Jove
Visualize
Contact Us
JoVE
x logofacebook logolinkedin logoyoutube logo
ABOUT JoVE
OverviewLeadershipBlogJoVE Help Center
AUTHORS
Publishing ProcessEditorial BoardScope & PoliciesPeer ReviewFAQSubmit
LIBRARIANS
TestimonialsSubscriptionsAccessResourcesLibrary Advisory BoardFAQ
RESEARCH
JoVE JournalMethods CollectionsJoVE Encyclopedia of ExperimentsArchive
EDUCATION
JoVE CoreJoVE BusinessJoVE Science EducationJoVE Lab ManualFaculty Resource CenterFaculty Site
Terms & Conditions of Use
Privacy Policy
Policies

Related Experiment Videos

Counterfactual thinking: the temporal order effect.

Clare R Walsh1, Ruth M J Byrne

  • 1Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island 02912, USA. clare_walsh@brown.edu

Memory & Cognition
|August 3, 2004
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Related Concept Videos

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by
Same author

Inference and Imagination.

Topics in cognitive science·2026
Same author

Counterfactual thinking and Aging: the role of executive function.

Neuropsychology, development, and cognition. Section B, Aging, neuropsychology and cognition·2026
Same author

Introduction to Progress and Puzzles of Cognitive Science: Introduction to a Wiley Virtual Issue.

Cognitive science·2024
Same author

How people think about the truth of hypothetical impossibilities.

Memory & cognition·2023
Same author

Human verifications: Computable with truth values outside logic.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·2023
Same author

How people reason with counterfactual and causal explanations for Artificial Intelligence decisions in familiar and unfamiliar domains.

Memory & cognition·2023
Same journal

Music enhances associative generalization: Evidence from a memory integration task.

Memory & cognition·2026
Same journal

Video, text, and memory: An emotional verbal overshadowing effect.

Memory & cognition·2026
Same journal

Limited protective effects of multilingualism against age-related cognitive decline.

Memory & cognition·2026
Same journal

Validation of illustrated texts: Can pictures raise awareness of inconsistencies?

Memory & cognition·2026
Same journal

4I remember (and forget) your happy smiling face: Directed forgetting of emotionally expressive faces of in-group and out-group members.

Memory & cognition·2026
Same journal

Identity in the spotlight: Matching faces without overlapping features.

Memory & cognition·2026
See all related articles

People often imagine different outcomes by undoing recent events. This study shows how describing winning conditions can change how we think about past events, influencing counterfactual thinking.

Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Decision Making
  • Human Behavior

Background:

  • Counterfactual thinking involves mentally simulating alternative pasts.
  • The temporal order effect suggests recent events are more easily undone.
  • Previous research has not fully explored how win conditions influence counterfactuals.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate how descriptions of winning conditions affect counterfactual thinking.
  • To test if win condition framing can alter the temporal order effect.
  • To propose a theory for the cognitive processes behind counterfactuals in this context.

Main Methods:

  • Three experiments were conducted using a card game scenario.
  • Participants were presented with identical game outcomes (both players picked black cards).

Related Experiment Videos

  • Winning conditions were described using varied phrasing (e.g., focusing on red vs. black cards).

    • Main Results:

    • The temporal order effect in counterfactual thinking was found to be malleable.
    • Different descriptions of winning conditions influenced which alternatives participants considered.
    • Framing of win conditions can either produce or reverse the typical temporal order effect.

    Conclusions:

    • The way potential outcomes are described significantly impacts counterfactual thought patterns.
    • Cognitive accessibility of different possibilities plays a key role in counterfactual simulations.
    • Understanding these mental representations is crucial for explaining counterfactual thinking and decision-making biases.