ABSTRACT
Since the beginnings of psychology as an experimental science, attempts to investigate phenomena described in terms of self-regulation, volition, will-power or ego-strength have been confronted with considerable difficulties. Ach (1910), interested in introspections associated with the primary act of will, tried to develop experimental techniques for a functional analysis of the accompanying mechanisms. Despite these early attempts, personality approaches to self-regulation have widely relied on global self-report assessments of self-regulatory competence (e.g., Bandura, 1982). In cognitive psychology, experimental approaches to the functional analysis of controlled versus automatic processing (Shiffrin & Schneider, 1977) or executive control (Baddeley, 1996; Norman & Shallice, 1986) have been developed. Unfortunately, these methods are of limited use for personality research because cognitive approaches do not cover personality processes presumably supported by volitional mechanisms such as resistance to temptation, delay of gratification, self-control of motivational states (Mischel & Mischel, 1983), self-monitoring and self-management (Kanfer & Schefft, 1988) or action control (Kuhl, 1981, 1984). Common to many recent approaches to the study of volition is a shift from global concepts toward attempts to decompose the functional constituents of self-regulation (Allport, Styles & Hsieh, 1994; Kuhl, 1984; Stuss, Shallice, Alexander & Picton, 1995). Validation of a recently developed self-report instrument decomposing self-regulatory competence into 30 functional mechanisms showed a remarkable convergence between subjective and objective indicators of self-regulatory functions (Kuhl & Fuhrmann, in press). Replacing one global index of volitional competence by specific indices of various functional components can help improve practical attempts to develop better procedures for training and psychological intervention (Fuhrmann & Kuhl, in press).
