Comparing Upward and Speeding Up

Comparison is one of the most ubiquitous and versatile components in human information processing. Social comparisons in particular have multifaceted judgmental, affective, behavioral, and motivational consequences. Initially, the consequences of nonsocial comparisons may appear to be less complex than the consequences of social comparisons. Comparing a smaller circle with a larger circle, for example, has little motivational relevance. Across two studies, however, we demonstrated that different types of nonsocial comparisons influence the motivational underpinnings of participants’ subsequent performance. Participants who were perceptually or numerically induced to compare upward (e.g., to compare a smaller stimulus with a larger stimulus) in a first task traded accuracy for speed in a subsequent unrelated performance task. Conversely, participants who had compared downward traded speed for accuracy. These trade-offs are indicative of promotion- and prevention-focused motivational orientations, respectively. Comparing a geometric circle with a “superior” (e.g., larger) circle seems to yield promotion-focused strategic orientations similar to those produced by comparing oneself to a person one perceives as superior. These findings demonstrate the surprising motivational power of nonsocial comparisons.