Feeling good and bad about the past and future self.
Abstract
Abstract
Prior research has shown that memories of feeling good about the self often focus on achievement themes, whereas memories of feeling bad about the self often focus on interpersonal themes. This study examined whether a similar relationship would be evident for imagined future events. Young adults in the United States and Denmark provided memories and imagined future events that are associated with positive or negative self-regard. Across cultures, achievement themes were prominently represented in memories of positive self-regard and interpersonal themes were prominently represented in memories of negative self-regard. In contrast, relationships between the emotional valence and thematic content of imagined future events were weak and inconsistent. Our results raise new questions for the theory that imagined future episodes are constructed primarily from recombinations of past episodes.
Department
Psychology
Publication Date
2-2013
Journal Title
Memory
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
10.1080/09658211.2012.720263
Document Type
Article
Recommended Citation
Pillemer, D.B., Thomsen, D., Kuwabara, K.J., Ivcevic, Z. Feeling good and bad about the past and future self. (2013) Memory, 21 (2), pp. 210-218.
Rights
© 2013 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.