Abstract: This research examines the possibility that people’s choices in the service of an explicit focal goal may also reflect their tendency to fulfill implicit background goals and in that sense are multifinal. In fact, though not generally depicted in these terms, participants’ behavior in numerous goal-priming studies may reflect a concern for multifinality. In a typical such study, participants are explicitly assigned some focal goal, and they are additionally primed with a background goal of which they are unaware. Participants’ behavior in such a situation appears to aim at satisfying both objectives: to pursue the focal goal by engaging in the experimental task as instructed and to do it in a way that satisfies the primed background goal. We carried out 2 experimental studies to investigate this notion. In Experiment 1, a primed implicit goal affected individuals’ choices even when those avowedly served an explicit “focal” goal. we created conditions in which such goals were manipulated. Specifically, we varied participants’ desire to identify or disidentify with their country as an implicit goal, while keeping the goal of discovering the more durable of two papers as an explicit focal goal at the forefront of their consciousness. Experiment 2, via 3 types of control groups, showed that choices were affected by both the explicit and implicit goals in isolation, and they shifted toward multifinality when these goals were conjointly present. Participants were told that they would participate in a series of three unrelated brief studies. Their task was to role play the chief executive officer of a company and select the best hire among four applicants for a job in the company. In one condition, participants were told that the company was chemistry in nature. In another condition, the company’s specific character was not described to participants. Participants were then provided with the applicants’ grades in four subjects. The overall grades of the four applicants were equal in that each received two As and two Bs across the four subjects. However, the instrumentality of their grades to participants’ goals varied according to our experimental design. In experiment 1, we discover that consistent with our predictions, 85.71% of participants in the proud condition and only 25.71% of those in the vandalism condition chose the red patch, affording an expression of identification with their country as the more durable one. In experiment 2, we discover that consistent with our predictions. In the zero-treatment condition, participants’ choices of the four applicants did not significantly differ. However, when participants’ explicit goal was to make the best hire for a chemistry company, the majority of participants chose either one or the other of the two applicants with an A in chemistry. Of greater interest, when participants’ goal of identifying with country was implicitly activated, the majority of participants chose one of the two applicants who received an A in Chinese history. Of greatest present interest, when participants’ explicit and implicit goals were both present, the majority of participants chose the applicant who received As in both Chinese history and chemistry.The discussion considers the integrative potential of the multifinality framework and its implications for a variety of phenomena in the domain of motivated cognition. The present findings lend consistent support to our analysis. The present research explored the multifinality principle in choice behavior. It examined the possibility that while pursuing explicit focal goals, individuals may concomitantly attempt to satisfy their implicit background goals that have been activated in the situation and of whose influence the actors may not be aware. We investigated these effects in a choice context wherein the different options were explicitly identified and hence were likely highly salient for the individuals. The goal-priming manipulation not only introduces an implicit goal whose attainment adds value to the behavior’s consequences along the logic of the multifinality principle, but also activates the relevant behavioral tendency to begin with.

Key words: motivated cognition, implicit choice, multifinality

摘要： 个体的选择可能是外显目标和内隐目标共同作用的结果，同时满足意识到的和未意识到的需要，这就是目标选择的多效性。通过两个行为学实验来验证内隐选择的多效性原则。实验一，被试随机分为积极和消极启动两个组，不同的启动后，要求判断两张不同颜色纸张的质量高低。结果发现在积极认同组，大多数的被试选择红色织物，在消极认同组（惭愧组），少数的被试选择红色织物。实验二，被试同样被分为两组，其中一组施加积极启动，另一组为控制组，之后，所有被试被邀请参加一项研究涉及雇佣人员的决策。结果发现当被试没有分配任何目标时，被试选择四位应征者并无显著之差异；当被试分配了外显或内隐的目标时，大多数的被试选择了具有相应特征的应征者；当被试的外显目标和隐性目标都存在，被试的选择表现出多效性。实验结果表明，在追求明确的外显目标时，个人可能与此同时试图满足他们的已经激活的内隐背景目标，选择者可能并没有意识到这种影响。在二选一或者多选一选择背景下，对一个已知选项的选择，受到多效性影响，其多效性是基于个人选择的价值最大化，并同时满足几个目标的原则。

关键词: 社会认知, 内隐选择, 多效性