The Effect Of Level Of Construal On The Temporal Distance Of Activity Enactment

Construal level theory (CLT) is a theory that discusses the relation of temporal distance and construal level from the point of psychological feature. It proposes that temporal distance, defined as the perceived proximity of an event in time, changes people's responses to future events by altering their mental representations of those events: The greater the temporal distance, the more likely events are to be represented in terms of high-level construal rather than in terms of more low-level construal. Through a series of researches, the former researcher confirmed the effect of the future events' temporal distance on the level of construal. However, in the opposite direction of CLT, does construal level affect temporal distance? Up to now, only Liberman (2007) conducted a research on this issue, it found that construal level affect temporal distance in future activities. But it is not published the effect of past activities and factors which affect the effect.This research is based on a study of Liberman (2007). At first, the research discuss the effect of construal level both on past and future activities, then prove the effect of construal level on past activities further, as well as the infection of locus of control and character of activity. The subjects of the research are college students, and there are three studies in the research. It discusses the difference of the temporal distance in past and future activities between high-level construal and low-level construal in the first study. In the second and third studies, researchers investigate the factors that affect the effect of construal level. Mainly draws the conclusion below after the research:(1) Whether in the future or in the past, construal level affect the temporal distance of activity enactment, and there is no difference between activities in the past and activities in the future;(2) In the past activities, locus of control doesn't affect the effect of construal level, and there are no difference between internal locus of control ones and external locus of control ones;(3) In the past activities, the character of activities affects the effect of construal level, the temporal distance of activities is affected by the association of level of construal and character of activities.