Depletion-as-Information: The Role of Feelings in Resource Depletion

The ego depletion model posits that the ability to exert selfcontrol relies on a limited resource of the self (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Muraven, and Tice 1998). Consistent with this model, numerous studies have found that exerting self-control in an initial task reduces ability to control oneself in subsequent tasks (c.f. Hagger, Wood, Stiff, and Chatzisarantis 2010). Nonetheless, recent findings (e.g., Agrawal and Wan 2009; Clarkson, Hirt, Jia, and Alexander 2010) suggest that initial acts of self-control do not always impair subsequent self-control. In fact, self-regulatory failure due to depletion may depend on how people interpret their experience of depletion. Our research builds on these recent findings by proposing that the experience of depletion may act as a source of information that lowers self-control. Hence, effects of depletion on self-control can be enhanced or reduced by altering the extent to which people rely on its experience as a source of information.