1,278
Views
41
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
REGULAR ARTICLES

When the alternative would have been better: Counterfactual reasoning and the emergence of regret

&
Pages 800-819 | Received 04 Dec 2009, Accepted 12 Aug 2011, Published online: 06 Oct 2011

REFERENCES

  • Amsel , E ., Robbins , M ., Fumarkin , T ., Janit , A ., Foulkes , S ., & Smalley , J. D . 2003 . The card not chosen: The development of judgments of regret in self and others . Unpublished manuscript . Available at http://faculty.weber.edu/eamsel/Research/Papers/card%20not%20chosen.rtf.
  • Amsel , E. and Smalley , J. D. 2000 . “ Beyond really and truly: Children's counterfactual thinking about pretend and possible worlds ” . In Children's reasoning and the mind , Edited by: Mitchell , P. and Riggs , K. J. 121 – 147 . Hove , , UK : Psychology Press .
  • Beck , S. R. and Crilly , M. 2009 . Is understanding regret dependent on developments in counterfactual thinking? . British Journal of Developmental Psychology , 27 : 505 – 510 .
  • Beck , S. R. , Riggs , K. J. and Gorniak , S. L. 2010 . The effect of causal chain length on counterfactual conditional reasoning . British Journal of Developmental Psychology , 28 : 505 – 521 .
  • Beck , S. R. , Robinson , E. J. , Carroll , D. J. and Apperly , I. A. 2006 . Children's thinking about counterfactuals and future hypotheticals as possibilities . Child Development , 77 : 413 – 426 .
  • Camille , N. , Coricelli , G. , Sallet , J. , Pradat-Diehl , P. , Duhamel , J.-R. and Sirigu , A. 2004 . The involvement of the orbitofrontal cortex in the experience of regret . Science , 304 : 1167 – 1170 .
  • Coricelli , G. , Critchley , H. D. , Joffily , M. , O'Doherty , J. P. , Sirigu , A. and Dolan , R. J. 2005 . Regret and its avoidance: A neuroimaging study of choice behaviour . Nature Neuroscience , 8 : 1255 – 1262 .
  • Coricelli , G. , Dolan , R. J. and Sirigu , A. 2007 . Brain, emotion and decision making: The paradigmatic example of regret . Trends in Cognitive Sciences , 11 : 258 – 265 .
  • German , T. P. and Nichols , S. 2003 . Children's counterfactual inferences about long and short causal chains . Developmental Science , 6 : 514 – 523 .
  • Gleicher , F. , Kost , K. A. , Baker , S. M. , Strathman , A. J. , Richman , S. A. and Sherman , S. J. 1990 . The role of counterfactual thinking in judgments of affect . Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin , 16 : 284 – 295 .
  • Guttentag , R. and Ferrell , J. 2004 . Reality compared with its alternatives: Age differences in judgments of regret and relief . Developmental Psychology , 40 : 764 – 775 .
  • Guttentag , R. and Ferrell , J. 2008 . Children's understanding of anticipatory regret and disappointment . Cognition and Emotion , 22 : 815 – 832 .
  • Harris , P. L. , German , T. and Mills , P. 1996 . Children's use of counterfactual thinking in causal reasoning . Cognition , 61 : 233 – 259 .
  • Kahneman , D. and Miller , D. T. 1986 . Norm theory: Comparing reality to its alternatives . Psychological Review , 93 : 136 – 153 .
  • Kahneman , D. and Tversky , A. 1982 . “ The simulation heuristic ” . In Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases , Edited by: Kahneman , D. , Slovic , P. and Tversky , A. 201 – 210 . Cambridge , , UK : Cambridge University Press .
  • Landman , J. 1987 . Regret and elation following action and inaction: Affective responses to positive versus negative outcomes . Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin , 13 : 524 – 536 .
  • Markman , K. D. , Gavanski , I. , Sherman , S. J. and McMullen , M. N. 1993 . The mental simulation of better and worse possible worlds . Journal of Experimental Social Psychology , 29 : 87 – 109 .
  • Müller , U. , Miller , M. R. , Michalczyk , K. and Karapinka , A. 2007 . False belief understanding: The influence of person, grammatical mood, counterfactual reasoning and working memory . British Journal of Developmental Psychology , 25 : 615 – 632 .
  • Nicolle , A. , Bach , D. R. , Driver , J. and Dolan , R. J. 2011 . A role for the striatum in regret-related choice repetition . Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience , 23 : 845 – 856 .
  • Nicolle , A. , Bach , D. R. , Frith , C. and Dolan , R. J. 2011 . Amygdala involvement in self-blame regret . Society for Neuroscience , 6 : 178 – 189 .
  • Nicolle , A. , Fleming , S. M. , Bach , D. R. , Driver , J. and Dolan , R. J. 2011 . A regret-induced status quo bias . The Journal of Neuroscience , 31 : 3320 – 3327 .
  • Perner , J. 2000 . “ About + belief + counterfactual ” . In Children's reasoning and the mind , Edited by: Mitchell , P. and Riggs , K. J. 367 – 401 . Hove , , UK : Psychology Press .
  • Perner , J. and Rafetseder , E. 2011 . “ Counterfactual and other forms of conditional reasoning. Children lost in the nearest possible world ” . In Understanding counterfactuals, understanding causation. Issues in philosophy and psychology , Edited by: Hoerl , C. , McCormack , T. and Beck , S. R. 90 – 110 . Oxford , , UK : Oxford University Press .
  • Perner , J. , Sprung , M. and Steinkogler , B. 2004 . Counterfactual conditionals and false belief: A developmental dissociation . Cognitive Development , 19 : 179 – 201 .
  • Rafetseder , E. , Christi-Vargas , R. and Perner , J. 2010 . Counterfactual reasoning: Developing a sense of “nearest possible world” . Child Development , 81 : 362 – 375 .
  • Rafetseder , E ., & Perner , J . submitted . Counterfactual reasoning: From childhood to adulthood . Developmental Psychology .
  • Riggs , K. J. , Peterson , D. M. , Robinson , E. J. and Mitchell , P. 1998 . Are errors in false belief tasks symptomatic of a broader difficulty with counterfactuality? . Cognitive Development , 13 : 73 – 90 .
  • Roese , N. J. 1997 . Counterfactual thinking . Psychological Bulletin , 121 : 133 – 148 .
  • Schwitalla , M. Ab wann ist kontrafaktisches und semifaktisches Denken möglich? 5–Jährige, 10–Jährige und Erwachsene im Vergleich Unpublished bachelor's thesis University of Salzburg , Austria 2010
  • Weisberg , D. P. and Beck , S. R. 2010 . Children's thinking about their own and others’ regret and relief . Journal of Experimental Child Psychology , 106 : 184 – 191 .
  • Wells , G. L. and Gavanski , I. 1989 . Mental simulation of causality . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 56 : 161 – 169 .
  • Zeelenberg , M. and Van Dijk , E. 2005 . “ On the comparative nature of regret ” . In The psychology of counterfactual thinking , Edited by: Mandel , D. R. , Hilton , D. J. and Catellani , P. 147 – 161 . Oxford , , UK : Routledge .

Reprints and Corporate Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

To request a reprint or corporate permissions for this article, please click on the relevant link below:

Academic Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

Obtain permissions instantly via Rightslink by clicking on the button below:

If you are unable to obtain permissions via Rightslink, please complete and submit this Permissions form. For more information, please visit our Permissions help page.