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Virtual Hand with Ambiguous Movement between the Self and Other Origin: Sense of Ownership and 'Other-Produced' Agency
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Mental Time Travel as Self-Affirmation.

Elena Stephan1, Constantine Sedikides2

  • 1Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.

Personality and Social Psychology Review : an Official Journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc
|October 25, 2023
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Mentally traveling to the future or past highlights positive self-aspects, bolstering self-integrity. This mental time travel enhances self-esteem, coherence, and control, aiding coping and behavior change.

Keywords:
mental time travelnostalgiaprospectionretrospectionself-affirmationself-prospection

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Area of Science:

  • Psychology
  • Cognitive Science
  • Social Psychology

Background:

  • Mental time travel, encompassing prospection and retrospection, plays a crucial role in self-perception.
  • Existing research highlights the impact of future and past self-imagination on psychological well-being.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To integrate and advance research on mental time travel's role in self-affirmation.
  • To explore how prospection and retrospection bolster self-integrity and self-esteem.

Main Methods:

  • Review of existing research programs on self-prospection and nostalgia.
  • Conceptual integration of findings on mental time travel and self-affirmation.

Main Results:

  • Imagining the self in the future or past highlights central and positive self-aspects.
  • Mental time travel broadens perceived self-integrity and provides a route to self-affirmation.
  • This process enhances self-esteem, coherence, and perceived control.

Conclusions:

  • Mental time travel serves as a significant source of self-affirmation.
  • It can be leveraged to facilitate coping and behavior change in various life domains.
  • Applications include relationships, health, education, and organizational contexts.