Letters to Our Future Selves? Failed High-Powered Replication Attempts Question Effects on Future Orientation, Delinquent Decisions, and Risky Investments

Letters to Our Future Selves? High-Powered Replication Attempts Question Effects on Future Orientation, Delinquent Decisions, and Risky Investments. Laura Quinten, Anja Murmann, Hanna Genau, Rafaela Warkentin, Rainer Banse. Social Cognition, July 2020. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343188765

Abstract: Enhancing people’s future orientation, in particular continuity with their future selves, has been proposed as promising to mitigate self-control-related problem behavior. In two pre-registered, direct replication studies, we tested a subtle manipulation, i.e., writing a letter to one’s future self, in order to reduce delinquent decisions (van Gelder et al., 2013, Study 1) and risky investments (Monroe et al., 2017, Study 1). With samples of N = 314 and N = 463, i.e., 2.5 times the original studies’ sample sizes, the results suggested that the expected effects are either non-existent or smaller than originally reported, and/or dependent on factors not examined. Vividness of the future self was successfully manipulated in Study 2, but manipulation checks overall indicated that the letter task is rather not reliable to alter future orientation. We discuss ideas to integrate self-affirmation approaches, and to test less subtle manipulations in samples with substantial, myopia-related self-control deficits.