How to Think, Say, or Do Precisely the Worst Thing for Any Occasion

Abstract

Did I Really Do That? Most of us believe that our daily actions occur because we exert conscious effort to make them happen; nevertheless, we sometimes seem to end up doing the precise thing we had hoped to avoid. Wegner (p. 48 ) reviews the recent psychological research on ironic processes. The findings support the view that the unwanted outcomes are held in working memory and that the monitoring centers that usually ensure correct behavior can be distracted or exhausted, allowing the taboo idea to escape.