关键词: 控制感剥夺, 状态毅力, 趋近动机

Abstract: The control deprivation has two kinds of effect on individuals, learned helplessness or more courage in dilemma. A literature proposed that brief experiences of control deprivation make people reassert control with more efforts, and prolonged experiences of control deprivation make people give up and cease seeking control. Thus the time length of the control deprivation matters. Prolonged experiences of control deprivation costs much energy which leads to negative consequence while brief experiences of control deprivation bring people with constructive power—state grit. Approach motivation facilitates goal-realization and might be the mechanism underlining the influence of control deprivation. The study conducted 2 experiments with a concept-identification task in order to examine effects of different types of control deprivation on state grit. Firstly, participants were instructed to identify which figure was the correct instance of a conceptual rule that they were expected to infer. In the control deprivation condition, the participants did get feedback on whether their answers were correct or incorrect, but the feedback was randomly determined and, thus, not contingent on the participant’s answers. Whereas participants in the short control deprivation condition performed 4 blocks of 10 trials, each on the concept identification task, the long control deprivation condition consisted of 12 blocks of 10 trials. Experiment 1 manipulated the length of time (prolong vs. brief) and the sense of control (maintenance vs. deprivation), 90 undergraduates were randomly organized into four groups. The state grit was measured by self-report scales (Grit-S). The results of experiment 1 showed that the significant interaction effect on state grit between time-length and control types, especially on perseverance of effort factor (p < .05), but not on consistency of interests factor. The simple effect test showed that the effect on perseverance of effort of the short-time group was significantly higher than that of the long-time group (p < .05) under the control deprivation condition. No significant difference between the two groups under the control maintenance condition was showed. The results of experiment 1 indicated that brief experiences of control deprivation created perseverance of effort, which built foundation for experiment 2 to select behavioral measures for perseverance of effort. Experiment 2 conducted a between-group design and manipulated the types of control (brief experiences of control deprivation vs. prolonged experiences of control deprivation) in order to deeply explore the function of high and low approach motivation, and 67 undergraduates were primed by the two categories. Besides, the experiment 2 had a grip task（the performance of grip was calculated by the length of time: time of persistence-the base-lined time）. Correlation analysis results showed that the types of control were positively correlated with high approach motivation, perseverance of effort factor and grip grades, and high approach motivation was positively correlated with perseverance of effort factor and grip grades. The results showed that the high approach motivation acted as the mediator between brief experiences of control deprivation and state grit. The findings implicated that brief experiences of control deprivation created a state of grit through the high approach motivation, and especially on perseverance of effort. In general, the present study provided supportive evidence of the idea that grit exhibits state-like tendencies and the evidence of making people “grittier ” through training, which lead researchers to focus on the power of the individuals’ potential.

Key words: Control Deprivation, State Grit, Approach motivation