Emerging Trends in The Social and Behavioral Sciences

Regulatory Focus Theory

Item

Title

Regulatory Focus Theory

Author

Higgins, E. Tory

Research Area

Cognition and Emotions

Topic

Motivation

Abstract

Regulatory focus theory was the child of self‐discrepancy theory and the parent of regulatory fit theory. Self‐discrepancy theory distinguishes between self‐regulation in relation to hopes and aspirations (ideals) versus self‐regulation in relation to duties and obligations (oughts). It proposes that ideal versus ought self‐regulation are two different motivational systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. In regulatory focus theory, promotion concerns with ideals (growth and advancement more generally) and prevention concerns with oughts (safety and security more generally) are motivational states that not only vary across individuals (personality) but also can be situationally induced. Regulatory focus theory proposes that the motivational state of being at “0” has negative valence in promotion (“0”as a nongain in relation to “+1”) but positive valence in prevention (“0” as a nonloss in relation to “−1”). Finally, giving rise to regulatory fit theory, regulatory focus theory distinguishes between the eager strategies that fit promotion and the vigilant strategies that fit prevention. Foundational research supporting each of these proposals is reviewed, and then more recent cutting‐edge research is described, including how this distinction is revealed in the behavior of nonhuman animals and how different tactics (e.g., risky vs conservative) can serve either promotion‐eagerness or prevention‐vigilance under different circumstances. Finally, I discuss two key issues for future research: whether promotion and prevention are competing motivations or can work together as partners, and whether there is support for the promotion–prevention distinction in everyday life beyond the laboratory.

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Identifier

etrds0279

extracted text

Regulatory Focus Theory
E. TORY HIGGINS

Abstract
Regulatory focus theory was the child of self-discrepancy theory and the parent of
regulatory fit theory. Self-discrepancy theory distinguishes between self-regulation
in relation to hopes and aspirations (ideals) versus self-regulation in relation to duties
and obligations (oughts). It proposes that ideal versus ought self-regulation are two different motivational systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. In regulatory
focus theory, promotion concerns with ideals (growth and advancement more generally) and prevention concerns with oughts (safety and security more generally) are
motivational states that not only vary across individuals (personality) but also can be
situationally induced. Regulatory focus theory proposes that the motivational state
of being at “0” has negative valence in promotion (“0”as a nongain in relation to “+1”)
but positive valence in prevention (“0” as a nonloss in relation to “−1”). Finally, giving rise to regulatory fit theory, regulatory focus theory distinguishes between the
eager strategies that fit promotion and the vigilant strategies that fit prevention. Foundational research supporting each of these proposals is reviewed, and then more recent
cutting-edge research is described, including how this distinction is revealed in the
behavior of nonhuman animals and how different tactics (e.g., risky vs conservative) can serve either promotion-eagerness or prevention-vigilance under different
circumstances. Finally, I discuss two key issues for future research: whether promotion and prevention are competing motivations or can work together as partners, and
whether there is support for the promotion–prevention distinction in everyday life
beyond the laboratory.

INTRODUCTION
The story of the development of regulatory focus theory begins with
self-discrepancy theory. When people are emotionally overwhelmed by a
serious setback in their life, such as the death of their child, the loss of their
job, or the break-up of their marriage, why do some become depressed while
others become anxious? To answer this question, self-discrepancy theory
proposed that even when people have the same specific goals, they often
vary in how they represent them. The goals that direct our self-regulation
are called self-guides. There are two basic kinds of self-guides. There are
ideal self-guides, which represent who we hope and aspire to be, and
Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. Edited by Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN 978-1-118-90077-2.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

ought self-guides, which represent our beliefs about who it is our duty or
obligation to be.
According to self-discrepancy theory (Higgins, 1987), it is this difference
between failing to meet ideal self-guides versus failing to meet ought
self-guides that explains why we have different emotional reactions to the
same negative life event. When a negative life event happens to us, we
represent it as saying something about how we are doing. When there
is a discrepancy between how we are doing, which is our actual self, and
a self-guide—a self-discrepancy—we suffer. A discrepancy between our
actual self and our ideal self-guides makes us feel sad, disappointed, and
discouraged—dejection-related emotions that relate clinically to depression. A discrepancy between our actual self and our ought self-guides
makes us feel nervous, tense, and worried—agitation-related emotions
that relate clinically to anxiety disorders. Thus, different kinds of emotional suffering depend on which type of self-guide is emphasized in our
self-regulation—dejection/depression suffering when ideals are emphasized
and agitation/anxiety suffering when oughts are emphasized.
As reflected in the name of the theory, self-discrepancy theory emphasized
the negative emotions produced by actual self-discrepancies to self-guides.
However, the theory also described the positive emotions produced by
actual self-congruencies to self-guides. An actual self-congruency with ideal
self-guides makes us feel happy and encouraged—cheerfulness-related
emotions. An actual self-congruency with ought self-guides makes us feel
calm and relaxed—quiescence-related emotions.
Self-discrepancy theory, then, distinguished between two self-regulatory
systems that produced two different emotional dimensions: a cheerfulness–
dejection dimension for self-regulation in relation to ideal self-guides and
a quiescence–agitation dimension for self-regulation in relation to ought
self-guides. This distinction between two self-regulatory systems with
different emotional consequences was the first step in the development of
regulatory focus theory because it challenged the utility of the most influential principle in motivation—the hedonic principle. The hedonic principle
states that people approach pleasure and avoid pain. Does that principle
tell us why people have different emotional reactions to the same negative
life event (dejection vs agitation) or why people have different emotional
reactions to the same positive life event (cheerfulness vs quiescence)? It does
not, because to know why people have different emotional reactions we
must understand that the hedonic principle plays out motivationally in two
very different ways. Self-discrepancy theory identified ideal versus ought
self-regulation as two different ways to approach pleasure and two different ways
to avoid pain. Recognizing this motivational distinction was central to the
development of regulatory focus theory. It made clear that, to understand

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how motivation works, it was essential to go “beyond pleasure and pain”
and study how different systems of self-regulation function (Higgins, 1997,
2012).
The downside of self-discrepancy theory for considering further the motivational differences between the ideal versus ought self-regulatory systems
was that self-discrepancy theory restricted the distinction between ideal and
ought self-regulation to a personality difference. However, motivation concerns psychological states and personality is just one source of psychological
states. Situations also induce psychological states, just as differences in the
accessibility of constructs can derive from chronic individual differences in
accessibility or from situational priming (Higgins, 1990). Another limitation
of self-discrepancy theory was its restriction to ideal and ought self-guides
because these self-guides are self-belief mental representations that are not
found in other animals and even in humans do not develop until approximately 3–5 years of age (Higgins, 1989). However, I felt that there was an
even more basic motivational distinction between two self-regulatory systems that was found in nonhuman animals and infants. This was a distinction
between two forms of survival—between the survival associated with safety,
security and defense and the survival associated with nurturance, growth,
and advancement (see also Bowlby, 1969, 1973).
Regulatory focus theory (Higgins, 1997, 1998) distinguishes between the
promotion motivational system and the prevention motivation system. The
promotion system relates to nurturance, growth, and advancement, and to the
attainment of better states, which includes, but is not restricted to, fulfilling the hopes and aspirations represented in ideal self-guides. The prevention
system relates to safety, security, and defense, and to the maintenance of satisfactory states, which includes, but is not restricted to, meeting the duties and
obligations represented in ought self-guides. Individuals can have a promotion focus or a prevention focus from a chronic predisposition (personality)
or from a situational induction, such as framing performance outcomes either
as a gain for success and a nongain for failure (promotion induction) or as a
nonloss for success and a loss for failure (prevention induction). Finally, promotion and prevention are independent such that individuals can be high in
both, low in both, or high in one and low in the other.
Like the ideal versus ought distinction, the promotion versus prevention
distinction is motivationally significant by distinguishing between two different systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. It is motivationally significant in another way as well. In brief, the motivational state of being
at “0” has a different valence in promotion versus prevention. Historically, “0” in
relation to “−1” or “+1” is treated as a neutral state. Importantly, regulatory
focus theory does not treat “0” as neutral. Indeed, “0” has a different valence

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

in the promotion versus the prevention system (see also Brendl & Higgins,
1996).
For promotion goal pursuit, successfully attaining a positive outcome supports the goal pursuit because it represents the presence of a positive outcome
or a gain, and as such it has positive valence. Not attaining a positive outcome
impedes promotion goal pursuit because it represents the absence of a positive outcome or a nongain, and as such it has negative valence. This means
that simply maintaining a status quo “0” is not experienced as neutral in the
promotion system of goal pursuit; instead, it has negative valence because it
fails to attain a positive outcome (failure to advance from “0” to “+1”). In
contrast, for prevention goal pursuit, maintaining a status quo “0” has positive valence because it represents the absence of a negative outcome or a
nonloss. Thus, once again, “0” is not experienced as neutral but instead has
positive valence (success in maintaining “0” against “−1”). What has negative valence for prevention goal pursuit is failing to maintain a status quo
“0” against a “−1,” which represents the presence of a negative outcome or
a loss.
There is a third way that the distinction between the promotion and prevention systems has general motivational significance. It reveals the distinct
motivational underpinnings of two general strategies of goal pursuit—eager
strategies and vigilant strategies. There is a natural preference in the promotion system for using eager strategies that advance the goal pursuit from
the current state to “+1.” Eager strategies fit promotion (Higgins, 2000).
Eager strategies and a promotion focus support and strengthen one another
(Higgins, 2006). In contrast, there is a natural preference in the prevention
system for using vigilant strategies that carefully maintain the current
satisfactory state of “0” against “−1.” Vigilant strategies fit prevention; they
support and strengthen one another (Higgins, 2000, 2006). This natural fit
does not mean that promotion and eagerness or prevention and vigilance
are redundant variables because a current situation, such as receiving
instructions from your supervisor, could force you to use strategies that are
a nonfit with your focus, such as being told to be vigilant when you have
a promotion focus. These conditions of regulatory fit and nonfit have their
own significant motivational consequences (Higgins, 2000, 2005).
FOUNDATIONAL RESEARCH
There is foundational research that highlights how the differences between
the promotion and prevention systems outlined above translates into different ways of seeing the world, different ways of dealing with tasks, different
responses to failure, and different processes of decision-making that intensify
value.

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DIFFERENT WAYS OF SEEING THE WORLD
At the time that regulatory focus theory began to emerge from selfdiscrepancy theory, Higgins, Roney, Crowe, and Hymes (1994) conducted a
study testing whether a situational induction of either ideal-promotion or
ought-prevention would influence whether eager-related or vigilant-related
story events would be better remembered. In the first regulatory focus priming study, undergraduate participants were asked to report either on how
their hopes had changed over time (priming ideal-promotion) or on how
their sense of obligation had changed over time (priming ought-prevention).
They then read about several episodes that occurred over a few days in
the life of another student. In the episodes where the target was trying
to approach a desired end-state, the target used either an eager approach
strategy (e.g., Because I wanted to be at school for the beginning of my 8:30
psychology class which is usually excellent, I woke up early this morning)
or a vigilant avoidance strategy (e.g., I wanted to take a class in photography
at the community center, so I did not register for a class in Spanish that
was scheduled at the same time). The study found that the participants
remembered episodes involving an eager approach strategy significantly
better when ideal-promotion was primed than when ought-prevention was
primed, whereas the reverse was true for remembering episodes involving
a vigilant avoidance strategy.
DIFFERENT WAYS OF DEALING WITH TASKS
As discussed earlier, when individuals are in a promotion focus, motivational strength should be higher if they have an eager approach orientation
during the goal pursuit than an avoidant vigilant orientation, and the
opposite should be true for individuals in a prevention focus. Moreover, the
greater motivational strength from such fit should translate into superior
performance. Förster, Higgins, and Idson (1998) tested this hypothesis in a
set of studies in which they either measured or manipulated participants’
regulatory focus. The undergraduate participants were asked to perform
an arm-pressure procedure while completing a set of anagrams. Half of the
participants pressed upward on the bottom of a surface—which involves
arm flexion, a motor action previously shown to induce an eager-related
approach orientation (Cacioppo, Priester, & Berntson, 1993). The other
half of the participants pressed downward on the top of a surface—which
involves arm extension, a motor action previously shown to induce a
vigilant-related avoidance orientation. Förster et al. (1998) found that the
promotion-focused participants who engaged in arm flexion found more
anagrams than those who engaged in arm extension, whereas the reverse
was true for prevention-focused participants.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

Förster et al. (1998) also found that as the participants proceeded through
the anagram sets (from the first to the last), there was a “goal looms larger”
effect of increased arm pressure as participants got closer to the end of the
anagram sets, with this positive gradient being obtained for arm flexion for
the promotion participants and for arm extension for the prevention participants. Importantly, this evidence for a “goal looms larger” effect indicates
that both promotion and prevention participants experienced their task as
approaching desired end-states (i.e., both approaching pleasure). The difference between promotion and prevention was at the strategic level, that is, two
different ways to approach pleasure, with strategic eager approach (arm flexion)
becoming stronger and stronger for promotion participants as they neared
task completion and strategic vigilant avoidance (arm extension) becoming
stronger and stronger for prevention as they neared task completion.
Later studies by Förster, Higgins, and Bianco (2003) replicated this “goal
looms larger” effect while, in addition, testing the prediction that, when
faced with a trade-off between speed and accuracy, promotion participants
would emphasize eager-related speed, whereas prevention participants
would emphasize vigilant-related accuracy. In a pair of studies in which
promotion- and prevention-focused participants were asked to complete a
series of four “connect-the-dot” pictures, Förster et al. (2003) assessed the
number of dots participants connected for each picture within the allotted
time frame, which constituted a measure of speed of goal completion. They
also assessed the number of dots participants missed up to the highest dot
they reached for each picture, which constituted a (reverse) measure of accuracy of goal completion. As predicted, promotion-focused participants were
faster (i.e., got through a greater percentage of the pictures in the allotted
time), whereas prevention-focused participants were more accurate (i.e.,
made fewer errors in the portions of the pictures that they had completed).
Förster et al. (2003) also found that the promotion-focused participants
became faster and faster (i.e., more and more eager) as they moved through
the task from the first to the final picture, whereas prevention-focused participants became more and more accurate (i.e., more and more vigilant). These
latter findings again reflect the “goal looms larger” effect, whereby strategic
motivation increases as people get closer and closer to goal completion.
DIFFERENT RESPONSES TO FAILURE
As discussed earlier, research on self-discrepancy theory showed that
people’s emotional responses to failure are different when they are in
an ideal-promotion focus versus an ought-prevention focus—having
dejection-related emotions in the former and agitation-related emotions

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in the latter. There is also a difference between promotion and prevention in how people imagine after a failure how things might have
turned out differently had they taken certain actions or not taken certain
actions—counterfactual thinking. Additive counterfactuals are thoughts about
what might have happened had one taken a different action. Subtractive
counterfactuals are thoughts about what might have happened had one not
taken a particular action (Roese, 1997). Roese, Hur, and Pennington (1999)
examined regulatory focus differences in people’s likelihood of generating
additive versus subtractive counterfactuals in response to a failure.
Because an additive counterfactual leads people to imagine how things
might have turned out differently had they not missed an opportunity for
advancement, that is, the painful failure to attain a “+1” (a nongain), this counterfactual represents an eager strategy of reversing a past error of omission
and thus should be preferred by people with a promotion focus. In contrast,
because a subtractive counterfactual leads people to imagine how things
might have turned out differently had they avoided making a mistake, that
is, the painful failure of committing a “−1” (a loss), this counterfactual represents
a vigilant strategy of reversing a past error of commission and thus should
be preferred by people with a prevention focus. In one study conducted by
Roese et al. (1999), participants read hypothetical scenarios involving either
promotion failures (i.e., failures to attain accomplishment-related goals) or
prevention failures (i.e., failures to attain safety-related goals). Participants
were then asked, for each scenario, to expand in writing on a counterfactual
stem reading, “If only … ”.
As predicted, participants who had received promotion-framed scenarios
were more likely than participants who had received prevention-framed scenarios to generate additive counterfactuals. The reverse was true for generating subtractive counterfactuals. Supporting the regulatory focus link to different emotional reactions to failure, the same promotion versus prevention
difference in the likelihood of generating additive versus subtractive counterfactuals, respectively, was found in another study by Roese et al. (1999) in
which either a promotion or prevention focus was induced in participants
by having them think of a negative experience they had had within the past
year that involved, respectively, either feeling dejected or feeling agitated.
DIFFERENT PROCESSES OF DECISION-MAKING THAT INTENSIFY VALUE
In a study of regulatory fit effects on intensifying value, Higgins, Idson, Freitas, Spiegel, and Molden (2003) tested the hypothesis that having a promotion versus a prevention focus would interact with an eager versus vigilant
decision-making process. Participants were asked to choose between a coffee mug and a disposable pen. The coffee mug was pretested to be preferred

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by the participants. Half of the participants were asked to think about what
they would gain if they chose each object (an eager decision-making process),
and the other half were asked to think about what they would lose if they
did not choose each object (a vigilant decision-making process). Note that
for both decision-making processes, it is the positive or pleasant properties of
the two objects that were emphasized in the instructions—positive properties they would gain (eager process) or would not lose (vigilant process) by
choosing an option. Thus, once again, both conditions concerned approaching a desired end-state. What varied was the strategic process for making the
choice—either an eager or a vigilant process.
As intended, almost all participants chose the mug and it is these participants who are considered in the analyses. In one study, the participants were
given the opportunity to own the mug by offering their own money to buy
it. They knew that their offer had to be above a set price (hidden in an envelope) in order for them to receive the mug “for the price that you offered.”
Promotion-focused participants offered more money for the mug when they
had used an eager than a vigilant decision-making process and the reverse
was true for prevention-focused participants. In one study, in which the price
of the nonchosen object (i.e., the pen) was also assessed, the positive value
of the nonchosen object was also greater in the fit conditions (i.e., promotion focus-eager decision; prevention focus-vigilant decision) than the nonfit
conditions (i.e., promotion focus-vigilant decision; prevention focus-eager
decision). Thus, fit intensified the positive value of both the chosen and nonchosen objects. This finding rules out a dissonance-based (Festinger, 1957) or
self-perception-based (Bem, 1967) explanation of the findings, because these
theories predict that the value of the nonchosen object would decrease.
AREAS OF CUTTING-EDGE WORK
Promotion and prevention self-regulation function at the system level of
self-regulation. Eagerness and vigilance function at the strategic level. Recent
research on regulatory focus has been concerned with the implications of
considering the next, lower level in the hierarchy of self-regulation—the
tactical level (Scholer & Higgins, 2008). Whereas strategies serve systems,
such as eager strategies serving the promotion system and vigilant strategies
serving the prevention system, tactics serve strategies. And which tactic
serves a particular strategy at a particular time depends on how the regulatory system as a whole is doing at that time—an assessment or monitoring
of the current state of affairs for that system. For example, whether it is risky
or conservative tactics that will better serve the prevention system depends
on whether the current state is a satisfactory “0” or a threatening “−1.”

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Early research testing regulatory focus theory (e.g., Crowe & Higgins, 1997;
Levine, Higgins, & Choi, 2000) found that individuals or groups who were
performing a recognition memory task in a prevention focus—compared to
those in a promotion focus—were more likely to make conservative decisions
(a tendency during the memory test to say “No” to both new and old items to
ensure against errors of commission) than to make risky or lenient decisions
(a tendency to say “Yes” to both new and old items to ensure against errors
of omission). When making the decision to be risky or conservative, the participants in these early studies were dealing with neutral or positive stimuli
and were themselves in a satisfactory or positive condition (a positive state
of affairs). What would happen if, instead, prevention-focused participants
were dealing with negative stimuli or were themselves in a negative condition (a negative state of affairs)? This question was addressed by Scholer and
her colleagues in a couple of research programs.
The first research program reexamined the recognition memory decisions of
prevention-focused participants (vs promotion-focused) for stimuli that this
time were negative (e.g., vomit; decay) rather than neutral or positive (Scholer,
Stroessner, & Higgins, 2008). For these negative stimuli, Scholer et al. (2008)
found that participants had a risky detection bias rather than a conservative
bias. Thus, in order for prevention-focused individuals to be appropriately
vigilant for the occurrence of negative objects or events, they need to be willing to take a “risk” and falsely identify something as a negative item that they
have seen before even when they have not (i.e., make an error of commission).
This willingness of prevention-focused individuals to make a tactically
risky decision when the current state of affairs is threatening, that is, tactical
risk in the service of vigilance, was also clearly demonstrated in another
program of research by Scholer, Zou, Fujita, Stroessner, and Higgins (2010).
Using a “two-study” paradigm, the participants in one experiment were
paid to complete a questionnaire battery and were then given a choice to
leave or to invest their payment in a second, stock-investment study. Most
participants decided to invest in the stock-investment study. At the end of
the first round of investing, all participants learned that they had lost not
only their original investment but also additional money—a real loss. At
this point, participants were given a choice between investing in either a
risky stock that could make up for all of their loss and a conservative stock
where they were more likely to make money on the investment but not
enough to bring them back to where they began. The expected value of these
stocks was the same, but the risky stock was riskier both in that its variance
was greater and participants perceived it as riskier. The study found that
participants who were more prevention-focused were more likely to choose
the riskier stock.

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However, this was not the end of the story. A second study included a different pair of options. Now both the risky and the conservative options had the
potential of returning participants to their break-even point, with the more
conservative option being more likely to reach “0,” and the more risky option
being less likely to definitely reach “0” but with some potential to go well
beyond “0.” Now the more prevention-focused individuals were less likely
to choose the risky option. Together, these studies make clear that what matters to prevention-focused individuals is to do what is necessary to restore a
nonloss by returning from “−1” to “0.” If only the risky option can do this,
then they will choose the risky option. If both options can do it and the conservative option is more likely to do it, then they will choose the conservative
option.
Recent research by Franks and her colleagues provides another illustration
of prevention-focused individuals being more likely than promotion-focused
individuals to choose a “risky” tactic in the service of vigilance but being
less likely under other conditions (Franks, Champagne, & Higgins, 2012;
Franks, Reiss, Cole, Friedrich, Thompson, & Higgins, 2013). Importantly,
this research also extends the testing of regulatory focus theory predictions
from human populations to monkeys and rats. The behavior of the monkeys
and rats in their cage homes, that is, seeking safety versus seeking food
treats, allowed promotion and prevention individuals to be identified.
Then their tactical behavioral choices were examined under other, different
conditions. For example, the monkey study was with cotton-top tamarins
and the responses of promotion and prevention monkeys to the introduction
of objects into their cage were examined. The specific tactical behavior
examined was the speed of approaching the object. Under most conditions,
approach speed was faster for promotion than prevention. However, when
the object was new and would not provide a food treat, approach speed
was faster for prevention than promotion. The absence of a food treat made
this condition a nongain for promotion and thus decreased approach speed.
However, the new object was a prevention-focused threat, that is, a potential
loss, and thus it needed to be approached and checked out. Such checking
behavior by prevention-focused animals is an approach tactic in the service
of being vigilant (see also Franks et al., 2012).
Another area of cutting-edge work also shows, like the previous studies,
that the self-regulatory distinction between promotion and prevention is not
simply approach versus avoidance. This new work also demonstrates the
utility of functional magnetic resonance imaging technology for examining
such issues (see also Cunningham, Raye, & Johnson, 2005). Specifically, Strauman et al. (2013) examined the neural correlates of priming promotion ideal
goals versus prevention ought goals, and correlated this goal-related activation to both a chronic measure of promotion and prevention orientation (the

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Regulatory Focus Questionnaire, Higgins et al., 2001) and to a well-established
chronic measure of approach and avoidance orientation (the Behavioral Inhibition System/Behavioral Activation System scale, Carver & White, 1994).
The study found that distinct neural regions were activated by promotion
ideal goals versus prevention ought goals. In addition, this differential activation was correlated with individual differences in chronic promotion and
chronic prevention, respectively, but it was not correlated with individual
differences in chronic approach and chronic avoidance.
KEY ISSUES FOR FUTURE RESEARCH
There are two key issues that need to be addressed in future research to
understand better the nature and the applicability of the regulatory focus
distinction between promotion and prevention. First, we need to know more
about whether promotion and prevention are best characterized as competing motivations, where only one can function at a time, or as independent
motivations that can both be active at the same time and even work together
effectively. Second, there is the issue of whether the laboratory findings about
how promotion and prevention work can be generalized to everyday situations; that is, can we move from past success in establishing internal validity
to evidence for generalizability and applicability?
ARE PROMOTION AND PREVENTION COMPETITORS OR PARTNERS?
There are ways to think about promotion and prevention that make them
seem like opposite motivational orientations that would naturally come into
conflict with one another. For example, prevention thinks of a satisfactory status quo “0” as a positive state that needs to be maintained whereas promotion
thinks of “0” as a negative, nongain state that needs to be abandoned in order
to advance to a better “+1” state. The question is, should I move away from
“0” or stay at “0?” Put this way, this creates a conflict. As another example,
if promotion takes the position that accuracy (or quality) must be sacrificed
for the sake of speed (or quantity) and prevention takes the opposite position, then there would again be a conflict. As a third example, if promotion’s
position in a signal detection recognition memory task is that a risky tactic of
saying “Yes” to test items (ensuring against errors of omission) is better than
a conservative tactic of saying “No” (ensuring against errors of commission),
whereas prevention’s position is opposite, once again conflict would occur.
As a final example, Förster and Higgins (2005) found using the Navon (1977)
task where large letters are made up of small letters, for example, a global
large H made up of local small F’s, that participants with a stronger promotion focus were faster to process the global than the local letters and the

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

reverse was true for individuals with a stronger prevention focus. So what
are you looking at, a global H or local F’s? A recipe for conflict.
These examples support the conclusion that promotion and prevention
are competing forces that conflict with one another and thus promotion and
prevention cannot work together as partners. Is this conclusion correct? To
answer this question, it is useful to distinguish between two versions of
this conclusion—simultaneous promotion and prevention versus successive
promotion and prevention. The conclusion is not correct for the successive
case because promotion and prevention could work together as partners
by taking turns being the dominant motivational force. Such turn taking
could be very advantageous. As just one example, Fugelstad, Rothman,
and Jeffery (2008) found that for health programs of smoking cessation and
weight loss, it was advantageous for people to be in a promotion focus at the
beginning of the program when behavioral change needed to be initiated
because they would be eager to move from the current status quo “0” to
a more positive state (+1), and it was advantageous for people later when
the initiated change needed to be maintained to be in a prevention focus
because they would be vigilant to maintain their new status quo and not
slip back to where they started (−1).
One could also think of taking turns between promotion and prevention in
the Navon task in order to perceive correctly that the stimulus is a global large
H made up of local small F’s, and in a signal detection recognition memory
task taking time to emphasize promotion and prevention in order to ensure
against errors of omission and commission and thereby maximize correct discrimination. These are examples of how promotion and prevention can work
together to produce a better outcome.
It is not always clear whether two motivational forces are working in parallel or in sequence. However, it should be noted that if it is a sequence, the time
interval could be very fast—so fast that it could be considered simultaneous
(in parallel). What this means is that the outcome will reflect the advantage
of the two motivational forces being both strong and working together. This is
the case for the speed-accuracy “trade-off” (Förster et al., 2003). This trade-off
is sometimes discussed as if there were a negative correlation between speed
and accuracy such that those individuals who have the highest speed also
have the lowest accuracy, and vice versa. However, it is possible for some
individuals to be high in speed and high in accuracy and others to be low in
both. Similarly, in the signal detection recognition memory task, rather than
individuals who have the least errors of omission necessarily having the most
errors of commission and vice versa (a negative correlation), it is possible for
some individuals to be low in both kinds of errors and others to be high in
both. What this would mean is that there could be a performance advantage when individuals are strong in both promotion and prevention or when

Regulatory Focus Theory

13

teams have some individuals who are strong in promotion and others who
are strong in prevention. Future research needs to examine this possibility.
What we do know is that satisfaction in romantic couples is greater when
one partner has a strong promotion focus and the other partner has a strong
prevention focus; that is, when there is complementarity rather than similarity of focus. Bohns et al. (2013) found that the pairing of a relationship partner
who prefers to pursue goals eagerly with a relationship partner who prefers
to pursue goals vigilantly led to positive relationship outcomes when the
partners agreed on which goals to pursue. Having available both eager and
vigilant strategic preferences in the relationship allows these couples to “divide and conquer” their goal activities (e.g., cooking dinner together) such
that each partner can take on his or her preferred eager or vigilant strategic role.
One can understand this case, and other cases where promotion and
prevention can work together effectively, in classic negotiation terms. The
examples of conflict between promotion and prevention that I discussed
earlier are cases where, as I purposely described them, promotion is taking
one position and prevention is taking an opposite position, which produces
conflict. However, effective negotiation involves treating differences as
differences in interests rather than differences in position. When the negotiating sides have different interests or strengths of preferences a “win–win”
outcome is achieved by trading off one preference for another so that each
side is given what they want most—trading across issues to let each side
have what they want (logrolling). As in the Bohns et al. (2013) case of letting
the promotion partner do the eager parts of the goal task and letting the
prevention partner do the vigilant parts, rather than promotion insisting
they both be eager and prevention insisting they both be vigilant, this allows
promotion and prevention to work together effectively as partners.
HOW GENERALIZABLE AND APPLICABLE IS THE PROMOTION–PREVENTION DISTINCTION?
The above section already provides two clear examples of the promotion–
prevention distinction being applicable to real-world issues in everyday
life—being more effective in changing health habits by emphasizing promotion to initiate change and prevention to maintain change, and being
more effective in working with your romantic partner by dividing labor
so the promotion partner can be eager and the prevention partner can
be vigilant. In addition, the work of Franks and her colleagues described
earlier demonstrates that the promotion–prevention distinction generalizes
to the behavior of nonhuman animals (monkeys and rats). I will now briefly
mention a few other examples of general applicability.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

The first is a study on shooting penalty shots in soccer where the participants were active soccer players in a regional league of the German Football
Association (Plessner, Unkelbach, Memmert, Baltes, & Kolb, 2009). The
study took place during one of the official training sessions. Each player
participant took five penalty shots. The participants varied in chronic promotion and chronic prevention. The framing of how to succeed in the penalty
shoot-out was experimentally manipulated. In the “success as gain (eager
shooting)” condition, the participants were told “You are going to shoot five
penalties. Your aspiration is to score at least three times.” In the “success as
avoiding loss (vigilant shooting)” condition, the participants were told “You
are going to shoot five penalties. Your obligation is not to miss more than
two times.” Even for such seasoned soccer players who are highly skilled
and always want to do their best, the shoot-out performance was about
30% better in the fit conditions (predominant promotion/gain; predominant prevention/avoid loss) than in the nonfit conditions (predominant
promotion/avoid loss; predominant prevention/gain).
Another study investigated the relation between regulatory focus and the
tendency for business managers to copy the managing behavior of their
former manager after having earlier experienced this manager’s behavior as
its recipient and later themselves taking on the same managing role (Zhang,
Higgins, & Chen, 2011). Earlier experimental evidence that individuals
with a stronger prevention (vs promotion) focus were more likely to copy
others, because the behavior of others functions as a status quo norm
to be maintained, was generalized to the field by surveying a sample of
superior-subordinate dyads in real-world organizations. This field study
found that current managers copied the managing style that they had
received from their superior even when they reported that they disliked that
style when it was used with them.
Another study (Wallace & Chen, 2006) examined employees who worked
in an organization’s facilities department (e.g., plumbing; electrical) where
their supervisors varied in their emphasis on safety (a situational safety climate variable) and they varied in conscientiousness (a personality variable).
The dependent measures were the employees’ productivity and their safety
performance. The study found that the impact of safety climate and conscientiousness on productivity and safety performance were mediated by
the employees’ promotion and prevention focus. For example, having a situational safety climate positively related to having a prevention focus and
having a prevention focus positively related to safety performance, whereas
having a situational safety climate negatively related to having a promotion
focus and having a promotion focus negatively related to safety performance.
What this and other studies clearly show is that the promotion–prevention
distinction is applicable to real-world issues in everyday life.

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15

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The research by the author and his collaborators that is reported in this essay,
as well as the writing of this essay, was supported by Grant 39429 from the
National Institute of Mental Health to E. Tory Higgins.
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events positive or negative? In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in experimental social
psychology (Vol. 28, pp. 95–160). New York, NY: Academic Press.
Cacioppo, J. T., Priester, J. R., & Berntson, G. G. (1993). Rudimentary determinants
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Carver, C. S., & White, T. L. (1994). Behavioral inhibition, behavioral activation, and
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Crowe, E., & Higgins, E. T. (1997). Regulatory focus and strategic inclinations: Promotion and prevention in decision-making. Organizational Behavior and Human
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Cunningham, W. A., Raye, C. L., & Johnson, M. K. (2005). Neural correlates of evaluation associated with promotion and prevention regulatory focus. Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience, 5, 202–211.
Festinger, L. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. Evanston, IL: Row, Peterson.
Förster, J., & Higgins, E. T. (2005). How global vs. local perception fits regulatory
focus. Psychological Science, 16, 631–636.
Förster, J., Higgins, E. T., & Bianco, A. T. (2003). Speed/accuracy decisions in task performance: Built-in trade-off or separate strategic concerns? Organizational Behavior
and Human Decision Processes, 90, 148–164.
Förster, J., Higgins, E. T., & Idson, C. L. (1998). Approach and avoidance strength as
a function of regulatory focus: Revisiting the “goal looms larger” effect. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 75, 1115–1131.
Franks, B., Champagne, F. A., & Higgins, E. T. (2012). Evidence for individual differences in regulatory focus in rats. Journal of Comparative Psychology, 126, 347–354.
Franks, B., Reiss, D., Cole, P., Friedrich, V., Thompson, E., & Higgins, E. T. (2013).
Predicting how individuals approach enrichment: Regulatory focus in cotton-top
tamarins (Sanguinus oedipus). Zoo Biology, 32, 427–435.

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Fugelstad, P., Rothman, A. J., & Jeffery, R. W. (2008). Getting there and hanging on:
The effect of regulatory focus on performance in smoking and weight loss interventions. Health Psychology, 27, 260–270.
Higgins, E. T. (1987). Self-discrepancy: A theory relating self and affect. Psychological
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Higgins, E. T. (1989). Continuities and discontinuities in self-regulatory and
self-evaluative processes: A developmental theory relating self and affect. Journal
of Personality, 57, 407–444.
Higgins, E. T. (1990). Personality, social psychology, and person-situation relations:
Standards and knowledge activation as a common language. In L. A. Pervin (Ed.),
Handbook of personality (pp. 301–338). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
Higgins, E. T. (1997). Beyond pleasure and pain. American Psychologist, 52, 1280–1300.
Higgins, E. T. (1998). Promotion and prevention: Regulatory focus as a motivational
principle. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 30,
pp. 1–46). New York, NY: Academic Press.
Higgins, E. T. (2000). Making a good decision: Value from fit. American Psychologist,
55, 1217–1230.
Higgins, E. T. (2005). Value from regulatory fit. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 14, 208–213.
Higgins, E. T. (2006). Value from hedonic experience and engagement. Psychological
Review, 113, 439–460.
Higgins, E. T., Friedman, R. S., Harlow, R. E., Idson, L. C., Ayduk, O. N., & Taylor, A.
(2001). Achievement orientations from subjective histories of success: Promotion
pride versus prevention pride. European Journal of Social Psychology, 31, 3–23.
Higgins, E. T., Idson, L. C., Freitas, A. L., Spiegel, S., & Molden, D. C. (2003). Transfer
of value from fit. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84, 1140–1153.
Higgins, E. T., Roney, C., Crowe, E., & Hymes, C. (1994). Ideal versus ought predilections for approach and avoidance: Distinct self-regulatory systems. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66, 276–286.
Levine, J. M., Higgins, E. T., & Choi, H. S. (2000). Development of strategic norms in
groups. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 82, 88–101.
Plessner, H., Unkelbach, C., Memmert, D., Baltes, A., & Kolb, A. (2009). Regulatory
fit as a determinant of sport performance: How to succeed in a soccer penaltyshooting. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 10, 108–115.
Navon, D. (1977). Forest before trees: The precedence of global features in visual
perception. Cognitive Psychology, 9, 353–383.
Roese, N. J. (1997). Counterfactual thinking. Psychological Bulletin, 121, 133–148.
Roese, N. J., Hur, T., & Pennington, G. L. (1999). Counterfactual thinking and regulatory focus: Implications for action versus inaction and sufficiency versus necessity.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77, 1109–1120.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (2008). Distinguishing levels of approach and avoidance: An illustration using regulatory focus theory. In A. J. Elliot (Ed.), Handbook
of approach and avoidance motivation (pp. 489–503). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Scholer, A. A., Stroessner, S. J., & Higgins, E. T. (2008). Responding to negativity: How
a risky tactic can serve a vigilant strategy. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology,
44, 767–774.

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Scholer, A. A., Zou, X., Fujita, K., Stroessner, S. J., & Higgins, E. T. (2010). When
risk-seeking becomes a motivational necessity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 99, 215–231.
Strauman, T. J., Detloff, A. M., Sestokas, R., Smith, D. V., Goetz, E. L., Rivera, C., &
Kwapil, L. (2013). What shall I be, what must I be: Neural correlates of personal
goal activation. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, 6, 1–14.
Wallace, C., & Chen, G. (2006). A mulitlevel integration of personality, climate,
self-regulation, and performance. Personnel Psychology, 59, 529–557.
Zhang, S., Higgins, E. T., & Chen, G. Q. (2011). Managing others like you were managed: How prevention focus motivates copying interpersonal norms. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 100, 647–663.

FURTHER READING
Grant-Halvorson, H., & Higgins, E. T. (2013). Focus: Use different ways of seeing the
world for success and influence. New York, NY: Penguin.
Higgins, E. T. (1997). Beyond pleasure and pain. American Psychologist, 52, 1280–1300.
Higgins, E. T. (2012). Beyond pleasure and pain: How motivation works. New York, NY:
Oxford University Press.
Lee, A. Y., & Higgins, E. T. (2009). The persuasive power of regulatory fit. In M.
Wänke (Ed.), Social psychology of consumer behavior (pp. 319–333). New York, NY:
Psychology Press.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (2011). Promotion and prevention systems: Regulatory
focus dynamics within self-regulatory hierarchies. In K. D. Vohs & R. F. Baumeister (Eds.), Handbook of self-regulation: Research, theory, and applications (2nd ed., pp.
143–161). New York, NY: Guilford.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (in press). Too much of a good thing? Trade-offs in
promotion and prevention focus. In R. M. Ryan (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of motivation. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

E. TORY HIGGINS SHORT BIOGRAPHY
E. Tory Higgins is the Stanley Schachter Professor of Psychology, Professor of
Business, and Director of the Motivation Science Center at Columbia (where
he also received his PhD in 1973). He is a Fellow of the American Academy of
Arts and Sciences. He is the author of Beyond Pleasure and Pain: How Motivation Works (Oxford, 2012). His research is on the intersection of motivation
and cognition, and his work has been applied to understanding and treating
depression and anxiety disorders. He has received a MERIT Award from the
National Institute of Mental Health, the Thomas M. Ostrom Award in Social
Cognition, the Donald T. Campbell Award for Outstanding Contributions to Social
Psychology (Society of Personality and Social Psychology), and the Lifetime
Contribution Award from the International Society for Self and Identity. He

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

has also received the Distinguished Scientist Award from the Society of Experimental Social Psychology, the William James Fellow Award for Distinguished
Achievements in Psychological Science (from the Association of Psychological
Science), and the American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished
Scientific Contributions. He is also a recipient of Columbia’s Presidential Award
for Outstanding Teaching.
RELATED ESSAYS
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Identity Fusion (Psychology), Michael D. Burhmester and William B. Swann
Jr.
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Understanding the Adaptive Functions of Morality from a Cognitive Psychological Perspective (Psychology), James Dungan and Liane Young
Insight (Psychology), Brian Erickson and John Kounios
The Roots of Moral Reasoning and Behavior in Infants (Psychology), J. Kiley
Hamlin and Conor M. Steckler
Moral Identity (Psychology), Sam A. Hardy and Gustavo Carlo
Motivation Science (Psychology), Arie W. Kruglanski et al.
Making Sense of Control: Change and Consequences (Psychology), Margie E.
Lachman et al.
Media and the development of Identity (Psychology), Adriana M. Manago
Retrieval-Based Learning: Research at the Interface between Cognitive Science and Education (Psychology), Ludmila D. Nunes and Jeffrey D. Karpicke
Identity-Based Motivation (Psychology), Daphna Oyserman
Effortful Control (Psychology), Tracy L. Spinrad and Nancy Eisenberg
Temporal Identity Integration as a Core Developmental Process (Psychology),
Moin Syed and Lauren L. Mitchell



Regulatory Focus Theory
E. TORY HIGGINS

Abstract
Regulatory focus theory was the child of self-discrepancy theory and the parent of
regulatory fit theory. Self-discrepancy theory distinguishes between self-regulation
in relation to hopes and aspirations (ideals) versus self-regulation in relation to duties
and obligations (oughts). It proposes that ideal versus ought self-regulation are two different motivational systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. In regulatory
focus theory, promotion concerns with ideals (growth and advancement more generally) and prevention concerns with oughts (safety and security more generally) are
motivational states that not only vary across individuals (personality) but also can be
situationally induced. Regulatory focus theory proposes that the motivational state
of being at “0” has negative valence in promotion (“0”as a nongain in relation to “+1”)
but positive valence in prevention (“0” as a nonloss in relation to “−1”). Finally, giving rise to regulatory fit theory, regulatory focus theory distinguishes between the
eager strategies that fit promotion and the vigilant strategies that fit prevention. Foundational research supporting each of these proposals is reviewed, and then more recent
cutting-edge research is described, including how this distinction is revealed in the
behavior of nonhuman animals and how different tactics (e.g., risky vs conservative) can serve either promotion-eagerness or prevention-vigilance under different
circumstances. Finally, I discuss two key issues for future research: whether promotion and prevention are competing motivations or can work together as partners, and
whether there is support for the promotion–prevention distinction in everyday life
beyond the laboratory.

INTRODUCTION
The story of the development of regulatory focus theory begins with
self-discrepancy theory. When people are emotionally overwhelmed by a
serious setback in their life, such as the death of their child, the loss of their
job, or the break-up of their marriage, why do some become depressed while
others become anxious? To answer this question, self-discrepancy theory
proposed that even when people have the same specific goals, they often
vary in how they represent them. The goals that direct our self-regulation
are called self-guides. There are two basic kinds of self-guides. There are
ideal self-guides, which represent who we hope and aspire to be, and
Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. Edited by Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN 978-1-118-90077-2.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

ought self-guides, which represent our beliefs about who it is our duty or
obligation to be.
According to self-discrepancy theory (Higgins, 1987), it is this difference
between failing to meet ideal self-guides versus failing to meet ought
self-guides that explains why we have different emotional reactions to the
same negative life event. When a negative life event happens to us, we
represent it as saying something about how we are doing. When there
is a discrepancy between how we are doing, which is our actual self, and
a self-guide—a self-discrepancy—we suffer. A discrepancy between our
actual self and our ideal self-guides makes us feel sad, disappointed, and
discouraged—dejection-related emotions that relate clinically to depression. A discrepancy between our actual self and our ought self-guides
makes us feel nervous, tense, and worried—agitation-related emotions
that relate clinically to anxiety disorders. Thus, different kinds of emotional suffering depend on which type of self-guide is emphasized in our
self-regulation—dejection/depression suffering when ideals are emphasized
and agitation/anxiety suffering when oughts are emphasized.
As reflected in the name of the theory, self-discrepancy theory emphasized
the negative emotions produced by actual self-discrepancies to self-guides.
However, the theory also described the positive emotions produced by
actual self-congruencies to self-guides. An actual self-congruency with ideal
self-guides makes us feel happy and encouraged—cheerfulness-related
emotions. An actual self-congruency with ought self-guides makes us feel
calm and relaxed—quiescence-related emotions.
Self-discrepancy theory, then, distinguished between two self-regulatory
systems that produced two different emotional dimensions: a cheerfulness–
dejection dimension for self-regulation in relation to ideal self-guides and
a quiescence–agitation dimension for self-regulation in relation to ought
self-guides. This distinction between two self-regulatory systems with
different emotional consequences was the first step in the development of
regulatory focus theory because it challenged the utility of the most influential principle in motivation—the hedonic principle. The hedonic principle
states that people approach pleasure and avoid pain. Does that principle
tell us why people have different emotional reactions to the same negative
life event (dejection vs agitation) or why people have different emotional
reactions to the same positive life event (cheerfulness vs quiescence)? It does
not, because to know why people have different emotional reactions we
must understand that the hedonic principle plays out motivationally in two
very different ways. Self-discrepancy theory identified ideal versus ought
self-regulation as two different ways to approach pleasure and two different ways
to avoid pain. Recognizing this motivational distinction was central to the
development of regulatory focus theory. It made clear that, to understand

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3

how motivation works, it was essential to go “beyond pleasure and pain”
and study how different systems of self-regulation function (Higgins, 1997,
2012).
The downside of self-discrepancy theory for considering further the motivational differences between the ideal versus ought self-regulatory systems
was that self-discrepancy theory restricted the distinction between ideal and
ought self-regulation to a personality difference. However, motivation concerns psychological states and personality is just one source of psychological
states. Situations also induce psychological states, just as differences in the
accessibility of constructs can derive from chronic individual differences in
accessibility or from situational priming (Higgins, 1990). Another limitation
of self-discrepancy theory was its restriction to ideal and ought self-guides
because these self-guides are self-belief mental representations that are not
found in other animals and even in humans do not develop until approximately 3–5 years of age (Higgins, 1989). However, I felt that there was an
even more basic motivational distinction between two self-regulatory systems that was found in nonhuman animals and infants. This was a distinction
between two forms of survival—between the survival associated with safety,
security and defense and the survival associated with nurturance, growth,
and advancement (see also Bowlby, 1969, 1973).
Regulatory focus theory (Higgins, 1997, 1998) distinguishes between the
promotion motivational system and the prevention motivation system. The
promotion system relates to nurturance, growth, and advancement, and to the
attainment of better states, which includes, but is not restricted to, fulfilling the hopes and aspirations represented in ideal self-guides. The prevention
system relates to safety, security, and defense, and to the maintenance of satisfactory states, which includes, but is not restricted to, meeting the duties and
obligations represented in ought self-guides. Individuals can have a promotion focus or a prevention focus from a chronic predisposition (personality)
or from a situational induction, such as framing performance outcomes either
as a gain for success and a nongain for failure (promotion induction) or as a
nonloss for success and a loss for failure (prevention induction). Finally, promotion and prevention are independent such that individuals can be high in
both, low in both, or high in one and low in the other.
Like the ideal versus ought distinction, the promotion versus prevention
distinction is motivationally significant by distinguishing between two different systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. It is motivationally significant in another way as well. In brief, the motivational state of being
at “0” has a different valence in promotion versus prevention. Historically, “0” in
relation to “−1” or “+1” is treated as a neutral state. Importantly, regulatory
focus theory does not treat “0” as neutral. Indeed, “0” has a different valence

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

in the promotion versus the prevention system (see also Brendl & Higgins,
1996).
For promotion goal pursuit, successfully attaining a positive outcome supports the goal pursuit because it represents the presence of a positive outcome
or a gain, and as such it has positive valence. Not attaining a positive outcome
impedes promotion goal pursuit because it represents the absence of a positive outcome or a nongain, and as such it has negative valence. This means
that simply maintaining a status quo “0” is not experienced as neutral in the
promotion system of goal pursuit; instead, it has negative valence because it
fails to attain a positive outcome (failure to advance from “0” to “+1”). In
contrast, for prevention goal pursuit, maintaining a status quo “0” has positive valence because it represents the absence of a negative outcome or a
nonloss. Thus, once again, “0” is not experienced as neutral but instead has
positive valence (success in maintaining “0” against “−1”). What has negative valence for prevention goal pursuit is failing to maintain a status quo
“0” against a “−1,” which represents the presence of a negative outcome or
a loss.
There is a third way that the distinction between the promotion and prevention systems has general motivational significance. It reveals the distinct
motivational underpinnings of two general strategies of goal pursuit—eager
strategies and vigilant strategies. There is a natural preference in the promotion system for using eager strategies that advance the goal pursuit from
the current state to “+1.” Eager strategies fit promotion (Higgins, 2000).
Eager strategies and a promotion focus support and strengthen one another
(Higgins, 2006). In contrast, there is a natural preference in the prevention
system for using vigilant strategies that carefully maintain the current
satisfactory state of “0” against “−1.” Vigilant strategies fit prevention; they
support and strengthen one another (Higgins, 2000, 2006). This natural fit
does not mean that promotion and eagerness or prevention and vigilance
are redundant variables because a current situation, such as receiving
instructions from your supervisor, could force you to use strategies that are
a nonfit with your focus, such as being told to be vigilant when you have
a promotion focus. These conditions of regulatory fit and nonfit have their
own significant motivational consequences (Higgins, 2000, 2005).
FOUNDATIONAL RESEARCH
There is foundational research that highlights how the differences between
the promotion and prevention systems outlined above translates into different ways of seeing the world, different ways of dealing with tasks, different
responses to failure, and different processes of decision-making that intensify
value.

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DIFFERENT WAYS OF SEEING THE WORLD
At the time that regulatory focus theory began to emerge from selfdiscrepancy theory, Higgins, Roney, Crowe, and Hymes (1994) conducted a
study testing whether a situational induction of either ideal-promotion or
ought-prevention would influence whether eager-related or vigilant-related
story events would be better remembered. In the first regulatory focus priming study, undergraduate participants were asked to report either on how
their hopes had changed over time (priming ideal-promotion) or on how
their sense of obligation had changed over time (priming ought-prevention).
They then read about several episodes that occurred over a few days in
the life of another student. In the episodes where the target was trying
to approach a desired end-state, the target used either an eager approach
strategy (e.g., Because I wanted to be at school for the beginning of my 8:30
psychology class which is usually excellent, I woke up early this morning)
or a vigilant avoidance strategy (e.g., I wanted to take a class in photography
at the community center, so I did not register for a class in Spanish that
was scheduled at the same time). The study found that the participants
remembered episodes involving an eager approach strategy significantly
better when ideal-promotion was primed than when ought-prevention was
primed, whereas the reverse was true for remembering episodes involving
a vigilant avoidance strategy.
DIFFERENT WAYS OF DEALING WITH TASKS
As discussed earlier, when individuals are in a promotion focus, motivational strength should be higher if they have an eager approach orientation
during the goal pursuit than an avoidant vigilant orientation, and the
opposite should be true for individuals in a prevention focus. Moreover, the
greater motivational strength from such fit should translate into superior
performance. Förster, Higgins, and Idson (1998) tested this hypothesis in a
set of studies in which they either measured or manipulated participants’
regulatory focus. The undergraduate participants were asked to perform
an arm-pressure procedure while completing a set of anagrams. Half of the
participants pressed upward on the bottom of a surface—which involves
arm flexion, a motor action previously shown to induce an eager-related
approach orientation (Cacioppo, Priester, & Berntson, 1993). The other
half of the participants pressed downward on the top of a surface—which
involves arm extension, a motor action previously shown to induce a
vigilant-related avoidance orientation. Förster et al. (1998) found that the
promotion-focused participants who engaged in arm flexion found more
anagrams than those who engaged in arm extension, whereas the reverse
was true for prevention-focused participants.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

Förster et al. (1998) also found that as the participants proceeded through
the anagram sets (from the first to the last), there was a “goal looms larger”
effect of increased arm pressure as participants got closer to the end of the
anagram sets, with this positive gradient being obtained for arm flexion for
the promotion participants and for arm extension for the prevention participants. Importantly, this evidence for a “goal looms larger” effect indicates
that both promotion and prevention participants experienced their task as
approaching desired end-states (i.e., both approaching pleasure). The difference between promotion and prevention was at the strategic level, that is, two
different ways to approach pleasure, with strategic eager approach (arm flexion)
becoming stronger and stronger for promotion participants as they neared
task completion and strategic vigilant avoidance (arm extension) becoming
stronger and stronger for prevention as they neared task completion.
Later studies by Förster, Higgins, and Bianco (2003) replicated this “goal
looms larger” effect while, in addition, testing the prediction that, when
faced with a trade-off between speed and accuracy, promotion participants
would emphasize eager-related speed, whereas prevention participants
would emphasize vigilant-related accuracy. In a pair of studies in which
promotion- and prevention-focused participants were asked to complete a
series of four “connect-the-dot” pictures, Förster et al. (2003) assessed the
number of dots participants connected for each picture within the allotted
time frame, which constituted a measure of speed of goal completion. They
also assessed the number of dots participants missed up to the highest dot
they reached for each picture, which constituted a (reverse) measure of accuracy of goal completion. As predicted, promotion-focused participants were
faster (i.e., got through a greater percentage of the pictures in the allotted
time), whereas prevention-focused participants were more accurate (i.e.,
made fewer errors in the portions of the pictures that they had completed).
Förster et al. (2003) also found that the promotion-focused participants
became faster and faster (i.e., more and more eager) as they moved through
the task from the first to the final picture, whereas prevention-focused participants became more and more accurate (i.e., more and more vigilant). These
latter findings again reflect the “goal looms larger” effect, whereby strategic
motivation increases as people get closer and closer to goal completion.
DIFFERENT RESPONSES TO FAILURE
As discussed earlier, research on self-discrepancy theory showed that
people’s emotional responses to failure are different when they are in
an ideal-promotion focus versus an ought-prevention focus—having
dejection-related emotions in the former and agitation-related emotions

Regulatory Focus Theory

7

in the latter. There is also a difference between promotion and prevention in how people imagine after a failure how things might have
turned out differently had they taken certain actions or not taken certain
actions—counterfactual thinking. Additive counterfactuals are thoughts about
what might have happened had one taken a different action. Subtractive
counterfactuals are thoughts about what might have happened had one not
taken a particular action (Roese, 1997). Roese, Hur, and Pennington (1999)
examined regulatory focus differences in people’s likelihood of generating
additive versus subtractive counterfactuals in response to a failure.
Because an additive counterfactual leads people to imagine how things
might have turned out differently had they not missed an opportunity for
advancement, that is, the painful failure to attain a “+1” (a nongain), this counterfactual represents an eager strategy of reversing a past error of omission
and thus should be preferred by people with a promotion focus. In contrast,
because a subtractive counterfactual leads people to imagine how things
might have turned out differently had they avoided making a mistake, that
is, the painful failure of committing a “−1” (a loss), this counterfactual represents
a vigilant strategy of reversing a past error of commission and thus should
be preferred by people with a prevention focus. In one study conducted by
Roese et al. (1999), participants read hypothetical scenarios involving either
promotion failures (i.e., failures to attain accomplishment-related goals) or
prevention failures (i.e., failures to attain safety-related goals). Participants
were then asked, for each scenario, to expand in writing on a counterfactual
stem reading, “If only … ”.
As predicted, participants who had received promotion-framed scenarios
were more likely than participants who had received prevention-framed scenarios to generate additive counterfactuals. The reverse was true for generating subtractive counterfactuals. Supporting the regulatory focus link to different emotional reactions to failure, the same promotion versus prevention
difference in the likelihood of generating additive versus subtractive counterfactuals, respectively, was found in another study by Roese et al. (1999) in
which either a promotion or prevention focus was induced in participants
by having them think of a negative experience they had had within the past
year that involved, respectively, either feeling dejected or feeling agitated.
DIFFERENT PROCESSES OF DECISION-MAKING THAT INTENSIFY VALUE
In a study of regulatory fit effects on intensifying value, Higgins, Idson, Freitas, Spiegel, and Molden (2003) tested the hypothesis that having a promotion versus a prevention focus would interact with an eager versus vigilant
decision-making process. Participants were asked to choose between a coffee mug and a disposable pen. The coffee mug was pretested to be preferred

8

EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

by the participants. Half of the participants were asked to think about what
they would gain if they chose each object (an eager decision-making process),
and the other half were asked to think about what they would lose if they
did not choose each object (a vigilant decision-making process). Note that
for both decision-making processes, it is the positive or pleasant properties of
the two objects that were emphasized in the instructions—positive properties they would gain (eager process) or would not lose (vigilant process) by
choosing an option. Thus, once again, both conditions concerned approaching a desired end-state. What varied was the strategic process for making the
choice—either an eager or a vigilant process.
As intended, almost all participants chose the mug and it is these participants who are considered in the analyses. In one study, the participants were
given the opportunity to own the mug by offering their own money to buy
it. They knew that their offer had to be above a set price (hidden in an envelope) in order for them to receive the mug “for the price that you offered.”
Promotion-focused participants offered more money for the mug when they
had used an eager than a vigilant decision-making process and the reverse
was true for prevention-focused participants. In one study, in which the price
of the nonchosen object (i.e., the pen) was also assessed, the positive value
of the nonchosen object was also greater in the fit conditions (i.e., promotion focus-eager decision; prevention focus-vigilant decision) than the nonfit
conditions (i.e., promotion focus-vigilant decision; prevention focus-eager
decision). Thus, fit intensified the positive value of both the chosen and nonchosen objects. This finding rules out a dissonance-based (Festinger, 1957) or
self-perception-based (Bem, 1967) explanation of the findings, because these
theories predict that the value of the nonchosen object would decrease.
AREAS OF CUTTING-EDGE WORK
Promotion and prevention self-regulation function at the system level of
self-regulation. Eagerness and vigilance function at the strategic level. Recent
research on regulatory focus has been concerned with the implications of
considering the next, lower level in the hierarchy of self-regulation—the
tactical level (Scholer & Higgins, 2008). Whereas strategies serve systems,
such as eager strategies serving the promotion system and vigilant strategies
serving the prevention system, tactics serve strategies. And which tactic
serves a particular strategy at a particular time depends on how the regulatory system as a whole is doing at that time—an assessment or monitoring
of the current state of affairs for that system. For example, whether it is risky
or conservative tactics that will better serve the prevention system depends
on whether the current state is a satisfactory “0” or a threatening “−1.”

Regulatory Focus Theory

9

Early research testing regulatory focus theory (e.g., Crowe & Higgins, 1997;
Levine, Higgins, & Choi, 2000) found that individuals or groups who were
performing a recognition memory task in a prevention focus—compared to
those in a promotion focus—were more likely to make conservative decisions
(a tendency during the memory test to say “No” to both new and old items to
ensure against errors of commission) than to make risky or lenient decisions
(a tendency to say “Yes” to both new and old items to ensure against errors
of omission). When making the decision to be risky or conservative, the participants in these early studies were dealing with neutral or positive stimuli
and were themselves in a satisfactory or positive condition (a positive state
of affairs). What would happen if, instead, prevention-focused participants
were dealing with negative stimuli or were themselves in a negative condition (a negative state of affairs)? This question was addressed by Scholer and
her colleagues in a couple of research programs.
The first research program reexamined the recognition memory decisions of
prevention-focused participants (vs promotion-focused) for stimuli that this
time were negative (e.g., vomit; decay) rather than neutral or positive (Scholer,
Stroessner, & Higgins, 2008). For these negative stimuli, Scholer et al. (2008)
found that participants had a risky detection bias rather than a conservative
bias. Thus, in order for prevention-focused individuals to be appropriately
vigilant for the occurrence of negative objects or events, they need to be willing to take a “risk” and falsely identify something as a negative item that they
have seen before even when they have not (i.e., make an error of commission).
This willingness of prevention-focused individuals to make a tactically
risky decision when the current state of affairs is threatening, that is, tactical
risk in the service of vigilance, was also clearly demonstrated in another
program of research by Scholer, Zou, Fujita, Stroessner, and Higgins (2010).
Using a “two-study” paradigm, the participants in one experiment were
paid to complete a questionnaire battery and were then given a choice to
leave or to invest their payment in a second, stock-investment study. Most
participants decided to invest in the stock-investment study. At the end of
the first round of investing, all participants learned that they had lost not
only their original investment but also additional money—a real loss. At
this point, participants were given a choice between investing in either a
risky stock that could make up for all of their loss and a conservative stock
where they were more likely to make money on the investment but not
enough to bring them back to where they began. The expected value of these
stocks was the same, but the risky stock was riskier both in that its variance
was greater and participants perceived it as riskier. The study found that
participants who were more prevention-focused were more likely to choose
the riskier stock.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

However, this was not the end of the story. A second study included a different pair of options. Now both the risky and the conservative options had the
potential of returning participants to their break-even point, with the more
conservative option being more likely to reach “0,” and the more risky option
being less likely to definitely reach “0” but with some potential to go well
beyond “0.” Now the more prevention-focused individuals were less likely
to choose the risky option. Together, these studies make clear that what matters to prevention-focused individuals is to do what is necessary to restore a
nonloss by returning from “−1” to “0.” If only the risky option can do this,
then they will choose the risky option. If both options can do it and the conservative option is more likely to do it, then they will choose the conservative
option.
Recent research by Franks and her colleagues provides another illustration
of prevention-focused individuals being more likely than promotion-focused
individuals to choose a “risky” tactic in the service of vigilance but being
less likely under other conditions (Franks, Champagne, & Higgins, 2012;
Franks, Reiss, Cole, Friedrich, Thompson, & Higgins, 2013). Importantly,
this research also extends the testing of regulatory focus theory predictions
from human populations to monkeys and rats. The behavior of the monkeys
and rats in their cage homes, that is, seeking safety versus seeking food
treats, allowed promotion and prevention individuals to be identified.
Then their tactical behavioral choices were examined under other, different
conditions. For example, the monkey study was with cotton-top tamarins
and the responses of promotion and prevention monkeys to the introduction
of objects into their cage were examined. The specific tactical behavior
examined was the speed of approaching the object. Under most conditions,
approach speed was faster for promotion than prevention. However, when
the object was new and would not provide a food treat, approach speed
was faster for prevention than promotion. The absence of a food treat made
this condition a nongain for promotion and thus decreased approach speed.
However, the new object was a prevention-focused threat, that is, a potential
loss, and thus it needed to be approached and checked out. Such checking
behavior by prevention-focused animals is an approach tactic in the service
of being vigilant (see also Franks et al., 2012).
Another area of cutting-edge work also shows, like the previous studies,
that the self-regulatory distinction between promotion and prevention is not
simply approach versus avoidance. This new work also demonstrates the
utility of functional magnetic resonance imaging technology for examining
such issues (see also Cunningham, Raye, & Johnson, 2005). Specifically, Strauman et al. (2013) examined the neural correlates of priming promotion ideal
goals versus prevention ought goals, and correlated this goal-related activation to both a chronic measure of promotion and prevention orientation (the

Regulatory Focus Theory

11

Regulatory Focus Questionnaire, Higgins et al., 2001) and to a well-established
chronic measure of approach and avoidance orientation (the Behavioral Inhibition System/Behavioral Activation System scale, Carver & White, 1994).
The study found that distinct neural regions were activated by promotion
ideal goals versus prevention ought goals. In addition, this differential activation was correlated with individual differences in chronic promotion and
chronic prevention, respectively, but it was not correlated with individual
differences in chronic approach and chronic avoidance.
KEY ISSUES FOR FUTURE RESEARCH
There are two key issues that need to be addressed in future research to
understand better the nature and the applicability of the regulatory focus
distinction between promotion and prevention. First, we need to know more
about whether promotion and prevention are best characterized as competing motivations, where only one can function at a time, or as independent
motivations that can both be active at the same time and even work together
effectively. Second, there is the issue of whether the laboratory findings about
how promotion and prevention work can be generalized to everyday situations; that is, can we move from past success in establishing internal validity
to evidence for generalizability and applicability?
ARE PROMOTION AND PREVENTION COMPETITORS OR PARTNERS?
There are ways to think about promotion and prevention that make them
seem like opposite motivational orientations that would naturally come into
conflict with one another. For example, prevention thinks of a satisfactory status quo “0” as a positive state that needs to be maintained whereas promotion
thinks of “0” as a negative, nongain state that needs to be abandoned in order
to advance to a better “+1” state. The question is, should I move away from
“0” or stay at “0?” Put this way, this creates a conflict. As another example,
if promotion takes the position that accuracy (or quality) must be sacrificed
for the sake of speed (or quantity) and prevention takes the opposite position, then there would again be a conflict. As a third example, if promotion’s
position in a signal detection recognition memory task is that a risky tactic of
saying “Yes” to test items (ensuring against errors of omission) is better than
a conservative tactic of saying “No” (ensuring against errors of commission),
whereas prevention’s position is opposite, once again conflict would occur.
As a final example, Förster and Higgins (2005) found using the Navon (1977)
task where large letters are made up of small letters, for example, a global
large H made up of local small F’s, that participants with a stronger promotion focus were faster to process the global than the local letters and the

12

EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

reverse was true for individuals with a stronger prevention focus. So what
are you looking at, a global H or local F’s? A recipe for conflict.
These examples support the conclusion that promotion and prevention
are competing forces that conflict with one another and thus promotion and
prevention cannot work together as partners. Is this conclusion correct? To
answer this question, it is useful to distinguish between two versions of
this conclusion—simultaneous promotion and prevention versus successive
promotion and prevention. The conclusion is not correct for the successive
case because promotion and prevention could work together as partners
by taking turns being the dominant motivational force. Such turn taking
could be very advantageous. As just one example, Fugelstad, Rothman,
and Jeffery (2008) found that for health programs of smoking cessation and
weight loss, it was advantageous for people to be in a promotion focus at the
beginning of the program when behavioral change needed to be initiated
because they would be eager to move from the current status quo “0” to
a more positive state (+1), and it was advantageous for people later when
the initiated change needed to be maintained to be in a prevention focus
because they would be vigilant to maintain their new status quo and not
slip back to where they started (−1).
One could also think of taking turns between promotion and prevention in
the Navon task in order to perceive correctly that the stimulus is a global large
H made up of local small F’s, and in a signal detection recognition memory
task taking time to emphasize promotion and prevention in order to ensure
against errors of omission and commission and thereby maximize correct discrimination. These are examples of how promotion and prevention can work
together to produce a better outcome.
It is not always clear whether two motivational forces are working in parallel or in sequence. However, it should be noted that if it is a sequence, the time
interval could be very fast—so fast that it could be considered simultaneous
(in parallel). What this means is that the outcome will reflect the advantage
of the two motivational forces being both strong and working together. This is
the case for the speed-accuracy “trade-off” (Förster et al., 2003). This trade-off
is sometimes discussed as if there were a negative correlation between speed
and accuracy such that those individuals who have the highest speed also
have the lowest accuracy, and vice versa. However, it is possible for some
individuals to be high in speed and high in accuracy and others to be low in
both. Similarly, in the signal detection recognition memory task, rather than
individuals who have the least errors of omission necessarily having the most
errors of commission and vice versa (a negative correlation), it is possible for
some individuals to be low in both kinds of errors and others to be high in
both. What this would mean is that there could be a performance advantage when individuals are strong in both promotion and prevention or when

Regulatory Focus Theory

13

teams have some individuals who are strong in promotion and others who
are strong in prevention. Future research needs to examine this possibility.
What we do know is that satisfaction in romantic couples is greater when
one partner has a strong promotion focus and the other partner has a strong
prevention focus; that is, when there is complementarity rather than similarity of focus. Bohns et al. (2013) found that the pairing of a relationship partner
who prefers to pursue goals eagerly with a relationship partner who prefers
to pursue goals vigilantly led to positive relationship outcomes when the
partners agreed on which goals to pursue. Having available both eager and
vigilant strategic preferences in the relationship allows these couples to “divide and conquer” their goal activities (e.g., cooking dinner together) such
that each partner can take on his or her preferred eager or vigilant strategic role.
One can understand this case, and other cases where promotion and
prevention can work together effectively, in classic negotiation terms. The
examples of conflict between promotion and prevention that I discussed
earlier are cases where, as I purposely described them, promotion is taking
one position and prevention is taking an opposite position, which produces
conflict. However, effective negotiation involves treating differences as
differences in interests rather than differences in position. When the negotiating sides have different interests or strengths of preferences a “win–win”
outcome is achieved by trading off one preference for another so that each
side is given what they want most—trading across issues to let each side
have what they want (logrolling). As in the Bohns et al. (2013) case of letting
the promotion partner do the eager parts of the goal task and letting the
prevention partner do the vigilant parts, rather than promotion insisting
they both be eager and prevention insisting they both be vigilant, this allows
promotion and prevention to work together effectively as partners.
HOW GENERALIZABLE AND APPLICABLE IS THE PROMOTION–PREVENTION DISTINCTION?
The above section already provides two clear examples of the promotion–
prevention distinction being applicable to real-world issues in everyday
life—being more effective in changing health habits by emphasizing promotion to initiate change and prevention to maintain change, and being
more effective in working with your romantic partner by dividing labor
so the promotion partner can be eager and the prevention partner can
be vigilant. In addition, the work of Franks and her colleagues described
earlier demonstrates that the promotion–prevention distinction generalizes
to the behavior of nonhuman animals (monkeys and rats). I will now briefly
mention a few other examples of general applicability.

14

EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

The first is a study on shooting penalty shots in soccer where the participants were active soccer players in a regional league of the German Football
Association (Plessner, Unkelbach, Memmert, Baltes, & Kolb, 2009). The
study took place during one of the official training sessions. Each player
participant took five penalty shots. The participants varied in chronic promotion and chronic prevention. The framing of how to succeed in the penalty
shoot-out was experimentally manipulated. In the “success as gain (eager
shooting)” condition, the participants were told “You are going to shoot five
penalties. Your aspiration is to score at least three times.” In the “success as
avoiding loss (vigilant shooting)” condition, the participants were told “You
are going to shoot five penalties. Your obligation is not to miss more than
two times.” Even for such seasoned soccer players who are highly skilled
and always want to do their best, the shoot-out performance was about
30% better in the fit conditions (predominant promotion/gain; predominant prevention/avoid loss) than in the nonfit conditions (predominant
promotion/avoid loss; predominant prevention/gain).
Another study investigated the relation between regulatory focus and the
tendency for business managers to copy the managing behavior of their
former manager after having earlier experienced this manager’s behavior as
its recipient and later themselves taking on the same managing role (Zhang,
Higgins, & Chen, 2011). Earlier experimental evidence that individuals
with a stronger prevention (vs promotion) focus were more likely to copy
others, because the behavior of others functions as a status quo norm
to be maintained, was generalized to the field by surveying a sample of
superior-subordinate dyads in real-world organizations. This field study
found that current managers copied the managing style that they had
received from their superior even when they reported that they disliked that
style when it was used with them.
Another study (Wallace & Chen, 2006) examined employees who worked
in an organization’s facilities department (e.g., plumbing; electrical) where
their supervisors varied in their emphasis on safety (a situational safety climate variable) and they varied in conscientiousness (a personality variable).
The dependent measures were the employees’ productivity and their safety
performance. The study found that the impact of safety climate and conscientiousness on productivity and safety performance were mediated by
the employees’ promotion and prevention focus. For example, having a situational safety climate positively related to having a prevention focus and
having a prevention focus positively related to safety performance, whereas
having a situational safety climate negatively related to having a promotion
focus and having a promotion focus negatively related to safety performance.
What this and other studies clearly show is that the promotion–prevention
distinction is applicable to real-world issues in everyday life.

Regulatory Focus Theory

15

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The research by the author and his collaborators that is reported in this essay,
as well as the writing of this essay, was supported by Grant 39429 from the
National Institute of Mental Health to E. Tory Higgins.
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risk-seeking becomes a motivational necessity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 99, 215–231.
Strauman, T. J., Detloff, A. M., Sestokas, R., Smith, D. V., Goetz, E. L., Rivera, C., &
Kwapil, L. (2013). What shall I be, what must I be: Neural correlates of personal
goal activation. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, 6, 1–14.
Wallace, C., & Chen, G. (2006). A mulitlevel integration of personality, climate,
self-regulation, and performance. Personnel Psychology, 59, 529–557.
Zhang, S., Higgins, E. T., & Chen, G. Q. (2011). Managing others like you were managed: How prevention focus motivates copying interpersonal norms. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 100, 647–663.

FURTHER READING
Grant-Halvorson, H., & Higgins, E. T. (2013). Focus: Use different ways of seeing the
world for success and influence. New York, NY: Penguin.
Higgins, E. T. (1997). Beyond pleasure and pain. American Psychologist, 52, 1280–1300.
Higgins, E. T. (2012). Beyond pleasure and pain: How motivation works. New York, NY:
Oxford University Press.
Lee, A. Y., & Higgins, E. T. (2009). The persuasive power of regulatory fit. In M.
Wänke (Ed.), Social psychology of consumer behavior (pp. 319–333). New York, NY:
Psychology Press.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (2011). Promotion and prevention systems: Regulatory
focus dynamics within self-regulatory hierarchies. In K. D. Vohs & R. F. Baumeister (Eds.), Handbook of self-regulation: Research, theory, and applications (2nd ed., pp.
143–161). New York, NY: Guilford.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (in press). Too much of a good thing? Trade-offs in
promotion and prevention focus. In R. M. Ryan (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of motivation. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

E. TORY HIGGINS SHORT BIOGRAPHY
E. Tory Higgins is the Stanley Schachter Professor of Psychology, Professor of
Business, and Director of the Motivation Science Center at Columbia (where
he also received his PhD in 1973). He is a Fellow of the American Academy of
Arts and Sciences. He is the author of Beyond Pleasure and Pain: How Motivation Works (Oxford, 2012). His research is on the intersection of motivation
and cognition, and his work has been applied to understanding and treating
depression and anxiety disorders. He has received a MERIT Award from the
National Institute of Mental Health, the Thomas M. Ostrom Award in Social
Cognition, the Donald T. Campbell Award for Outstanding Contributions to Social
Psychology (Society of Personality and Social Psychology), and the Lifetime
Contribution Award from the International Society for Self and Identity. He

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

has also received the Distinguished Scientist Award from the Society of Experimental Social Psychology, the William James Fellow Award for Distinguished
Achievements in Psychological Science (from the Association of Psychological
Science), and the American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished
Scientific Contributions. He is also a recipient of Columbia’s Presidential Award
for Outstanding Teaching.
RELATED ESSAYS
Intersectionality and the Development of Self and Identity (Psychology), Margarita Azmitia and Virginia Thomas
Identity Fusion (Psychology), Michael D. Burhmester and William B. Swann
Jr.
Choice Architecture (Psychology), Adrian R. Camilleri and Rick P. Larrick
Understanding the Adaptive Functions of Morality from a Cognitive Psychological Perspective (Psychology), James Dungan and Liane Young
Insight (Psychology), Brian Erickson and John Kounios
The Roots of Moral Reasoning and Behavior in Infants (Psychology), J. Kiley
Hamlin and Conor M. Steckler
Moral Identity (Psychology), Sam A. Hardy and Gustavo Carlo
Motivation Science (Psychology), Arie W. Kruglanski et al.
Making Sense of Control: Change and Consequences (Psychology), Margie E.
Lachman et al.
Media and the development of Identity (Psychology), Adriana M. Manago
Retrieval-Based Learning: Research at the Interface between Cognitive Science and Education (Psychology), Ludmila D. Nunes and Jeffrey D. Karpicke
Identity-Based Motivation (Psychology), Daphna Oyserman
Effortful Control (Psychology), Tracy L. Spinrad and Nancy Eisenberg
Temporal Identity Integration as a Core Developmental Process (Psychology),
Moin Syed and Lauren L. Mitchell


Regulatory Focus Theory
E. TORY HIGGINS

Abstract
Regulatory focus theory was the child of self-discrepancy theory and the parent of
regulatory fit theory. Self-discrepancy theory distinguishes between self-regulation
in relation to hopes and aspirations (ideals) versus self-regulation in relation to duties
and obligations (oughts). It proposes that ideal versus ought self-regulation are two different motivational systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. In regulatory
focus theory, promotion concerns with ideals (growth and advancement more generally) and prevention concerns with oughts (safety and security more generally) are
motivational states that not only vary across individuals (personality) but also can be
situationally induced. Regulatory focus theory proposes that the motivational state
of being at “0” has negative valence in promotion (“0”as a nongain in relation to “+1”)
but positive valence in prevention (“0” as a nonloss in relation to “−1”). Finally, giving rise to regulatory fit theory, regulatory focus theory distinguishes between the
eager strategies that fit promotion and the vigilant strategies that fit prevention. Foundational research supporting each of these proposals is reviewed, and then more recent
cutting-edge research is described, including how this distinction is revealed in the
behavior of nonhuman animals and how different tactics (e.g., risky vs conservative) can serve either promotion-eagerness or prevention-vigilance under different
circumstances. Finally, I discuss two key issues for future research: whether promotion and prevention are competing motivations or can work together as partners, and
whether there is support for the promotion–prevention distinction in everyday life
beyond the laboratory.

INTRODUCTION
The story of the development of regulatory focus theory begins with
self-discrepancy theory. When people are emotionally overwhelmed by a
serious setback in their life, such as the death of their child, the loss of their
job, or the break-up of their marriage, why do some become depressed while
others become anxious? To answer this question, self-discrepancy theory
proposed that even when people have the same specific goals, they often
vary in how they represent them. The goals that direct our self-regulation
are called self-guides. There are two basic kinds of self-guides. There are
ideal self-guides, which represent who we hope and aspire to be, and
Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. Edited by Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN 978-1-118-90077-2.

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ought self-guides, which represent our beliefs about who it is our duty or
obligation to be.
According to self-discrepancy theory (Higgins, 1987), it is this difference
between failing to meet ideal self-guides versus failing to meet ought
self-guides that explains why we have different emotional reactions to the
same negative life event. When a negative life event happens to us, we
represent it as saying something about how we are doing. When there
is a discrepancy between how we are doing, which is our actual self, and
a self-guide—a self-discrepancy—we suffer. A discrepancy between our
actual self and our ideal self-guides makes us feel sad, disappointed, and
discouraged—dejection-related emotions that relate clinically to depression. A discrepancy between our actual self and our ought self-guides
makes us feel nervous, tense, and worried—agitation-related emotions
that relate clinically to anxiety disorders. Thus, different kinds of emotional suffering depend on which type of self-guide is emphasized in our
self-regulation—dejection/depression suffering when ideals are emphasized
and agitation/anxiety suffering when oughts are emphasized.
As reflected in the name of the theory, self-discrepancy theory emphasized
the negative emotions produced by actual self-discrepancies to self-guides.
However, the theory also described the positive emotions produced by
actual self-congruencies to self-guides. An actual self-congruency with ideal
self-guides makes us feel happy and encouraged—cheerfulness-related
emotions. An actual self-congruency with ought self-guides makes us feel
calm and relaxed—quiescence-related emotions.
Self-discrepancy theory, then, distinguished between two self-regulatory
systems that produced two different emotional dimensions: a cheerfulness–
dejection dimension for self-regulation in relation to ideal self-guides and
a quiescence–agitation dimension for self-regulation in relation to ought
self-guides. This distinction between two self-regulatory systems with
different emotional consequences was the first step in the development of
regulatory focus theory because it challenged the utility of the most influential principle in motivation—the hedonic principle. The hedonic principle
states that people approach pleasure and avoid pain. Does that principle
tell us why people have different emotional reactions to the same negative
life event (dejection vs agitation) or why people have different emotional
reactions to the same positive life event (cheerfulness vs quiescence)? It does
not, because to know why people have different emotional reactions we
must understand that the hedonic principle plays out motivationally in two
very different ways. Self-discrepancy theory identified ideal versus ought
self-regulation as two different ways to approach pleasure and two different ways
to avoid pain. Recognizing this motivational distinction was central to the
development of regulatory focus theory. It made clear that, to understand

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3

how motivation works, it was essential to go “beyond pleasure and pain”
and study how different systems of self-regulation function (Higgins, 1997,
2012).
The downside of self-discrepancy theory for considering further the motivational differences between the ideal versus ought self-regulatory systems
was that self-discrepancy theory restricted the distinction between ideal and
ought self-regulation to a personality difference. However, motivation concerns psychological states and personality is just one source of psychological
states. Situations also induce psychological states, just as differences in the
accessibility of constructs can derive from chronic individual differences in
accessibility or from situational priming (Higgins, 1990). Another limitation
of self-discrepancy theory was its restriction to ideal and ought self-guides
because these self-guides are self-belief mental representations that are not
found in other animals and even in humans do not develop until approximately 3–5 years of age (Higgins, 1989). However, I felt that there was an
even more basic motivational distinction between two self-regulatory systems that was found in nonhuman animals and infants. This was a distinction
between two forms of survival—between the survival associated with safety,
security and defense and the survival associated with nurturance, growth,
and advancement (see also Bowlby, 1969, 1973).
Regulatory focus theory (Higgins, 1997, 1998) distinguishes between the
promotion motivational system and the prevention motivation system. The
promotion system relates to nurturance, growth, and advancement, and to the
attainment of better states, which includes, but is not restricted to, fulfilling the hopes and aspirations represented in ideal self-guides. The prevention
system relates to safety, security, and defense, and to the maintenance of satisfactory states, which includes, but is not restricted to, meeting the duties and
obligations represented in ought self-guides. Individuals can have a promotion focus or a prevention focus from a chronic predisposition (personality)
or from a situational induction, such as framing performance outcomes either
as a gain for success and a nongain for failure (promotion induction) or as a
nonloss for success and a loss for failure (prevention induction). Finally, promotion and prevention are independent such that individuals can be high in
both, low in both, or high in one and low in the other.
Like the ideal versus ought distinction, the promotion versus prevention
distinction is motivationally significant by distinguishing between two different systems for approaching pleasure and avoiding pain. It is motivationally significant in another way as well. In brief, the motivational state of being
at “0” has a different valence in promotion versus prevention. Historically, “0” in
relation to “−1” or “+1” is treated as a neutral state. Importantly, regulatory
focus theory does not treat “0” as neutral. Indeed, “0” has a different valence

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in the promotion versus the prevention system (see also Brendl & Higgins,
1996).
For promotion goal pursuit, successfully attaining a positive outcome supports the goal pursuit because it represents the presence of a positive outcome
or a gain, and as such it has positive valence. Not attaining a positive outcome
impedes promotion goal pursuit because it represents the absence of a positive outcome or a nongain, and as such it has negative valence. This means
that simply maintaining a status quo “0” is not experienced as neutral in the
promotion system of goal pursuit; instead, it has negative valence because it
fails to attain a positive outcome (failure to advance from “0” to “+1”). In
contrast, for prevention goal pursuit, maintaining a status quo “0” has positive valence because it represents the absence of a negative outcome or a
nonloss. Thus, once again, “0” is not experienced as neutral but instead has
positive valence (success in maintaining “0” against “−1”). What has negative valence for prevention goal pursuit is failing to maintain a status quo
“0” against a “−1,” which represents the presence of a negative outcome or
a loss.
There is a third way that the distinction between the promotion and prevention systems has general motivational significance. It reveals the distinct
motivational underpinnings of two general strategies of goal pursuit—eager
strategies and vigilant strategies. There is a natural preference in the promotion system for using eager strategies that advance the goal pursuit from
the current state to “+1.” Eager strategies fit promotion (Higgins, 2000).
Eager strategies and a promotion focus support and strengthen one another
(Higgins, 2006). In contrast, there is a natural preference in the prevention
system for using vigilant strategies that carefully maintain the current
satisfactory state of “0” against “−1.” Vigilant strategies fit prevention; they
support and strengthen one another (Higgins, 2000, 2006). This natural fit
does not mean that promotion and eagerness or prevention and vigilance
are redundant variables because a current situation, such as receiving
instructions from your supervisor, could force you to use strategies that are
a nonfit with your focus, such as being told to be vigilant when you have
a promotion focus. These conditions of regulatory fit and nonfit have their
own significant motivational consequences (Higgins, 2000, 2005).
FOUNDATIONAL RESEARCH
There is foundational research that highlights how the differences between
the promotion and prevention systems outlined above translates into different ways of seeing the world, different ways of dealing with tasks, different
responses to failure, and different processes of decision-making that intensify
value.

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DIFFERENT WAYS OF SEEING THE WORLD
At the time that regulatory focus theory began to emerge from selfdiscrepancy theory, Higgins, Roney, Crowe, and Hymes (1994) conducted a
study testing whether a situational induction of either ideal-promotion or
ought-prevention would influence whether eager-related or vigilant-related
story events would be better remembered. In the first regulatory focus priming study, undergraduate participants were asked to report either on how
their hopes had changed over time (priming ideal-promotion) or on how
their sense of obligation had changed over time (priming ought-prevention).
They then read about several episodes that occurred over a few days in
the life of another student. In the episodes where the target was trying
to approach a desired end-state, the target used either an eager approach
strategy (e.g., Because I wanted to be at school for the beginning of my 8:30
psychology class which is usually excellent, I woke up early this morning)
or a vigilant avoidance strategy (e.g., I wanted to take a class in photography
at the community center, so I did not register for a class in Spanish that
was scheduled at the same time). The study found that the participants
remembered episodes involving an eager approach strategy significantly
better when ideal-promotion was primed than when ought-prevention was
primed, whereas the reverse was true for remembering episodes involving
a vigilant avoidance strategy.
DIFFERENT WAYS OF DEALING WITH TASKS
As discussed earlier, when individuals are in a promotion focus, motivational strength should be higher if they have an eager approach orientation
during the goal pursuit than an avoidant vigilant orientation, and the
opposite should be true for individuals in a prevention focus. Moreover, the
greater motivational strength from such fit should translate into superior
performance. Förster, Higgins, and Idson (1998) tested this hypothesis in a
set of studies in which they either measured or manipulated participants’
regulatory focus. The undergraduate participants were asked to perform
an arm-pressure procedure while completing a set of anagrams. Half of the
participants pressed upward on the bottom of a surface—which involves
arm flexion, a motor action previously shown to induce an eager-related
approach orientation (Cacioppo, Priester, & Berntson, 1993). The other
half of the participants pressed downward on the top of a surface—which
involves arm extension, a motor action previously shown to induce a
vigilant-related avoidance orientation. Förster et al. (1998) found that the
promotion-focused participants who engaged in arm flexion found more
anagrams than those who engaged in arm extension, whereas the reverse
was true for prevention-focused participants.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

Förster et al. (1998) also found that as the participants proceeded through
the anagram sets (from the first to the last), there was a “goal looms larger”
effect of increased arm pressure as participants got closer to the end of the
anagram sets, with this positive gradient being obtained for arm flexion for
the promotion participants and for arm extension for the prevention participants. Importantly, this evidence for a “goal looms larger” effect indicates
that both promotion and prevention participants experienced their task as
approaching desired end-states (i.e., both approaching pleasure). The difference between promotion and prevention was at the strategic level, that is, two
different ways to approach pleasure, with strategic eager approach (arm flexion)
becoming stronger and stronger for promotion participants as they neared
task completion and strategic vigilant avoidance (arm extension) becoming
stronger and stronger for prevention as they neared task completion.
Later studies by Förster, Higgins, and Bianco (2003) replicated this “goal
looms larger” effect while, in addition, testing the prediction that, when
faced with a trade-off between speed and accuracy, promotion participants
would emphasize eager-related speed, whereas prevention participants
would emphasize vigilant-related accuracy. In a pair of studies in which
promotion- and prevention-focused participants were asked to complete a
series of four “connect-the-dot” pictures, Förster et al. (2003) assessed the
number of dots participants connected for each picture within the allotted
time frame, which constituted a measure of speed of goal completion. They
also assessed the number of dots participants missed up to the highest dot
they reached for each picture, which constituted a (reverse) measure of accuracy of goal completion. As predicted, promotion-focused participants were
faster (i.e., got through a greater percentage of the pictures in the allotted
time), whereas prevention-focused participants were more accurate (i.e.,
made fewer errors in the portions of the pictures that they had completed).
Förster et al. (2003) also found that the promotion-focused participants
became faster and faster (i.e., more and more eager) as they moved through
the task from the first to the final picture, whereas prevention-focused participants became more and more accurate (i.e., more and more vigilant). These
latter findings again reflect the “goal looms larger” effect, whereby strategic
motivation increases as people get closer and closer to goal completion.
DIFFERENT RESPONSES TO FAILURE
As discussed earlier, research on self-discrepancy theory showed that
people’s emotional responses to failure are different when they are in
an ideal-promotion focus versus an ought-prevention focus—having
dejection-related emotions in the former and agitation-related emotions

Regulatory Focus Theory

7

in the latter. There is also a difference between promotion and prevention in how people imagine after a failure how things might have
turned out differently had they taken certain actions or not taken certain
actions—counterfactual thinking. Additive counterfactuals are thoughts about
what might have happened had one taken a different action. Subtractive
counterfactuals are thoughts about what might have happened had one not
taken a particular action (Roese, 1997). Roese, Hur, and Pennington (1999)
examined regulatory focus differences in people’s likelihood of generating
additive versus subtractive counterfactuals in response to a failure.
Because an additive counterfactual leads people to imagine how things
might have turned out differently had they not missed an opportunity for
advancement, that is, the painful failure to attain a “+1” (a nongain), this counterfactual represents an eager strategy of reversing a past error of omission
and thus should be preferred by people with a promotion focus. In contrast,
because a subtractive counterfactual leads people to imagine how things
might have turned out differently had they avoided making a mistake, that
is, the painful failure of committing a “−1” (a loss), this counterfactual represents
a vigilant strategy of reversing a past error of commission and thus should
be preferred by people with a prevention focus. In one study conducted by
Roese et al. (1999), participants read hypothetical scenarios involving either
promotion failures (i.e., failures to attain accomplishment-related goals) or
prevention failures (i.e., failures to attain safety-related goals). Participants
were then asked, for each scenario, to expand in writing on a counterfactual
stem reading, “If only … ”.
As predicted, participants who had received promotion-framed scenarios
were more likely than participants who had received prevention-framed scenarios to generate additive counterfactuals. The reverse was true for generating subtractive counterfactuals. Supporting the regulatory focus link to different emotional reactions to failure, the same promotion versus prevention
difference in the likelihood of generating additive versus subtractive counterfactuals, respectively, was found in another study by Roese et al. (1999) in
which either a promotion or prevention focus was induced in participants
by having them think of a negative experience they had had within the past
year that involved, respectively, either feeling dejected or feeling agitated.
DIFFERENT PROCESSES OF DECISION-MAKING THAT INTENSIFY VALUE
In a study of regulatory fit effects on intensifying value, Higgins, Idson, Freitas, Spiegel, and Molden (2003) tested the hypothesis that having a promotion versus a prevention focus would interact with an eager versus vigilant
decision-making process. Participants were asked to choose between a coffee mug and a disposable pen. The coffee mug was pretested to be preferred

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

by the participants. Half of the participants were asked to think about what
they would gain if they chose each object (an eager decision-making process),
and the other half were asked to think about what they would lose if they
did not choose each object (a vigilant decision-making process). Note that
for both decision-making processes, it is the positive or pleasant properties of
the two objects that were emphasized in the instructions—positive properties they would gain (eager process) or would not lose (vigilant process) by
choosing an option. Thus, once again, both conditions concerned approaching a desired end-state. What varied was the strategic process for making the
choice—either an eager or a vigilant process.
As intended, almost all participants chose the mug and it is these participants who are considered in the analyses. In one study, the participants were
given the opportunity to own the mug by offering their own money to buy
it. They knew that their offer had to be above a set price (hidden in an envelope) in order for them to receive the mug “for the price that you offered.”
Promotion-focused participants offered more money for the mug when they
had used an eager than a vigilant decision-making process and the reverse
was true for prevention-focused participants. In one study, in which the price
of the nonchosen object (i.e., the pen) was also assessed, the positive value
of the nonchosen object was also greater in the fit conditions (i.e., promotion focus-eager decision; prevention focus-vigilant decision) than the nonfit
conditions (i.e., promotion focus-vigilant decision; prevention focus-eager
decision). Thus, fit intensified the positive value of both the chosen and nonchosen objects. This finding rules out a dissonance-based (Festinger, 1957) or
self-perception-based (Bem, 1967) explanation of the findings, because these
theories predict that the value of the nonchosen object would decrease.
AREAS OF CUTTING-EDGE WORK
Promotion and prevention self-regulation function at the system level of
self-regulation. Eagerness and vigilance function at the strategic level. Recent
research on regulatory focus has been concerned with the implications of
considering the next, lower level in the hierarchy of self-regulation—the
tactical level (Scholer & Higgins, 2008). Whereas strategies serve systems,
such as eager strategies serving the promotion system and vigilant strategies
serving the prevention system, tactics serve strategies. And which tactic
serves a particular strategy at a particular time depends on how the regulatory system as a whole is doing at that time—an assessment or monitoring
of the current state of affairs for that system. For example, whether it is risky
or conservative tactics that will better serve the prevention system depends
on whether the current state is a satisfactory “0” or a threatening “−1.”

Regulatory Focus Theory

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Early research testing regulatory focus theory (e.g., Crowe & Higgins, 1997;
Levine, Higgins, & Choi, 2000) found that individuals or groups who were
performing a recognition memory task in a prevention focus—compared to
those in a promotion focus—were more likely to make conservative decisions
(a tendency during the memory test to say “No” to both new and old items to
ensure against errors of commission) than to make risky or lenient decisions
(a tendency to say “Yes” to both new and old items to ensure against errors
of omission). When making the decision to be risky or conservative, the participants in these early studies were dealing with neutral or positive stimuli
and were themselves in a satisfactory or positive condition (a positive state
of affairs). What would happen if, instead, prevention-focused participants
were dealing with negative stimuli or were themselves in a negative condition (a negative state of affairs)? This question was addressed by Scholer and
her colleagues in a couple of research programs.
The first research program reexamined the recognition memory decisions of
prevention-focused participants (vs promotion-focused) for stimuli that this
time were negative (e.g., vomit; decay) rather than neutral or positive (Scholer,
Stroessner, & Higgins, 2008). For these negative stimuli, Scholer et al. (2008)
found that participants had a risky detection bias rather than a conservative
bias. Thus, in order for prevention-focused individuals to be appropriately
vigilant for the occurrence of negative objects or events, they need to be willing to take a “risk” and falsely identify something as a negative item that they
have seen before even when they have not (i.e., make an error of commission).
This willingness of prevention-focused individuals to make a tactically
risky decision when the current state of affairs is threatening, that is, tactical
risk in the service of vigilance, was also clearly demonstrated in another
program of research by Scholer, Zou, Fujita, Stroessner, and Higgins (2010).
Using a “two-study” paradigm, the participants in one experiment were
paid to complete a questionnaire battery and were then given a choice to
leave or to invest their payment in a second, stock-investment study. Most
participants decided to invest in the stock-investment study. At the end of
the first round of investing, all participants learned that they had lost not
only their original investment but also additional money—a real loss. At
this point, participants were given a choice between investing in either a
risky stock that could make up for all of their loss and a conservative stock
where they were more likely to make money on the investment but not
enough to bring them back to where they began. The expected value of these
stocks was the same, but the risky stock was riskier both in that its variance
was greater and participants perceived it as riskier. The study found that
participants who were more prevention-focused were more likely to choose
the riskier stock.

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However, this was not the end of the story. A second study included a different pair of options. Now both the risky and the conservative options had the
potential of returning participants to their break-even point, with the more
conservative option being more likely to reach “0,” and the more risky option
being less likely to definitely reach “0” but with some potential to go well
beyond “0.” Now the more prevention-focused individuals were less likely
to choose the risky option. Together, these studies make clear that what matters to prevention-focused individuals is to do what is necessary to restore a
nonloss by returning from “−1” to “0.” If only the risky option can do this,
then they will choose the risky option. If both options can do it and the conservative option is more likely to do it, then they will choose the conservative
option.
Recent research by Franks and her colleagues provides another illustration
of prevention-focused individuals being more likely than promotion-focused
individuals to choose a “risky” tactic in the service of vigilance but being
less likely under other conditions (Franks, Champagne, & Higgins, 2012;
Franks, Reiss, Cole, Friedrich, Thompson, & Higgins, 2013). Importantly,
this research also extends the testing of regulatory focus theory predictions
from human populations to monkeys and rats. The behavior of the monkeys
and rats in their cage homes, that is, seeking safety versus seeking food
treats, allowed promotion and prevention individuals to be identified.
Then their tactical behavioral choices were examined under other, different
conditions. For example, the monkey study was with cotton-top tamarins
and the responses of promotion and prevention monkeys to the introduction
of objects into their cage were examined. The specific tactical behavior
examined was the speed of approaching the object. Under most conditions,
approach speed was faster for promotion than prevention. However, when
the object was new and would not provide a food treat, approach speed
was faster for prevention than promotion. The absence of a food treat made
this condition a nongain for promotion and thus decreased approach speed.
However, the new object was a prevention-focused threat, that is, a potential
loss, and thus it needed to be approached and checked out. Such checking
behavior by prevention-focused animals is an approach tactic in the service
of being vigilant (see also Franks et al., 2012).
Another area of cutting-edge work also shows, like the previous studies,
that the self-regulatory distinction between promotion and prevention is not
simply approach versus avoidance. This new work also demonstrates the
utility of functional magnetic resonance imaging technology for examining
such issues (see also Cunningham, Raye, & Johnson, 2005). Specifically, Strauman et al. (2013) examined the neural correlates of priming promotion ideal
goals versus prevention ought goals, and correlated this goal-related activation to both a chronic measure of promotion and prevention orientation (the

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Regulatory Focus Questionnaire, Higgins et al., 2001) and to a well-established
chronic measure of approach and avoidance orientation (the Behavioral Inhibition System/Behavioral Activation System scale, Carver & White, 1994).
The study found that distinct neural regions were activated by promotion
ideal goals versus prevention ought goals. In addition, this differential activation was correlated with individual differences in chronic promotion and
chronic prevention, respectively, but it was not correlated with individual
differences in chronic approach and chronic avoidance.
KEY ISSUES FOR FUTURE RESEARCH
There are two key issues that need to be addressed in future research to
understand better the nature and the applicability of the regulatory focus
distinction between promotion and prevention. First, we need to know more
about whether promotion and prevention are best characterized as competing motivations, where only one can function at a time, or as independent
motivations that can both be active at the same time and even work together
effectively. Second, there is the issue of whether the laboratory findings about
how promotion and prevention work can be generalized to everyday situations; that is, can we move from past success in establishing internal validity
to evidence for generalizability and applicability?
ARE PROMOTION AND PREVENTION COMPETITORS OR PARTNERS?
There are ways to think about promotion and prevention that make them
seem like opposite motivational orientations that would naturally come into
conflict with one another. For example, prevention thinks of a satisfactory status quo “0” as a positive state that needs to be maintained whereas promotion
thinks of “0” as a negative, nongain state that needs to be abandoned in order
to advance to a better “+1” state. The question is, should I move away from
“0” or stay at “0?” Put this way, this creates a conflict. As another example,
if promotion takes the position that accuracy (or quality) must be sacrificed
for the sake of speed (or quantity) and prevention takes the opposite position, then there would again be a conflict. As a third example, if promotion’s
position in a signal detection recognition memory task is that a risky tactic of
saying “Yes” to test items (ensuring against errors of omission) is better than
a conservative tactic of saying “No” (ensuring against errors of commission),
whereas prevention’s position is opposite, once again conflict would occur.
As a final example, Förster and Higgins (2005) found using the Navon (1977)
task where large letters are made up of small letters, for example, a global
large H made up of local small F’s, that participants with a stronger promotion focus were faster to process the global than the local letters and the

12

EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

reverse was true for individuals with a stronger prevention focus. So what
are you looking at, a global H or local F’s? A recipe for conflict.
These examples support the conclusion that promotion and prevention
are competing forces that conflict with one another and thus promotion and
prevention cannot work together as partners. Is this conclusion correct? To
answer this question, it is useful to distinguish between two versions of
this conclusion—simultaneous promotion and prevention versus successive
promotion and prevention. The conclusion is not correct for the successive
case because promotion and prevention could work together as partners
by taking turns being the dominant motivational force. Such turn taking
could be very advantageous. As just one example, Fugelstad, Rothman,
and Jeffery (2008) found that for health programs of smoking cessation and
weight loss, it was advantageous for people to be in a promotion focus at the
beginning of the program when behavioral change needed to be initiated
because they would be eager to move from the current status quo “0” to
a more positive state (+1), and it was advantageous for people later when
the initiated change needed to be maintained to be in a prevention focus
because they would be vigilant to maintain their new status quo and not
slip back to where they started (−1).
One could also think of taking turns between promotion and prevention in
the Navon task in order to perceive correctly that the stimulus is a global large
H made up of local small F’s, and in a signal detection recognition memory
task taking time to emphasize promotion and prevention in order to ensure
against errors of omission and commission and thereby maximize correct discrimination. These are examples of how promotion and prevention can work
together to produce a better outcome.
It is not always clear whether two motivational forces are working in parallel or in sequence. However, it should be noted that if it is a sequence, the time
interval could be very fast—so fast that it could be considered simultaneous
(in parallel). What this means is that the outcome will reflect the advantage
of the two motivational forces being both strong and working together. This is
the case for the speed-accuracy “trade-off” (Förster et al., 2003). This trade-off
is sometimes discussed as if there were a negative correlation between speed
and accuracy such that those individuals who have the highest speed also
have the lowest accuracy, and vice versa. However, it is possible for some
individuals to be high in speed and high in accuracy and others to be low in
both. Similarly, in the signal detection recognition memory task, rather than
individuals who have the least errors of omission necessarily having the most
errors of commission and vice versa (a negative correlation), it is possible for
some individuals to be low in both kinds of errors and others to be high in
both. What this would mean is that there could be a performance advantage when individuals are strong in both promotion and prevention or when

Regulatory Focus Theory

13

teams have some individuals who are strong in promotion and others who
are strong in prevention. Future research needs to examine this possibility.
What we do know is that satisfaction in romantic couples is greater when
one partner has a strong promotion focus and the other partner has a strong
prevention focus; that is, when there is complementarity rather than similarity of focus. Bohns et al. (2013) found that the pairing of a relationship partner
who prefers to pursue goals eagerly with a relationship partner who prefers
to pursue goals vigilantly led to positive relationship outcomes when the
partners agreed on which goals to pursue. Having available both eager and
vigilant strategic preferences in the relationship allows these couples to “divide and conquer” their goal activities (e.g., cooking dinner together) such
that each partner can take on his or her preferred eager or vigilant strategic role.
One can understand this case, and other cases where promotion and
prevention can work together effectively, in classic negotiation terms. The
examples of conflict between promotion and prevention that I discussed
earlier are cases where, as I purposely described them, promotion is taking
one position and prevention is taking an opposite position, which produces
conflict. However, effective negotiation involves treating differences as
differences in interests rather than differences in position. When the negotiating sides have different interests or strengths of preferences a “win–win”
outcome is achieved by trading off one preference for another so that each
side is given what they want most—trading across issues to let each side
have what they want (logrolling). As in the Bohns et al. (2013) case of letting
the promotion partner do the eager parts of the goal task and letting the
prevention partner do the vigilant parts, rather than promotion insisting
they both be eager and prevention insisting they both be vigilant, this allows
promotion and prevention to work together effectively as partners.
HOW GENERALIZABLE AND APPLICABLE IS THE PROMOTION–PREVENTION DISTINCTION?
The above section already provides two clear examples of the promotion–
prevention distinction being applicable to real-world issues in everyday
life—being more effective in changing health habits by emphasizing promotion to initiate change and prevention to maintain change, and being
more effective in working with your romantic partner by dividing labor
so the promotion partner can be eager and the prevention partner can
be vigilant. In addition, the work of Franks and her colleagues described
earlier demonstrates that the promotion–prevention distinction generalizes
to the behavior of nonhuman animals (monkeys and rats). I will now briefly
mention a few other examples of general applicability.

14

EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

The first is a study on shooting penalty shots in soccer where the participants were active soccer players in a regional league of the German Football
Association (Plessner, Unkelbach, Memmert, Baltes, & Kolb, 2009). The
study took place during one of the official training sessions. Each player
participant took five penalty shots. The participants varied in chronic promotion and chronic prevention. The framing of how to succeed in the penalty
shoot-out was experimentally manipulated. In the “success as gain (eager
shooting)” condition, the participants were told “You are going to shoot five
penalties. Your aspiration is to score at least three times.” In the “success as
avoiding loss (vigilant shooting)” condition, the participants were told “You
are going to shoot five penalties. Your obligation is not to miss more than
two times.” Even for such seasoned soccer players who are highly skilled
and always want to do their best, the shoot-out performance was about
30% better in the fit conditions (predominant promotion/gain; predominant prevention/avoid loss) than in the nonfit conditions (predominant
promotion/avoid loss; predominant prevention/gain).
Another study investigated the relation between regulatory focus and the
tendency for business managers to copy the managing behavior of their
former manager after having earlier experienced this manager’s behavior as
its recipient and later themselves taking on the same managing role (Zhang,
Higgins, & Chen, 2011). Earlier experimental evidence that individuals
with a stronger prevention (vs promotion) focus were more likely to copy
others, because the behavior of others functions as a status quo norm
to be maintained, was generalized to the field by surveying a sample of
superior-subordinate dyads in real-world organizations. This field study
found that current managers copied the managing style that they had
received from their superior even when they reported that they disliked that
style when it was used with them.
Another study (Wallace & Chen, 2006) examined employees who worked
in an organization’s facilities department (e.g., plumbing; electrical) where
their supervisors varied in their emphasis on safety (a situational safety climate variable) and they varied in conscientiousness (a personality variable).
The dependent measures were the employees’ productivity and their safety
performance. The study found that the impact of safety climate and conscientiousness on productivity and safety performance were mediated by
the employees’ promotion and prevention focus. For example, having a situational safety climate positively related to having a prevention focus and
having a prevention focus positively related to safety performance, whereas
having a situational safety climate negatively related to having a promotion
focus and having a promotion focus negatively related to safety performance.
What this and other studies clearly show is that the promotion–prevention
distinction is applicable to real-world issues in everyday life.

Regulatory Focus Theory

15

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The research by the author and his collaborators that is reported in this essay,
as well as the writing of this essay, was supported by Grant 39429 from the
National Institute of Mental Health to E. Tory Higgins.
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Fugelstad, P., Rothman, A. J., & Jeffery, R. W. (2008). Getting there and hanging on:
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Scholer, A. A., Zou, X., Fujita, K., Stroessner, S. J., & Higgins, E. T. (2010). When
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FURTHER READING
Grant-Halvorson, H., & Higgins, E. T. (2013). Focus: Use different ways of seeing the
world for success and influence. New York, NY: Penguin.
Higgins, E. T. (1997). Beyond pleasure and pain. American Psychologist, 52, 1280–1300.
Higgins, E. T. (2012). Beyond pleasure and pain: How motivation works. New York, NY:
Oxford University Press.
Lee, A. Y., & Higgins, E. T. (2009). The persuasive power of regulatory fit. In M.
Wänke (Ed.), Social psychology of consumer behavior (pp. 319–333). New York, NY:
Psychology Press.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (2011). Promotion and prevention systems: Regulatory
focus dynamics within self-regulatory hierarchies. In K. D. Vohs & R. F. Baumeister (Eds.), Handbook of self-regulation: Research, theory, and applications (2nd ed., pp.
143–161). New York, NY: Guilford.
Scholer, A. A., & Higgins, E. T. (in press). Too much of a good thing? Trade-offs in
promotion and prevention focus. In R. M. Ryan (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of motivation. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

E. TORY HIGGINS SHORT BIOGRAPHY
E. Tory Higgins is the Stanley Schachter Professor of Psychology, Professor of
Business, and Director of the Motivation Science Center at Columbia (where
he also received his PhD in 1973). He is a Fellow of the American Academy of
Arts and Sciences. He is the author of Beyond Pleasure and Pain: How Motivation Works (Oxford, 2012). His research is on the intersection of motivation
and cognition, and his work has been applied to understanding and treating
depression and anxiety disorders. He has received a MERIT Award from the
National Institute of Mental Health, the Thomas M. Ostrom Award in Social
Cognition, the Donald T. Campbell Award for Outstanding Contributions to Social
Psychology (Society of Personality and Social Psychology), and the Lifetime
Contribution Award from the International Society for Self and Identity. He

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

has also received the Distinguished Scientist Award from the Society of Experimental Social Psychology, the William James Fellow Award for Distinguished
Achievements in Psychological Science (from the Association of Psychological
Science), and the American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished
Scientific Contributions. He is also a recipient of Columbia’s Presidential Award
for Outstanding Teaching.
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