The Influence And Mechanism Of Ego Depletion On Social Mindfulness

Social mindfulness refers to the behavior of individuals who prioritize the needs and power of others before making decisions or choices in interpersonal interaction situations,and respect and protect the other person’s right to choose.As a new perspective in the study of pro-social behavior,social mindfulness emphasizes self-control over "concern for others" in interpersonal decision-making.Cognitive resources are limited,and individuals perform self-control tasks that deplete cognitive resources.Based on the self-control resource model,this study explores the impact of ego depletion on social mindfulness and its internal mechanisms,and further examines whether initiating cognitive perspective taking can mitigate the negative impact of ego depletion on social mindfulness.Study 1 consisted of two experiments;Experiment 1 examined the effect of ego depletion on social mindfulness using a one-way between-subjects design.By manipulating individual self-loss levels through the Stroop task,subjects’ scores on the So Mi task were used as a measure of social mindfulness,and the results showed that subjects in the attrition group had lower So Mi scores compared to the no-attrition group.Based on this,Experiment 2 also manipulated subjects’ attrition status through the Stroop task,using individual ratings in the cognitive perspective-taking task and the affective empathy task as indicators of the dependent variable,respectively,to further explore the mechanisms underlying the effect of self attrition on social mindfulness.The results of Experiment 2a showed that subjects in the attrition group had significantly lower levels of cognitive perspective taking than those in the no-attrition group;the results of Experiment 2b showed that no significant differences were found between the two groups in terms of their levels of affective empathy.Study 2(Experiment 3)explored whether initiating cognitive perspective taking after attrition could mitigate the negative effects of self attrition on Social mindfulness.Using a one-way between-subjects design,the Stroop task was used to manipulate individuals’ attrition status and to initiate their cognitive perspective taking by having them look at a picture and think differently about writing.The results showed that initiating cognitive perspective taking was effective in mitigating the negative effects of self attrition on Social mindfulness.Key findings from the current study:(1)Self-depletion diminishes individual Social mindfulness.Subjects in the attrition state showed less Social mindfulnessbehavior than those in the no-attrition state;the effects of self-loss on different components of Social mindfulnessbehavior were different,with lower levels of cognitive perspective taking in the attrition state than in the no-attrition state;no significant differences were found in the levels of affective empathy between the attrition and no-attrition groups.(2)In the state of ego depletion,initiating subjects’ cognitive perspective picking by looking at the diagram and thinking differently can effectively mitigate the negative effects of ego depletion on Social mindfulness and restore individuals’ self-control resources to normal levels,thus leading to an increase in the tendency of Social mindfulness.This study reveals the potential influence of cognitive control on Social mindfulness,which provides clues for other future researchers to explore the cognitive characteristics of Social mindfulness in depth;at the same time,the way to mitigate the aftereffects of ego depletion by initiating a cognitive perspective also provides a scientific way to improve the level of Social mindfulness among school students.