Thinking about What Might Have Been: If Only, Even If, Causality and Emotions

We discuss two different kinds of thinking about what might have been: Counterfactual “if only” thinking about how things might have been different and semifactual “even if’ thinking about how things might have turned out the same. We report the results of an experiment that showed that the two kinds of thinking have different effects on cause and emotion judgements. The experiment provides the first demonstration that semifactual “even if’ thoughts reduce peoples judgements of causality and their emotional reactions compared to no thoughts about what might have been, and it replicates recent findings that counterfactual “if only” thoughts increase peoples judgements of causality and their emotional reactions.