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Cognition and Emotion Volume 26, 2012 - Issue 5
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When the alternative would have been better: Counterfactual reasoning and the emergence of regret

Eva Rafetseder Department of Psychology, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria
&
Josef Perner Department of Psychology, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria; Centre for Neurocognitive Research, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, AustriaCorrespondence[email protected]
Pages 800-819 | Received 04 Dec 2009, Accepted 12 Aug 2011, Published online: 06 Oct 2011

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Alicia K. Jones, Shalini Gautam & Jonathan Redshaw. (2024) Young children experience both regret and relief in a gain-or-loss context. Cognition and Emotion 38:1, pages 163-170.
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Marta Stragà, Angela Faiella, Ingrid Santini & Donatella Ferrante. (2023) “The game would have been better for me if…”: children’s counterfactual thinking about their own performance in a game. Thinking & Reasoning 29:4, pages 663-697.
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Teresa McCormack & Aidan Feeney. (2015) The development of the experience and anticipation of regret. Cognition and Emotion 29:2, pages 266-280.
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Anna C. K. Van Duijvenvoorde, Hilde M. Huizenga & Brenda R. J. Jansen. (2014) What is and what could have been: Experiencing regret and relief across childhood. Cognition and Emotion 28:5, pages 926-935.
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Articles from other publishers (37)

Lily FitzGibbon, Caroline Putt, Aidan Feeney, Teresa McCormack & Sarah Ruth Beck. (2024) Experience of regret is unaffected by concurrent working memory load. Routledge Open Research 3, pages 3.
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Claudia González-Márquez. (2023) Neuromodulation and memory: exploring ethical ramifications in memory modification treatment via implantable neurotechnologies. Frontiers in Psychology 14.
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Alyson Wong, Sara Cordes, Paul L. Harris & Nadia Chernyak. (2023) Being nice by choice: The effect of counterfactual reasoning on children's social evaluations. Developmental Science 26:6.
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Zan Liu, Ye Hong & Yanjie Su. (2022) “I am regretful but I would not change my decision”: the dissociation between emotional regret and behavioural regret in children. Current Psychology 42:30, pages 26006-26015.
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Angela Nyhout, Hilary Sweatman & Patricia A. Ganea. (2023) Children's hypothetical reasoning about complex and dynamic systems. Child Development 94:5, pages 1340-1355.
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Shalini Gautam, Thomas Suddendorf & Jonathan Redshaw. (2022) Counterfactual thinking elicits emotional change in young children. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 377:1866.
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Monika Dunin-Kozicka & Arkadiusz Gut. (2022) Pretense: the context of possibilities. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 21:5, pages 1107-1130.
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Matthew Johnston, Teresa McCormack, Agnieszka J. Graham, Sara Lorimer, Sarah R. Beck, Christoph Hoerl & Aidan Feeney. (2022) Children’s understanding of counterfactual and temporal relief in others. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 223, pages 105491.
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Bethany Corbett, Aidan Feeney & Teresa McCormack. (2021) Interpersonal regret and prosocial risk taking in children. Cognitive Development 58, pages 101036.
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Rossella Guerini, Lily FitzGibbon & Giorgio Coricelli. (2020) The role of agency in regret and relief in 3- to 10-year-old children. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 179, pages 797-806.
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Teresa McCormack, Aidan Feeney & Sarah R. Beck. (2020) Regret and Decision-Making: A Developmental Perspective. Current Directions in Psychological Science 29:4, pages 346-350.
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Angela Nyhout & Patricia A. Ganea. (2020) What is and what never should have been: Children’s causal and counterfactual judgments about the same events. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 192, pages 104773.
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Brian Uprichard & Teresa McCormack. (2018) Becoming Kinder: Prosocial Choice and the Development of Interpersonal Regret. Child Development 90:4.
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Angela Nyhout, Lena Henke & Patricia A. Ganea. (2017) Children's Counterfactual Reasoning About Causally Overdetermined Events. Child Development 90:2, pages 610-622.
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Teresa McCormack, Eimear O'Connor, Jessica Cherry, Sarah R. Beck & Aidan Feeney. (2019) Experiencing regret about a choice helps children learn to delay gratification. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 179, pages 162-175.
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Jo Black, Mahsa Barzy, David Williams & Heather Ferguson. (2018) Intact counterfactual emotion processing in autism spectrum disorder: Evidence from eye‐tracking. Autism Research 12:3, pages 422-444.
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Daniel P. Keating, Michael I. Demidenko & Dominic Kelly. 2019. Reference Module in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Psychology. Reference Module in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Psychology.
S. L. Bosacki. 2016. Social Cognition in Middle Childhood and Adolescence. Social Cognition in Middle Childhood and Adolescence 82 108 .
Kristin Hansen Lagattuta, Noel M. Elrod & Hannah J. Kramer. (2016) How do thoughts, emotions, and decisions align? A new way to examine theory of mind during middle childhood and beyond. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 149, pages 116-133.
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Teresa McCormack, Eimear O’Connor, Sarah Beck & Aidan Feeney. (2016) The development of regret and relief about the outcomes of risky decisions. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 148, pages 1-19.
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Nicole R. Guajardo, Lena F. McNally & Amanda Wright. (2016) Children’s spontaneous counterfactuals: The roles of valence, expectancy, and cognitive flexibility. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 146, pages 79-94.
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Kai Epstude, Annika Scholl & Neal J. Roese. (2016) Prefactual Thoughts: Mental Simulations about What Might Happen. Review of General Psychology 20:1, pages 48-56.
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Eugenia Kulakova & Mante S. Nieuwland. (2016) Understanding Counterfactuality: A Review of Experimental Evidence for the Dual Meaning of Counterfactuals. Language and Linguistics Compass 10:2, pages 49-65.
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Sarah R. Beck. (2015) Why What Is Counterfactual Really Matters: A Response to Weisberg and Gopnik (). Cognitive Science 40:1, pages 253-256.
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Marianne Habib & Mathieu Cassotti. (2015) Le temps des regrets : comment le développement du regret influence-t-il la prise de décision à risque des enfants et des adolescents ?. L’Année psychologique 115:04, pages 637-664.
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Marianne Habib & Mathieu Cassotti. (2015) Le temps des regrets : comment le développement du regret influence-t-il la prise de décision à risque des enfants et des adolescents ?. L’Année psychologique Vol. 115:4, pages 637-664.
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Eimear O’Connor, Teresa McCormack, Sarah R. Beck & Aidan Feeney. (2015) Regret and adaptive decision making in young children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 135, pages 86-92.
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Marianne Habib, Grégoire Borst, Nicolas Poirel, Olivier Houdé, Sylvain Moutier & Mathieu Cassotti. (2013) Socio‐Emotional Context and Adolescents' Decision Making: The Experience of Regret and Relief After Social Comparison. Journal of Research on Adolescence 25:1, pages 81-91.
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Eric Amsel & David Moshman. 2015. International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences. International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences 306 312 .
Eimear O'Connor, Teresa McCormack & Aidan Feeney. (2014) Do Children Who Experience Regret Make Better Decisions? A Developmental Study of the Behavioral Consequences of Regret. Child Development 85:5, pages 1995-2010.
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Sarah R. Beck & Kevin J. Riggs. (2014) Developing Thoughts About What Might Have Been. Child Development Perspectives 8:3, pages 175-179.
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Sarah R. Beck, Daniel P. Weisberg, Patrick Burns & Kevin J. Riggs. (2013) Conditional Reasoning and Emotional Experience: A Review of the Development of Counterfactual Thinking. Studia Logica 102:4, pages 673-689.
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Eva Rafetseder & Josef Perner. (2014) Counterfactual Reasoning: Sharpening Conceptual Distinctions in Developmental Studies. Child Development Perspectives 8:1, pages 54-58.
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Chris D. Frith. (2014) Action, agency and responsibility. Neuropsychologia 55, pages 137-142.
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Chris Frith. (2013) The psychology of volition. Experimental Brain Research 229:3, pages 289-299.
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Eva Rafetseder, Maria Schwitalla & Josef Perner. (2013) Counterfactual reasoning: From childhood to adulthood. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 114:3, pages 389-404.
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M. Habib, M. Cassotti, G. Borst, G. Simon, A. Pineau, O. Houdé & S. Moutier. (2012) Counterfactually mediated emotions: A developmental study of regret and relief in a probabilistic gambling task. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology 112:2, pages 265-274.
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