MISSED OPPORTUNITIES - PSYCHOLOGICAL RAMIFICATIONS OF COUNTERFACTUAL THOUGHT IN MIDLIFE WOMEN

Counterfactual thinking entails the process of imagining alternatives to reality-what might have been. The present study examines the freque ncy, content, and emotional and cognitive concomitants of counterfactu al thinking about past missed opportunities in midlife women. At age 4 3, nearly two-thirds of the sample of educated adult women reported ha ving missed certain opportunities at some time in their lives. Most of the counterfactual thoughts concerned missed opportunities for greate r challenge in work. Emotional distress at age 33 did not predict late r counterfactual thought. Instead, counterfactual thinking at age 43 w as associated with concurrent emotional distress. However, acknowledgi ng counterfactual thinking about the past was also associated with env isioning ways to change things for the better in the future. This sugg ests the possibility that the negative appraisal often entailed in cou nterfactual thinking may be associated with emotional distress in the short run but with motivational benefits in the long run, at least for middle-aged women.