THE INFLUENCE OF COMPETING INTENTIONS ON THE EFFICIENCY OF THE CURRENT ACTIVITY

According to the Rubicon theory of action phases, the efficiency of ac tual activities decreases, if a strong competing goal intention and an opportunity to initiate corresponding activities occur. The degree of this decrease, however, should depend on the difficulty of the curren t activity. In the case of difficult activities, the theory predicts a n increase of volitional strength for the current goal intention. This should both increase effort and reduce or eliminate the impairment of efficiency. Our experimental results confirmed this prediction. In Ex periment I, the efficiency of a word choosing task was reduced by a co mpeting goal intention, only if the task difficulty was low. In the mo re difficult condition, a competing goal intention and a corresponding favorable opportunity did not lead to a significant impairment of tas k efficiency. Experiment II showed that these findings cannot be expla ined only by higher attentional demands of the material presented as a n opportunity for initiation of the competing goal intention. The resu lts are interpreted as evidence for the volitional protection of curre nt goal intentions in case of difficulty.