in thoughts...
Friday, October 31, 2003
Counterfactual Thinking...
This was the interesting topic that we were doing for our last cognitive tutorial... and man, am I experiencing an overwhelming amount of counterfactual thinking since yesterday...
Well, basically, what happens in real life becomes facts, can't change those... But in our heads we often do counterfactual thinking, trying to "undo" certain actions in our minds, and imagining the different outcomes that could have been...
Think Sliding Doors, you know, the movie starring Gwyneth Paltrow...
Well, in our lives, we construct counterfactual thinking
1. for its preparatory role - in case we face a similar situation next time, we can learn from our mistakes and do things in a better way next time
2. for its affective role - to make you feel better or make you feel worse, depending on what emotions you want to generate
3. to encourage creativity - generating possible alternatives allows you to explore all the ways things may have turned out differently
4. to make conversation more interesting (this point was contributed by Sarah from my Cognitive class... hehe... it's really quite true...)
5. to determine which was the main cause of the eventual outcome. Think this is something we had to do a lot of during History class... Well, I think the police have to do this too...
If I had not taken my phone and wallet to the Ladies, I would not have lost them.
Fact: I lost my phone and money. (effect/outcome)
Perceived cause: I took my phone and wallet with me to the Ladies.
Well... Maybe next time I shouldn't take my stuff to the loo... (that's constructing a counterfactual thought to prevent myself from losing my things again)
But... Maybe I would have lost it somewhere else even if I didn't bring it to the Ladies... Maybe if I went to the Ladies, left my things at a table or in the library for a couple of minutes, I may come back to realise that my stuff were taken ANYWAY... (that's constructing a counterfactual thought to make myself feel better - that the outcome will be the same no matter what I did)
Okie... That's considered my revision of this topic huh... think I understood it from the way the tutor was explaining... Now, on with what I found was interesting...
The tutor mentioned that old people tend to regret inactions more than actions, while younger folks tend to regret actions more than inactions... I wrote on 14 July 2003 the entry "How I wish I had..." By this tendency that my tutor mentioned, I think my mental age is much older than my physical age, haha... I'm a freaking 75 year old trapped in a 20 year-old's body...
I was wondering... WHY do old people tend to regret inactions more? WHY do young people tend to regret actions more?
Could it be:
Young people theoretically have more time to live, so if they have any regret for any inactions, this regret is minimized when they think that "If this happens to me again, I'll take action this time, instead of being passive and not taking action". The thought that they might die any moment does not occur to them as much as it does to the older people. Taking the probability that they still have a lot of their lives ahead of them, there is a high chance (or at least relatively higher chance compared to older folks) that whatever event they regretted their inaction for, this event may just happen again, and this time they can undo their regret by behaving in the "better" way...
Older people theoretically already do not have much time left to live, and if they keep thinking that they might just die any moment now, they will have the urge to "live life to the fullest", and thus, INACTION, is very much regretted. They may be thinking, "Aiyah, I should have just been brave at that point and did it. Now I won't get the chance anymore." In fact, they might be quite proud of their actions - even those moments and actions that they previously thought to be embarrassing, which now become stories of interest for them to tell their grandchildren...
Opinions, anyone?
Well, basically, what happens in real life becomes facts, can't change those... But in our heads we often do counterfactual thinking, trying to "undo" certain actions in our minds, and imagining the different outcomes that could have been...
Think Sliding Doors, you know, the movie starring Gwyneth Paltrow...
Well, in our lives, we construct counterfactual thinking
1. for its preparatory role - in case we face a similar situation next time, we can learn from our mistakes and do things in a better way next time
2. for its affective role - to make you feel better or make you feel worse, depending on what emotions you want to generate
3. to encourage creativity - generating possible alternatives allows you to explore all the ways things may have turned out differently
4. to make conversation more interesting (this point was contributed by Sarah from my Cognitive class... hehe... it's really quite true...)
5. to determine which was the main cause of the eventual outcome. Think this is something we had to do a lot of during History class... Well, I think the police have to do this too...
If I had not taken my phone and wallet to the Ladies, I would not have lost them.
Fact: I lost my phone and money. (effect/outcome)
Perceived cause: I took my phone and wallet with me to the Ladies.
Well... Maybe next time I shouldn't take my stuff to the loo... (that's constructing a counterfactual thought to prevent myself from losing my things again)
But... Maybe I would have lost it somewhere else even if I didn't bring it to the Ladies... Maybe if I went to the Ladies, left my things at a table or in the library for a couple of minutes, I may come back to realise that my stuff were taken ANYWAY... (that's constructing a counterfactual thought to make myself feel better - that the outcome will be the same no matter what I did)
Okie... That's considered my revision of this topic huh... think I understood it from the way the tutor was explaining... Now, on with what I found was interesting...
The tutor mentioned that old people tend to regret inactions more than actions, while younger folks tend to regret actions more than inactions... I wrote on 14 July 2003 the entry "How I wish I had..." By this tendency that my tutor mentioned, I think my mental age is much older than my physical age, haha... I'm a freaking 75 year old trapped in a 20 year-old's body...
I was wondering... WHY do old people tend to regret inactions more? WHY do young people tend to regret actions more?
Could it be:
Young people theoretically have more time to live, so if they have any regret for any inactions, this regret is minimized when they think that "If this happens to me again, I'll take action this time, instead of being passive and not taking action". The thought that they might die any moment does not occur to them as much as it does to the older people. Taking the probability that they still have a lot of their lives ahead of them, there is a high chance (or at least relatively higher chance compared to older folks) that whatever event they regretted their inaction for, this event may just happen again, and this time they can undo their regret by behaving in the "better" way...
Older people theoretically already do not have much time left to live, and if they keep thinking that they might just die any moment now, they will have the urge to "live life to the fullest", and thus, INACTION, is very much regretted. They may be thinking, "Aiyah, I should have just been brave at that point and did it. Now I won't get the chance anymore." In fact, they might be quite proud of their actions - even those moments and actions that they previously thought to be embarrassing, which now become stories of interest for them to tell their grandchildren...
Opinions, anyone?
posted by Sodium-squared at 10/31/2003 12:00:00 PM
<< Home