ABSTRACT
Psychology has noted for long that the self plays a double role in contexts of control and self-regulation; it is at once the origin as well as the target of self-regulative activity (Bandura, 1989; Flammer, 1990). Skills of self-regulation and self-control are basic requirements of social coexistence; they form the cornerstone of processes of intentional self-development through which we embody conceptions of an “ought” self and of a desirable form of life into our conduct (Brandtstädter, 1998). Many social problems and discontents seem to revolve around difficulties to control one’s emotions, thoughts, or behavior:
Self-regulation failure is the major social pathology of the present time…. People are miserable because they cannot control their money, their weight, their emotions, their drinking, their hostility, their craving for drugs, their spending, their own behavior vis-à-vis their family members, their sexual impulses, and more.
(Baumeister, Heatherton, & Tice, 1994, p. 3)