Compensatory Control: Achieving Order Through the Mind, Our Institutions, and the Heavens
Abstract
We propose that people protect the belief in a controlled, nonrandom world by imbuing their social, physical, and metaphysical environments with order and structure when their sense of personal control is threatened. We demonstrate that when personal control is threatened, people can preserve a sense of order by (a) perceiving patterns in noise or adhering to superstitions and conspiracies, (b) defending the legitimacy of the sociopolitical institutions that offer control, or (c) believing in an interventionist God. We also present evidence that these processes of compensatory control help people cope with the anxiety and discomfort that lacking personal control fuels, that it is lack of personal control specifically and not general threat or negativity that drives these processes, and that these various forms of compensatory control are ultimately substitutable for one another. Our model of compensatory control offers insight into a wide variety of phenomena, from prejudice to the idiosyncratic rituals of professional athletes to societal rituals around weddings, graduations, and funerals.
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Self-Regulation Facilitates Meaning in Life
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- Authors
- Kay, A. C., Whitson, J. A., Gaucher, D., & Galinsky, A. D.
- Affiliations
- University of Waterloo (CA)
- The University of Texas at Austin (US)
- Northwestern University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Kay, Aaron C.
- Venue
- Current Directions in Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2009-10
- Volume
- 18
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 264-268
- ISSN
- 0963-7214 (ISSN-L)
- 1467-8721
- OpenAlex
- W2153864281
- Semantic Scholar
- 47620e096cbb1181fa8ec2d0f7379e68622616b4
- Cited by
- 598
- References
- 22
- Citations by year
- 2026: 68 · 2025: 55 · 2024: 50 · 2023: 46 · 2022: 44 · 2021: 52 · 2020: 42 · 2019: 32 · 2018: 33 · 2017: 24 · 2016: 28 · 2015: 31 · 2014: 28 · 2013: 25 · 2012: 19
- FWCI
- 14.19
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Current Directions in Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Paranormal Experiences and Beliefs
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Free Will and Agency
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Keywords
- compensatory control, personal control, pattern perception, superstition, conspiracy beliefs, institutional legitimacy, anxiety, threats, coping, prejudice, ritual
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
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