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The impact of perspective in visualizing health‐related behaviors: first‐person perspective increases motivation to adopt health‐related behaviors
Author(s) -
Rennie Laura J.,
Harris Peter R.,
Webb Thomas L.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/jasp.12266
Subject(s) - perspective (graphical) , psychology , social psychology , time perspective , perspective taking , third person , first person , health behavior , observer (physics) , visualization , medicine , computer science , empathy , physics , environmental health , quantum mechanics , artificial intelligence , psychoanalysis
Two experiments investigated the effects of perspective and visualization on motivation to engage in health‐related behaviors. Participants visualized themselves donating blood ( E xperiment 1) or quitting smoking ( E xperiment 2) from either the first‐person (own) or third‐person (observer's) perspective. Subsequently, motivation to engage in the visualized behavior was assessed. Contrary to previous findings showing the benefits of taking a third‐person perspective on behaviors not related to health, visualizing using the first‐person perspective had greater effects on motivation than visualizing using the third‐person perspective. Indeed, visualizing using the third‐person perspective was no more effective than not visualizing anything ( E xperiment 2). The theoretical implications and potential applications of these findings are discussed.