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. 2006 Aug;32(8):1050-8.
doi: 10.1177/0146167206288282.

Long ago it was meant to be: the interplay between time, construal, and fate beliefs

Jeremy Burrus  1 , Neal J Roese
Affiliations

Long ago it was meant to be: the interplay between time, construal, and fate beliefs

Jeremy Burrus et al. Pers Soc Psychol Bull. 2006 Aug.

Abstract

Fate means that an event was meant to be, that is, predetermined by prior unseen forces. Most people believe in fate, which seems at odds with similarly pervasive beliefs that alternative past actions would have brought about different circumstances (i.e., counterfactual beliefs). Two experiments revealed that construal level accounts for the relative plausibility of fate versus counterfactual explanations. Construal was manipulated in Experiment 1, such that goal pursuits framed in abstract ("why?") as opposed to concrete ("how?") terms heightened fate but not counterfactual attributions. Extending this finding, Experiment 2 showed that fate judgments were higher for temporally distant than recent past events, an effect mediated by construal perceptions. Neither counterfactual nor luck judgments varied with temporal distance. These findings help to explain how individuals explain complicated yet meaningful life events while extending the reach of Trope and Liberman's (2003) construal-level theory.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Attributions to fate and counterfactual possibility as a function of construal-level manipulation (Experiment 1).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Attributions to fate, luck, and counterfactual possibility as a function of temporal focus manipulation (Experiment 2).
Figure 3
Figure 3
Mediation of temporal focus and fate attribution by construal level (Experiment 2). NOTE: Numbers represent standardized βs. The number in parentheses represents the standardized β holding constant the proposed mediator. *p < .05.
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