ABSTRACT
Whether we get up in the morning and go to work, whether we have one beer or more in the evening after work, or whether we surf the Internet in between, self-regulation determines our daily behavior, our success, health, and well-being. This becomes dramatically apparent when it fails, when we stay home rather than going to work, and have five beers instead of one. It is not surprising that an abundance of research has investigated the boundary conditions that influence successful self-control. For example, children who use strategies to direct their attention away from alluring features of candy are more successful in delaying gratification than children who are more engaged in these features (Metcalfe & Mischel, 1999; Mischel, 1974). Apparently, distracting oneself from the allure helps. Distraction may also harm when it undermines cognitive resources. Adult individuals who are cognitively busy during a choice between a tasty but rather unhealthy chocolate cake and a healthy but affectively less appealing fruit salad tend to prefer the affectively superior but unhealthy chocolate cake over the healthy but affectively less appealing fruit salad (Shiv & Fedorikhin, 1999). In contrast, in situations of no distraction people have more resources to think about their choice, which often leads to a preference for the cognitively superior fruit salad over the affectively superior chocolate cake. Generally, when cognitively busy, people typically appear to be less successful at self-control (see also Boon, Stroebe, Shut, & Ijntema, 2002; Ward & Mann, 2000).
