title: What Remains on Your Mind After You Are Done?: Flexible Regulation of Knowledge Accessibility.
abstract: The accessibility of stored knowledge has been found to decline over time after activation without further stimulation. A special case is goal pursuit; goal-related knowledge remains accessible until goal completion, and then its accessibility declines rapidly. We hypothesized that after goal completion the decline in accessibility of goal-related knowledge would be especially rapid for strong promotion-focused individuals because their motivation to eagerly advance beyond the status quo would make accessibility of this knowledge an irrelevant detriment. We hypothesized an opposite effect for strongly prevention-predominant individuals because their motivation to vigilantly maintain a satisfactory state would make accessibility of this knowledge continually relevant. The results of two studies supported both these predicted moderators of accessibility change. Indeed, we found that for strongly prevention-predominant participants, knowledge accessibility actually increased over time after goal completion. We discuss how even basic cognitive mechanisms, like changes in accessibility, can be affected by general motivational concerns.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Columbia University; Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden.
authors.forename: Per H
authors.initials: PH
authors.lastname: Hedberg
authors.forename: E Tory
authors.initials: ET
authors.lastname: Higgins