On Doing the Decision: Effects of Active versus Passive Choice on Commitment and Self-Perception

Abstract

Two studies demonstrate that making a volunteer decision by doing something results in more commitment to it than making the identical decision by doing nothing. Undergraduates were asked to volunteer for a university committee (Study l a) or a sex and AIDS awareness education project (Study 2) and indicated their choice either by affirming it on two items or by skippping two items that affirmed the opposite choice. Subjects who responded actively were more extreme in the degree of their decision than passive respondents. This effect persevered over 6 weeks (Study lb) and had behavioral consequences (Study 2). Attributional analyses in both studies suggest that active and passive choice may result in unique construals of oneself and of the decision: Active agreement results in citing more types of reasons for one's decision, and active refusal heightens one's perceived resistance to social influence.