| Just as we feel will for our physical actions, we also feel will over mental actions such as generating ideas or solving problems. And just as in physical agency, mental agency is indicated by a period of preparation before the idea occurs. If present, effort cues may mislead a person to inflate feelings of personal responsibility, and to over-claim authorship for mental actions. In three studies I examined how effort cues can result in inadvertent plagiarism. Partners took turns solving anagrams presented on a computer monitor. A memory task was given at the end regarding who was responsible for solving each anagram. I hypothesized that people would plagiarize more of their partners' anagrams when they experienced an effort pattern that resembled true authorship, i.e., high effort during the problem phase and effort release when the solution arrives. In Experiment 1, both participants were signaled to squeeze a handgrip at specific times as they performed the task. Effort varied during the anagram presentation and the solution presentation in four patterns: low-low; low-high; high-low; and high-high. Plagiarism was most prevalent for items originally presented in the high-low pattern, consistent with predictions. In Experiment 2, perceived effort was manipulated by the legibility of the anagram font. Two fonts were used: (1) black lettering on gray (easy), and (2) yellow lettering on gray (difficult). The same patterns of effort were during the anagram trials, and again I found that plagiarism was most likely to occur for the high-low effort pattern. In Experiment 3, some participants were warned to pay attention to the difficulty of the yellow font. People were more likely to plagiarize for the high-low pattern than the control pattern. However, I found that plagiarism rates were significantly reduced by warning participants of the effects of the yellow font. Together these studies show that feelings of agency for thoughts are enhanced by the feeling that one was working hard to produce those thoughts. Mental effort can be misattributed to the generation of thoughts, and can lead to inappropriate feelings of responsibility for the ideas produced by others. |
