance influence restaurant visit intention; however, mimicking desire has a stronger influence than goal relevance. Little difference was found between the tourist and the resident groups in the proposed relationships, except that vicarious expression positively influences mimicking desire in the tourist group but not in the resident group.Practical implicationsThis study guides restauranteurs and social media influencers (foodstagrammers). It shows that consumers value the textual content and aesthetic appeal of photos over the popularity of a post. It also indicates that vicarious expression is more important for tourists than for residents.Originality/valueThis research advances social media marketing literature by proposing a new information processing framework. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the first studies to explore the impact of visual post attributes on individual decision-making behaviours through socially acceptable norms.

Emotional attention: Time course and effects of agonistic and antagonistic overlay of intrinsic and goal relevances.

Emotional attention can be explained within a goal-directed theory framework according to which attention is captured by the goal relevance of stimuli, that is, their conduciveness nature to a momentarily important goal. However, such an explanation does not consider the attentional impact of intrinsic relevance of stimuli, that is, their general pleasantness. This problem could be resolved by appraisal theories, suggesting that attention is captured by intrinsic relevance and goal relevance of stimuli, whether the relevance overlay is agonistic (e.g., pleasant and goal-conducive) or antagonistic (e.g., unpleasant and goal-conducive). Moreover, appraisal theories suggest that early and late attentional capture would be more impacted by intrinsic relevance and goal relevance, respectively. In the present study, we confronted the predictions of appraisal theories with that of goal-directed theory. To this end, 120 participants performed parallelly an induction task to induce different relevance values to three colored squares, and a dot-probe task with two different stimulus onset asynchrony, to measure early and late attentional captures. This paradigm allowed us to measure attentional capture between a neutral stimulus, a goal-relevant stimulus, and an overlay stimulus. The overlay stimulus was agonistic in one group, while it was antagonistic in the other group. Our results showed evidence in favor of appraisal theories. Namely, the overlay stimulus captured more attention than the goal-relevant and the neutral stimulus, regardless of whether the overlay was agonistic or antagonistic. However, our results were mixed regarding the effects of intrinsic relevance and goal relevance on attentional capture as a function of temporality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

A Sequential Sampling Approach to the Integration of Habits and Goals

Habits often conflict with goal-directed behaviors and this phenomenon continues to attract interests from neuroscientists, experimental psychologists, and applied health psychologists. Recent computational models explain habit-goal conflicts as the competitions between two learning systems, arbitrated by a central unit. Based on recent research that combined reinforcement learning and sequential sampling, we show that habit-goal conflicts can be more parsimoniously explained by a dynamic integration of habit and goal values in a sequential sampling model, without any arbitration. A computational model was developed by extending the multialternative decision field theory with the assumptions that habits bias starting points of preference accumulation, and that goal importance and goal relevance determine sampling probabilities of goal-related attributes. Simulation studies demonstrated our approach’s ability to qualitatively reproduce important empirical findings from three paradigms – classic devaluation, devaluation with a concurrent schedule, and reversal learning, and to predict gradual changes in decision times. In addition, a parameter recovery exercise using approximate Bayesian computation showcased the possibility of fitting the model to empirical data in future research. Implications of our work for habit theories and applications are discussed.

Threats and opportunities: Independent dimensions of goal relevance shape social cognition and behavior.

People pursue goals. They seek to build friendships, find romantic partners, maintain close relationships, gain social status and resources, and stay healthy and safe. But pursuing goals requires assessing who, among the people around them, will help or hurt their ability to reach those goals-that is, who poses goal-relevant affordances. This article overviews recent advances and new predictions from an affordance management approach to social cognition and behavior. The central tenet of this work is that judgments of who helps or hurts goals are independent (rather than opposite ends of a single judgment): Who helps my goal, and who hurts my goal? For any goal, people judge others in one of four ways: as helping the goal, hurting the goal, both helping and hurting the goal, or as irrelevant to the goal. These perceived affordances change across goals: people who help one goal may hurt, both help and hurt, or be irrelevant to another goal. This simple, novel division of helping and hurting across goals has numerous implications for psychological phenomena. It provides a framework for understanding when and how two forms of devaluation will emerge-being seen to pose a threat and being seen as irrelevant-with implications for prejudice, stigmatization, and discrimination. It also provides a lens for understanding how and when others' appraisals of us may affect our own goal pursuit. The article concludes by discussing necessary next steps and promising new directions for applying this approach to understand social cognition and behavior. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Combined effects of intrinsic and goal relevances on attention and action tendency during the emotional episode.

Recent work on emotional attention suggests that attention is prioritized toward stimuli that are intrinsically relevant and toward events that are conducive to momentaneous important goals. The appraisal of intrinsic relevance and goal relevance is aimed to alert individuals to the presence of events that may require action that could affect their well-being and is part of the process that leads to an emotional episode. However, to our knowledge, no empirical data has yet highlighted how precisely intrinsic and goal relevances combine with each other to trigger attentional biases. The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that intrinsic and goal relevances have multiplicative effects on attention and trigger action tendency. To this end, participants appraised the level of intrinsic relevance, goal relevance and action tendency associated with 4 stimuli (2 related to hunger and 2 to thirst), before performing a dot-probe task in which these stimuli were in competition. We observed that intrinsic and goal relevances appraisals had indeed multiplicative effects on attention. In addition, the action tendency reported by participants was best predicted when intrinsic and goal relevances were considered together. These results show the importance of considering both intrinsic and goal relevances in research on emotion and attention. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Stressing affordances: Towards an appraisal theory of technostress through a case study of hospital nurses' use of electronic medical record systems

Nurses use electronic medical record (EMR) systems to accomplish a variety of care-related tasks. Nurses, therefore, encounter a range of stressful situations and events related to using EMR systems, a phenomenon known as technostress. Previous research suggests that individuals appraise technostress differently. However, not much is known about the appraisal process of technostress. By integrating the literature on technostress, affordances, and appraisal theory, this paper introduces the appraisal theory of technostress, which is developed empirically through an interpretive case study involving interviews with hospital nurses. The appraisal theory of technostress explains how individuals process and appraise information about how to potentially act on technology-related stressful events through a system's features. Information about the event, and information about the action potential afforded by the system's features, is evaluated through an appraisal process that includes three appraisal checks: goal relevance, goal conduciveness, and value compatibility. The appraisal checks verify whether the action possibilities of the system's features align or misalign with an individual's goals and values related to action, and shape how the event and the system's features are appraised as challenge or hindrance techno-stressors. Overall, the study offers a novel theoretical perspective and methodological approach to conceptualizing and investigating technostress. More detailed contributions to research and practice are also discussed.

The foundational economy-as-an-organism assumption of ecological economics: Is it scientifically useful?

This paper documents prominent biological metaphors in ecological economics and argues that the discipline is founded on an untested assumption, essentially an analogy: The economy-as-an-organism. A transdisciplinary approach is taken to test the scientific usefulness of this analogy, and eight propositions are put forth and examined. Results show that: 1) This analogy bears all the characteristics of scientifically useful analogies, as documented in the relevant literature. 2) World Bank data from 165 countries from 1960 to 2013 show that empirically verifiable laws that apply to all organisms apply analogously to all economies – supporting the ecological economics view that economies and organisms are metabolically analogous. 3) Empirical results affirm those of a mature GDP-energy literature, despite employing very different assumptions and perspectives – thus validating the analogy's scientific potential. 4) The analogy offers a new perspective on economies, correctly predicts their “characteristics,” and generates new testable hypotheses, hallmarks of scientific analogies. 5) New perspectives and predictions relate to sustainability and are particularly relevant to researchers interested in this field – thus satisfying the “goal relevance” characteristic of scientific analogies. All results of this exploratory and conceptual paper suggest that our analogy is scientifically useful and worthy of additional research.

Inspiration and wellness tourism: the role of cognitive appraisal

ABSTRACT Integrating Cognitive Appraisal Theory with the transmission model of inspiration, this paper investigates the tourist inspiration-eliciting process in the context of wellness tourism. A questionnaire survey (N = 974) was provided to wellness tourists in Shizhu county, China, with findings revealing the motivations of wellness tourists positively influence goal relevance and goal congruence. Goal congruence led to the elicitation of inspiration, which could be separated into two stages of inspired-by and inspired-to. Tourist inspiration was found to diminish as frequency of visitation increased. This research provides conceptual clarity surrounding the intricate connection between motivations and tourist inspiration.

Alpha oscillations and event-related potentials reflect distinct dynamics of attribute construction and evidence accumulation in dietary decision making.

How does regulatory focus alter attribute value construction (AVC) and evidence accumulation (EA)? We recorded electroencephalogram during food choices while participants responded naturally or regulated their choices by attending to health attributes or decreasing attention to taste attributes. Using a drift diffusion model, we predicted the time course of neural signals associated with AVC and EA. Results suggested that event-related potentials (ERPs) correlated with the time course of model-predicted taste-attribute signals, with no modulation by regulation. By contrast, suppression of frontal and occipital alpha power correlated with the time course of EA, tracked tastiness according to its goal relevance, and predicted individual variation in successful down-regulation of tastiness. Additionally, an earlier rise in frontal and occipital theta power represented food tastiness more strongly during regulation and predicted a weaker influence of food tastiness on behaviour. Our findings illuminate how regulation modifies the representation of attributes during the process of EA.

Goal relevance and desirability of virtuous behavior in satisfying affiliative and pathogen avoidance needs

Recent findings suggest that behavioral repertoires frequently conceptualized as virtuous possess a fundamental nature that implicates virtues as highly desirable in facilitating group living through factors of caring, self-control, and inquisitiveness. Although much of this desirability has previously demonstrated in mating domains, it could be possible their benefits extend to affiliative and pathogen-avoidant domains. Two studies (N = 285) sought to determine the potential costs and benefits of associating with virtuous individuals (Study 1) and how these affordances could shape subsequent interpersonal preferences (Study 2). In Study 1, participants inferred a caring behavioral repertoire as particularly effective at facilitating affiliative, whereas inquisitiveness was perceived as particularly threatening to pathogen-avoidant goals. Study 2 provides evidence dispositionally heightened affiliative interests heightened preferences for caring, but pathogen-avoidant motives did not influence preferences. I frame results from an evolutionary perspective and synthesize it with recent findings demonstrating how virtue shapes effective group living.

The Impact of Goal Relevance and Symbolic Relevance of a Brand on Islamic Identity and Royalty

The Impact of Goal Relevance and Symbolic Relevance of a Brand on Islamic Identity and Royalty

Emotional arousal influences remembrance of goal-relevant stimuli.

Emotional stimuli rarely occur in isolation; instead, they often cluster with nearby neutral items in time and space. Research suggests that emotional arousal at encoding strengthens memory retention for temporally adjacent goal-relevant neutral stimuli. It is an open question whether these emotion-induced enhancement effects are the same for spatially adjacent stimuli. The present study examined how emotional arousal influenced memory of temporally or spatially adjacent goal-relevant neutral items. In Experiment 1, two stimuli were presented consecutively as a temporally adjacent pair during the study phase, with a neutral-test stimulus paired with either a negative or neutral bystander stimulus. Participants were instructed to attend to the neutral-test stimulus in the goal-relevant condition and to the bystander stimulus in the goal-irrelevant condition. The method for Experiment 2 was similar to Experiment 1 except that the two stimuli were presented simultaneously during the study, so that they were spatially rather than temporally adjacent. Memory performance was measured for neutral-test items using a recognition test with a remember-know paradigm. Emotional arousal at encoding enhanced the remembrance of temporally adjacent goal-relevant neutral stimuli but impaired the remembrance of spatially adjacent goal-relevant neutral stimuli. Using a similar procedure, Experiment 3 collected behavioral data from two samples for temporally and spatially adjacent conditions and replicated the results of Experiments 1 and 2. The effects of emotional arousal on remembrance of goal-relevant neutral items double dissociated for temporally and spatially adjacent conditions support that arousal-biased competition amplifies the effects of goal relevance. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Age differences in vulnerability to distraction under arousal.

Aging affects brain circuitry involved in both inhibition and arousal. In this study, we tested whether older adults are more or less prone to distraction from emotionally arousing events than young adults. To do so, we examined how arousing taboo distractor words affected concurrent 1-back task performance and subsequent memory for distractors. Our second goal was to examine how the arousal level of 1 item can modulate processing of preceding neutral distractors (taboo-minus-1 distractors). During the task, participants first made 1-back judgments about target pictures that were superimposed with to-be-ignored neutral or taboo distractors. Relative to young adults, older adults were more distracted by taboo than neutral words on the 1-back task and remembered more of the taboo distractors on a later incidental recognition task. Furthermore, young adults showed better suppression of taboo-minus-1 distractors than neutral distractors, whereas in older adults, arousal did not facilitate suppression of taboo-minus-1 distractors. This effect appeared to require attentional control as adding an unrelated attentional load during the 1-back task eliminated the beneficial effect of arousal for young adults' suppression of taboo-minus-1 distractors. Finally, when top-down attentional guidance was provided by increasing the goal relevance of target pictures, both groups showed enhanced suppression of taboo-minus-1 distractors versus other neutral distractors. Together, these findings imply that the effect of arousal on distractibility in aging may arise from an interaction between top-down and bottom-up processes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

How do consumers process digital display ads in-store? The effect of location, content, and goal relevance

This study examines under which circumstances customers are more likely to process in-store digital display ads. An exploratory field study is conducted (n = 296), with a between-subjects, 2 (value-expressive versus utilitarian messages) by 2 (entrance versus register location) by 2 (low versus high goal relevance) quasi-experimental design, in a retail store of horticulture-, baking- and pet supplies. The findings show that DS can appeal to both segments of customers when positioned in proximity to the register, rather than the entrance. In terms of the content displayed, there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach as both types of content have different effects, depending on the shopping goal of the customer.

How to win the consumer’s heart? Exploring appraisal determinants of consumer pre-consumption emotions

• Pre-consumption emotions are explained by appraisal dimensions. • Emotions are goal-relevant signals that beneficially guide consumer behavior. • Goal-relevant contents is the key success factor of emotion-focused marketing. • eWOM is effective in improving consumer appraisal of goal relevance. Emotions are key drivers of consumption in the tourism and hospitality sector. Therefore, advancing our understanding of the determinants of consumer emotions is critical for tourism and hospitality marketers to effectively influence consumer affect-driven consumption behavior. However, research on the determinants of pre-consumption emotions remains under-explored. This study aims to fill the research gap and proposes a theoretical framework to explain affect-driven behavior. Grounded on the cognitive appraisal theory of emotions, we hypothesize that marketing stimuli are personally appraised based on several dimensions such as novelty and goal relevance. These appraisal dimensions determine the elicitation of positive emotions, leading to behavioral intentions. A total of 655 participants were recruited for an empirical study to test this framework in the context of a tourism event experience. We use an experimental research design to examine consumer appraisals, emotions and behavioral intentions in four conditions: two marketing visual formats (poster vs. video) over two delivery channels (advertising vs. e-word-of-mouth). Research outcomes support the theoretical framework of consumer affect-driven behavior, suggesting that the elicitation of positive emotions beneficially guides consumer behavior in goal striving and novelty seeking. Based on this, emotion-focused marketing implications are recommended, including goal-based segmentation, goal-relevant content development and the use of eWOM as an emotion-enhancing message delivery channel.

Neurophysiological evidence for evaluative feedback processing depending on goal relevance

Feedback signaling the success or failure of actions is readily exploited to implement goal-directed behavior. Two event-related brain potentials (ERPs) have been identified as reliable markers of evaluative feedback processing: the Feedback-Related Negativity (FRN) and the P3. Recent ERP studies have shown a substantial reduction of these components when the feedback’s goal relevance (in terms of goal informativeness) was decreased. However, it remains unclear whether this lowering of evaluative feedback processing at the FRN and P3 levels (i) reflects a common regulation process operating across them or (ii) indirectly and mostly depends on valence processing. To address these questions, 44 participants performed a time estimation task wherein the perceived goal relevance of the feedback following each decision was manipulated via instructions in different blocks. We recorded 64-channel EEG and collected subjective ratings of feedback valence and relevance, separately for goal-relevant and irrelevant conditions. ERP results showed a substantial reduction of the FRN and P3 components for irrelevant than relevant feedback, despite the balanced task relevance between them. Moreover, a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) showed that these two successive ERP effects had dissociable spatiotemporal properties. Crucially, a multivariate multiple regression analysis revealed that goal relevance per se, but not valence, was the unique significant predictor of the amplitude reduction of the FRN and P3 when the feedback was goal irrelevant. Our results suggest that although these ERP components exhibit non-overlapping spatiotemporal properties and performance monitoring effects, they can both be modulated by a common, valence-unspecific process related to goal relevance.

Decision Making and Oddball Effects on Pupil Size: Evidence for a Sequential Process.

In our physical environment as well as in many experimental paradigms, we need to decide whether an occurring stimulus is relevant to us or not; further, stimuli have uneven probabilities to emerge. Both, decision making and the difference between rare and frequent stimuli (oddball effect) are described to affect pupil dilation. Surprisingly though, conjoint systematic pupillometric investigations into both factors are still rare. In two experiments, both factors as well as their interplay were investigated. Participants completed a sequential letter matching task. In this task, stimulus probability and letter matching (decision making) were manipulated independently. As dependent variables, pupil dilation and reaction time were assessed. Results suggest a clearly larger pupil dilation for target than for distractor letters, even when targets were frequent and distractors rare. When considering the data structure best, no main effect of stimulus probability was found, instead, oddball effects only emerged when stimuli were goal-relevant to participants. The results are discussed in the light of common theoretical concepts of decision making and stimulus probability. Finally, relating theories of each factor, we propose an integrated framework for effects of decision making and stimulus features on pupil dilation. We assume a sequential mechanism during which incoming stimuli are decided upon regarding their goal relevance and, about 200 ms later, relevant stimuli are appraised regarding their value.

Beyond cost–benefit analysis: resident emotions, appraisals and support toward tourism performing arts developments

ABSTRACT Abundant literature has examined resident reactions to tourism by their perceptions of perceived impacts, overlooking individual emotional responses that might be elicited by psychological causes toward specific types of tourism. This paper employs cognitive appraisal theory to explore the existence and causes of resident emotional responses to tourism performing arts developments. A survey of 438 residents was conducted in Hangzhou, China. Findings revealed that love and interest were dominant emotions. Appraisals of pleasantness, goal congruence, goal relevance, fairness, certainty and coping potential positively elicited happiness, love and gratefulness yet were negatively related to sadness and anger. Worry was elicited by low coping potential and high certainty of outcomes while anger was positively related to other attributions for tourism impacts. Results also detected that resident positive emotions had much more effects than negative emotions on their supports to TPA. The findings have implications for the way destinations position and promote tourism developments to encourage community engagement and manage resident hostility.