Let me take the wheel: Illusory control and sense of agency
Authors
Tobias-Webb, Juliette
Limbrick-Oldfield, EH
Gillan, CM
Moore, JW
Aitken, MRF
Clark, L
Publication Date
2017Journal Title
The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology
ISSN
1747-0218
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Volume
70
Issue
8
Pages
1732-1746
Language
English
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Tobias-Webb, J., Limbrick-Oldfield, E., Gillan, C., Moore, J., Aitken, M., & Clark, L. (2017). Let me take the wheel: Illusory control and sense of agency. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 70 (8), 1732-1746. https://doi.org/10.1080/17470218.2016.1206128
Abstract
Illusory control refers to an effect in games of chance where features associated with skilful situations increase expectancies of success. Past work has operationalized illusory control in terms of subjective ratings or behaviour, with limited consideration of the relationship between these definitions, or the broader construct of agency. This study used a novel card-guessing task in 78 participants to investigate the relationship between subjective and behavioural illusory control. We compared trials in which participants (a) had no opportunity to exercise illusory control, (b) could exercise illusory control for free, or (c) could pay to exercise illusory control. Contingency Judgment and Intentional Binding tasks assessed explicit and implicit sense of agency, respectively. On the card-guessing task, confidence was higher when participants exerted control than in the baseline condition. In a complementary model, participants were more likely to exercise control when their confidence was high, and this effect was accentuated in the pay condition relative to the free condition. Decisions to pay were positively correlated with control ratings on the Contingency Judgment task, but were not significantly related to Intentional Binding. These results establish an association between subjective and behavioural illusory control and locate the construct within the cognitive literature on agency.
Keywords
agency, cognitive distortions, contingency judgment, gambling, illusion of control, intentional binding
Relationships
Is supplemented by: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.516
Sponsorship
J.T.W. is funded by a Cambridge Australia Poynton Scholarship.
L.C., E.L.O. and M.R.F.A. were funded by a Medical Research
Council [grant number G1100554/1]. C.M.G. is funded by a Sir
Henry Welcome Postdoctoral Fellowship [grant number 101521/
Z/12/Z].
Funder references
MRC (G1100554)
Embargo Lift Date
2100-01-01
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17470218.2016.1206128
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/263472
Rights
Attribution 4.0 International, Attribution 4.0 International, Attribution 4.0 International, Attribution 4.0 International