phenomenon · claim-type · cross-domain-transfer · mechanism · claim-relation · replication-status · limitation — grounded in the full text| phenomenon | nonconscious goal pursuit— “Our argument is that goals can be triggered outside of awareness and then run to completion, attaining desired outcomes ( Bargh, 1990 ; Bargh & Chartrand, 1999 ; Bargh & Gollwitzer, 1994 ).” | |
| claim-type | existence— “Taken together, the results of the five experiments support the proposal that behavioral goals can become activated without any consciously made choice required.” | |
| method — evidence | — “Five experiments are reported in which the goal either to perform well or to cooperate was activated, without the awareness of participants, through a priming manipulation.” | |
| mechanism | Repeated, consistent pursuit of a goal in a given situation forms an automatic situation-to-goal association, so situational cues alone later activate the goal without conscious choice.— “In other words, over time the goal representation will develop an automatic association with the features of those situations in which that goal has been repeatedly and consistently chosen and pursued in the past.” | mechanisms[0] |
| mechanism | An activated but unfulfilled goal-directed action tendency accumulates strength over time (unlike perceptual activation, which decays), which is why the behavioural priming effect grows with delay.— “Until the goal is acted on, however, the action tendency is posited to increase in strength over time, thus pressing for realization.” | mechanisms[1] |
| replicates | Ovsiankina (1928)— “This finding replicates the classic finding of Ovsiankina (1928) in the case of conscious goal pursuit.” | claim_relations[0] |
| builds-on | J. A. Bargh, 1990— “It is proposed that goals can be activated outside of awareness and then operate nonconsciously to guide self-regulation effectively (J. A. Bargh, 1990 ).” | claim_relations[1] |
| builds-on | Atkinson and Birch (1970)— “According to Atkinson and Birch’s (1970) “dynamic theory of action,” goal-directed action tendencies consume their strength to the degree they are acted on, reaching their lowest level of activation immediately after the goal is attained.” | claim_relations[2] |
| sense | nonconscious goal pursuit - the claim in one sentence, and note how much is packed into it: goals can be ACTIVATED OUTSIDE OF AWARENESS, then OPERATE nonconsciously, and do so EFFECTIVELY - guiding self-regulation rather than merely biasing a judgement. Three separate assertions (activation without awareness, autonomous operation, functional success), any of which could fail while the others held— “It is proposed that goals can be activated outside of awareness and then operate nonconsciously to guide self-regulation effectively (J. A. Bargh, 1990 ). Five experiments are reported in which the goal either to perform well or to cooperate was activated, without the awareness of participants, through a priming manipulation” | senses[0] |
| sense | goal versus construct - THE DISAMBIGUATION THIS CORPUS NEEDS AND RARELY GETS. A prime made of `win, compete, succeed, strive` could have activated a construct that changes how the situation is CONSTRUED, or a goal that DRIVES behaviour. The paper separates them by time course and states the falsifier first: NO model of construal effects predicts an increase over time, so the same prime is required to produce a decreasing perceptual effect and an increasing behavioural one. A crossover, not a difference in size— “No model of priming or accessibility effects on perception or construal predicts an increase in effect over time ( Bargh, 1994 ; Higgins, 1989 , 1996 ; Wyer & Srull, 1989 ). The dissociation we predicted, if goal-priming effects are not mediated by perceptual construal, is straightforward. The effects of the same priming manipulation… | senses[1] |
| sense | DEFINITION BY DIAGNOSTIC SIGNATURE - goal pursuit is identified by CONTENT-FREE features (vigour, persistence against obstacles, resumption after disruption) taken from the study of consciously held goals. Because the criteria are content-free they can be applied to a goal the participant cannot report, which is the only reason the nonconscious version is testable at all. The definition is doing methodological work, not just fixing a meaning— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | senses[2] |
| sense | the control is built into the definition: participants are given ONE AND THE SAME TASK with the goal activated for some and not others, so that `we were able to hold the content of the task goal constant across all participants` and let the content-free features be the only thing that varies. Borrowing a content-free definition and then holding content constant is the same decision made twice, at the level of theory and of design— “we were able to hold the content of the task goal constant across all participants so that we could examine the content-free features of nonconscious goal pursuit and be able to compare these to the known content-free features of conscious goal pursuit” | senses[3] |
| control | Experiment 3 used a DISSOCIATION PARADIGM specifically to test the perceptual-construal account — held — rules out that the prime changed how the situation was PERCEIVED rather than activating a goal - the leading alternative explanation for behavioural priming— “Experiment 3 used a dissociation paradigm to rule out perceptual-construal alternative explanations.” | controls[0] |
| control | a control group was subliminally exposed to words UNRELATED to impression formation — held — rules out that the effect comes from subliminal exposure as such rather than from the content of the primed words— “Instead, one group had been previously primed (subliminally) with words related to impression formation, and a control group was subliminally exposed to words unrelated to impression formation.” | controls[1] |
| control | extensive questioning during debriefing looked for any sign that participants were aware of the priming manipulation's effect — held — rules out that the effect is conscious compliance rather than nonconscious activation— “In both experiments, extensive questioning of the participants during debriefing revealed no signs of conscious awareness of the effect that the priming manipulation might have had on the subsequent task.” | controls[2] |
| audit | goal pursuit —operationalised-as→ content-free features — Audit 2026-09-28: DOUBTFUL - read against its full span and kept, but goal pursuit is 'CHARACTERIZED BY' content-free features; operationalised-as is loose.— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[0] |
| note | goal pursuit —operationalised-as→ content-free features — The definitional move the whole paper rests on. Confidence 0.95: the sentence is a characterisation of goal pursuit, cited to Lewin, Heckhausen and Wicklund & Gollwitzer, not an inference of mine.— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[0] |
| weight | goal pursuit —operationalised-as→ content-free features — 0.95— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[0] |
| note | persistence —part-of→ content-free features — Listed as one of the three, in the sentence that names the category.— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[1] |
| weight | persistence —part-of→ content-free features — 0.95— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[1] |
| note | resumption —part-of→ content-free features — The second of the three tested directly - Experiment 5, resumption after a lengthy disruption with a more attractive alternative available.— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[2] |
| weight | resumption —part-of→ content-free features — 0.95— “Goal pursuit (i.e., striving for the desired outcome), however, is also characterized by content-free features, such as vigorous acting toward goal attainment, persistence in the face of obstacles, and resumption after disruption” | concept_edges[2] |
| differs in | goal-directed action tendencies —distinct-from→ perceptual construal — WHAT DELAY DOES TO THEM - construal effects DECREASE over time, goal-directed action tendencies INCREASE. A crossover on the same manipulation, and the increase is the half no accessibility or construal model predicts, which is what makes it a falsifier rather than a comparison— “No model of priming or accessibility effects on perception or construal predicts an increase in effect over time ( Bargh, 1994 ; Higgins, 1989 , 1996 ; Wyer & Srull, 1989 ). The dissociation we predicted, if goal-priming effects are not mediated by perceptual construal, is straightforward. The effects of the same priming manipulation…— “No model of priming or accessibility effects on perception or construal predicts an increase in effect over time” | concept_edges[3] |
| note | goal-directed action tendencies —distinct-from→ perceptual construal — THE SHARPEST ROW ON THIS RECORD. Two kinds of priming effect told apart by their TIME COURSE - the second record tonight where identity turns on latency rather than on magnitude (see Chen2018). The prediction is stated before the experiment and names the result that would refute it.— “No model of priming or accessibility effects on perception or construal predicts an increase in effect over time ( Bargh, 1994 ; Higgins, 1989 , 1996 ; Wyer & Srull, 1989 ). The dissociation we predicted, if goal-priming effects are not mediated by perceptual construal, is straightforward. The effects of the same priming manipulation… | concept_edges[3] |
| weight | goal-directed action tendencies —distinct-from→ perceptual construal — 0.95— “No model of priming or accessibility effects on perception or construal predicts an increase in effect over time ( Bargh, 1994 ; Higgins, 1989 , 1996 ; Wyer & Srull, 1989 ). The dissociation we predicted, if goal-priming effects are not mediated by perceptual construal, is straightforward. The effects of the same priming manipulation… | concept_edges[3] |
| outcome (stated by the tagger, no quotation) | control — held | controls[0] |
| outcome (stated by the tagger, no quotation) | control — held | controls[1] |
| outcome (stated by the tagger, no quotation) | control — held | controls[2] |
| replication | untested | |
| limitation | The intention-behaviour correlations rest on small per-cell samples.— “Because the number of participants on which these correlations are based is somewhat small, these results should be interpreted with caution.” | limitations[0] |
| limitation | Retrospective self-report is a weak index of what participants were actually aware of during the task.— “Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged that any such memory-based self-report measure of prior conscious states is not the most sensitive or powerful measure of actual awareness during the experimental tasks ( Ericsson & Simon, 1980 ).” | limitations[1] |
| limitation | The intention questionnaire may not have been sensitive enough to detect real differences in cooperation motivation.— “However, the lack of a difference between those participants explicitly instructed to cooperate (i.e., the conscious-goal condition) and those not given such instructions raises the issue of whether the intention questionnaire was sufficiently sensitive to capture actual differences in the motivation to cooperate during the task.” | limitations[2] |
finding · quantity · variable · definition · key-term — grounded in the full text| finding | Participants primed with high-performance words found more words on unrelated word-search puzzles than participants primed with neutral words.— “High-performance-goal primed participants found a mean of 26.0 words, compared with a mean of 21.5 words for participants in the neutral priming condition.” | content_tags.findings[0] |
| finding | Priming the goal of cooperation increased the number of fish returned to the common pool, as did an explicit conscious cooperation goal.— “It revealed a main effect for priming, F (1, 56) = 3.93, p = .05, as well as a main effect for conscious goal, F (1, 56) = 5.99, p < .02.” | content_tags.findings[1] |
| finding | The goal-priming effect did not depend on a concurrent conscious goal in the same direction, ruling out the 'piggybacking' account.— “Moreover, in line with our hypothesis that nonconscious-goal activation does not require the preexistence of a conscious goal in the same direction (the piggybacking issue), participants in the no-conscious-goal condition showed the same increase in cooperation due to goal priming as did participants in the conscious-goal condition.” | content_tags.findings[2] |
| finding | A five-minute delay after the identical prime weakened the impression-formation (perceptual) effect but strengthened the task-performance (motivational) effect, a crossover dissociation.— “Most importantly for the present hypotheses, however, primed participants’ achievement-related impressions of the target person became less extreme over time, t (57) = 1.83, p < .04, whereas the performance of primed participants on the word-search task increased over time, t (91) = 2.50, p < .01.” | content_tags.findings[3] |
| finding | Performance-goal primed participants were far more likely than neutral-primed participants to keep working after an explicit instruction to stop, showing persistence against an obstacle.— “A substantially greater proportion of participants in the high-performance–goal priming condition (57%) than in the neutral priming condition (22%) continued to work on the task after the stop signal was given.” | content_tags.findings[4] |
| finding | After an interruption, a far larger share of performance-goal primed participants (66% against 32%) chose to resume the interrupted Scrabble task.— “As predicted, a considerably higher proportion of high-performance–goal primed participants (66%) chose to continue working on die… | content_tags.findings[5] |
| finding | The self-reported intentions of participants with a nonconscious cooperation goal were unrelated to their actual cooperation, although priming did change their behaviour. | content_tags.findings[6] |
| quantity | 26.0 vs. 21.5 — mean number of hidden words found by performance-primed versus neutral-primed participants in Experiment 1 | content_tags.quantities[0] |
| quantity | 57% / 22% — proportion of participants who kept working after the stop signal, performance-primed versus neutral-primed (Experiment 4) | content_tags.quantities[1] |
| quantity | 66% / 32% — proportion who resumed the interrupted Scrabble task rather than switching to the cartoon task, primed versus unprimed (Experiment 5) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[2] |
| quantity | F (1, 74) = 9.64, p = .003 — the reliable main effect of the performance prime on number of words found in Experiment 1 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[3] |
| quantity | 78 — number of participants in Experiment 1 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[4] |
| quantity | 288 — number of participants in the four-factor dissociation study, Experiment 3 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[5] |
| quantity | r = −.11 — the (small, negative) correlation between self-reported intention to cooperate and actual cooperation among participants without a conscious cooperation goal Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.quantities[6] |
| variable | priming condition (independent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[0] |
| variable | number of words (dependent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[1] |
| variable | postpriming delay (moderator) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[3] |
| variable | participant gender (control) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[5] |
| variable | choice of task (dependent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[6] |
| variable | conscious goal (independent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[7] |
| variable | number of fish returned (independent) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.variables[8] |
| definition | automatic goal pursuit Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.definitions[0] |
| definition | content-free features Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.definitions[1] |
| definition | continuing on the task Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.definitions[2] |
| concept | goal pursuit — not defined in this paper's own words; the thing claimed to run without awareness - and it is identified by CONTENT-FREE FEATURES rather than by what is being pursued, which is what makes the claim testable on a goal the person does not know they hold Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[0] |
| concept | content-free features — not defined in this paper's own words; the diagnostic signature, borrowed wholesale from the study of CONSCIOUS goals: vigour, persistence against obstacles, resumption after disruption. Properties that say nothing about the goal's content, so they transfer to a goal the participant cannot report Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[1] |
| concept | persistence — not defined in this paper's own words; one of the two features tested directly - continuing at a task in the face of a clear obstacle to attainment. An operationalisation of goal-ness, not of effort Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[2] |
| concept | resumption — not defined in this paper's own words; the other - going back to an interrupted task when an intrinsically more attractive alternative is available. The classic Lewinian signature of a goal that is still live Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[3] |
| concept | perceptual construal — not defined in this paper's own words; the rival explanation the design exists to eliminate: that the prime changed how the situation was INTERPRETED rather than installing a goal. Same manipulation, different claim, and only the time course tells them apart Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[4] |
| concept | goal-directed action tendencies — not defined in this paper's own words; the dependent variable that is supposed to STRENGTHEN with delay - the half of the crossover that no construal model predicts, which is exactly why it was chosen Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | concepts[5] |
| ANOVA F | as written: analysis of variance (ANOVA) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[0] |
| p-value p | as written: F (1, 74) = 9.64, p = .003 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[1] |
| interaction effect F | as written: Prime × Delay × Task interaction Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[2] |
| t-test t | as written: t (18) = 2.32, p < .04 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[3] |
| Cronbach's alpha α | as written: Cronbach’s α = .74 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[4] |
| correlation r | as written: within-cell correlations between these two measures Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[5] |
| standardization (z scores) z | as written: standardized (using z scores) Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[6] |
| mean M | as written: M = 2.5 Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher. | content_tags.statistics[7] |
When we have changed our mind. Some entries in the table begin with a word in capitals and the reason for it. EVIDENCE CORRECTED — the finding still stands, but we had quoted the wrong sentence from the paper, and the quotation has been replaced with the right one. RETRACTED — the entry itself was wrong; it stays on the page, marked, with the reason, rather than being deleted. WITHDRAWN AND REPLACED — the entry was wrong, and a corrected version of it appears in the entries below. Each mark carries its own reason, in brackets, because the reasons differ from one entry to the next. An entry we have WITHDRAWN is removed from this page and kept in the record, with its reason. A line reading Audit and a date is a later re-reading of the entry against its whole sentence: DOUBTFUL means it was kept, and the reason says what is loose about it. Quotation marks inside the tagger's sentence. Where a tag is the tagger's own sentence, a phrase in quotation marks inside it is borrowed from the paper — the tagger's wording around it is not. The paper's own sentence is the evidence quote for that row; on this page it is withheld with the article, and the article is at its publisher. Nothing inside quotation marks anywhere on this page is ours: if it is quoted, it is the paper's. Whose words a concept carries. A concept entry records a term the paper itself uses, so the term, the sense given for it, and its evidence are the paper's own words, quoted where the paper fixes them. This is the opposite of a sense entry in the tag table, which is the tagger's sentence about how the paper uses a term. Where a concept entry could not be grounded in the paper's words, the entry says so on its own row.
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