Self-Regulation, Choice, and Ego Depletion

ABOUT THE  SPEAKER

Roy Baumeister is Francis Eppes Eminent Scholar and Professor of Psychology at Florida State University and Professor of Psychology at the University of Queensland. He is the New York Times bestselling author of Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength (Penguin Press, 2011; coauthored with John Tierney).

Professor Baumeister has over 400 publications, with the titles of his monographs reflecting his interest in the "big" questions that humans face; he is the author of Identity: Cultural Change and the Struggle for Self (Oxford UP, 1986), Meanings of Life (Guilford Press, 1991), Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty (W. H. Freeman, 1997), The Cultural Animal: Human Nature, Meaning, and Social Life (Oxford UP, 2005), and Is There Anything Good about Men? (Oxford UP, 2010).

In 2013, Professor Baumeister received the highest award given by the Association for Psychological Science, the William James Fellow award, in recognition of his lifetime achievements.

To learn more about Roy Baumeister, please see http://www.roybaumeister.com/

LECTURE ABSTRACT

Just when we thought we had worked out the main outlines of self-regulation theory, several new findings have emerged to challenge that picture. This talk presents results from laboratory, longitudinal, and meta-analytic studies. High self-control may specialize less in resisting temptation than in avoiding it. Self-control is often highly effective but does grow weaker (ego depletion) as the day wears on. Ego depletion intensifies subjective desires and feelings, rather than just weakening powers of restraint. Similarity in trait self-control is not the best predictor of relationship satisfaction. Powerful leaders self-regulate task performance in unusual ways, sometimes performing better but sometimes worse than subordinates.