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Human action serves two complementary purposes. On the one hand, actions are meant to achieve desired effects in the environment. On the other hand, people act as a consequence of external events, trying to accommodate to environmental demands. While the former type of action is usually referred to as “voluntary,” “goal-directed,” or “intention-based,” the latter is often conceptualized as “response,” “reaction,” or “stimulus-based.” At the same time, the concepts of intention- and stimulus-based action control are inseparably interwoven. Although intention-based actions by definition rely on intentions, the planning process also needs to consider stimulus information from the agent’s actual environment. Similarly, although stimulus-based actions are triggered by external stimuli from the environment, stimulus information is not a sufficient condition for the execution of the action: to respond to the external information in the appropriate way, it rather needs to be complemented by an intentional set. In this chapter, we address theoretical and experimental approaches to the cognitive underpinnings of action control. We outline current theories of human action control and review experimental paradigms addressing this issue by comparing intention-based and stimulus-based actions or by investigating the interference between both types of action control. Finally, we discuss the function of the self within the proposed cognitive framework. For this purpose, we link the action control theories under discussion to cross-cultural and social-psychological evidence suggesting that individuals differ in self-regulatory performance depending on their social orientation—that is, how they define the self in connection to other people. We will claim that research on self-control can profit from cognitive research on action control because both fields deal with situations in which automatic behavioral tendencies need to be controlled and adjusted to the individual’s goals and desires, for example, losing weight, abstaining from alcohol, cigarettes or drugs, or avoiding violent and aggressive reactions to others. In turn, to understand from a cognitive perspective why people fail to withstand predominant responses to the environment, and, on the other hand, how they can successfully regulate their behavior can be viewed as a substantial part of understanding self-control.

An examination of Williams account of agent-regret leads to its supplementation, and to an explanation of why we are attached to, and responsible for, some of our actions even when we do not control them, by relating our attachments to the emerging sense of who we are. These reflections lead to showing (a) that the control principle of responsibility reaches further than is often assumes, e.g. to establish responsibility for some beliefs and emotions, and (b) that we are responsible for actions regarding which the control principle does not apply. The chapter defends a rational functioning principle of responsibility. It concludes with some observations about how these conclusion bear on the question of blameworthiness which follow in Williams's footsteps.

This chapter further broadens the scope of our window into agile thinking beyond that of the representational world of memory, categorization, and concepts (the focus of Chapters 2 and 3), and beyond that of sensory-perceptual and motor inputs and guides to representations and thinking (the topic of Chapter 4), to encompass action and motivation, or the impetus for, and enactment of, agile thinking. This chapter consists of four main sections, each of which, in turn, is comprised of several subsections. The four sections focus on four main areas. Firstly, hierarchical models of action control and motivation are considered, particularly in relation to higher level versus lower level construals of our actions, and the interactions between controlled and automatic processing in forming and implementing intentions are examined. Secondly, the next section looks at the need for moderate and changing levels of control, emphasizing the correlation of moderate levels of control with increased resiliency and the growing evidence that executive control or self-regulatory processes may, under some conditions, become depleted if the need for high levels of self-regulatory control is sustained for prolonged periods. The following section analyzes forms of motivation and incentives, especially evidence that contests the often proposed conflict between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, and that underscores the important synergistic effects that may be obtained by a combination of intrinsic and extrinsic motivational orientation. Finally, the last section examines the potential powerful role of reinforcement in encouraging organisms not only to repeat but also to vary, including in innovatively creative ways. Thus, further developing the integrated Controlled-Automatic, Specific-Abstract (iCASA) framework, the chapter focuses on alterations in our level of representational specificity, and our level of control, with regard to actions and our motivation for action, in enabling mental agility.

Considerable evidence suggests that the behavioral mechanisms for instrumental action selection are mediated by two distinct learning processes: a goal-directed process whereby actions are selected with reference to the incentive value and causal relationship between actions and associated outcomes, and a more reflexive habitual process in which actions are elicited by antecedent stimuli without any consideration of the associated outcome. This chapter reviews evidence from experiments in both rodents and humans which suggests that the behavioral dichotomy between these two modes of action selection are also reflected at the neural level, involving at least partly dissociable regions: a circuit involving the medial prefrontal cortex and dorsomedial striatum is implicated in goal-directed learning, whereas a region of posterior lateral dorsal striatum is implicated in habitual learning. Building on the arguments put forward by Winstanley et al. (this volume), it can be concluded that the specific neural circuits identified as contributing to goal-directed learning, but not those involved in habit learning, are a constituent element of the neural systems underlying cognitive search.

This chapter takes the view that consciousness and free will are real and effective phenomena. Empirical findings in psychology are used to understand how they function. Free will is said to be a form of action control, including planning and volition. Consciousness, meanwhile, is the brain making input for itself to facilitate cross-communication across different segments of brain and mind.

This chapter focuses on action control. It argues that we should understand the human being as having a behavior system, which the cognitive, emotional and motivational systems may or may not influence. Probably that view reflects how the human psyche actually developed. Even cockroaches, rats, and worms can make behavior, so behavior obviously does not require much intelligence or cultural learning. In order for human beings to be cultural animals, however, nature had to change the behavior-producing system so as to make it receptive to meanings. Meaning is the vehicle by which culture influences behavior. People use meaning to allow their behavior to benefit from culture.

This chapter discusses the concepts of motivation, action control, and individual differences. It also elaborates on the processes and neural bases of online action control and illustrates the advantages of an individual-differences approach. Finally, the chapter explains how action control is modulated by motivational incentives.

This chapter challenges the assumption of attention functioning as a means of preventing consciousness from getting overloaded, and also challenges the assumption of any relationships between management of scarce resources and the original biological function of attention. It emphasizes that attention is directly derived from mechanisms governing the control of basic movements. The author establishes the theoretical stage through discussions on the implications of the brain’s preference to stimulus events and action plans in a feature-based manner and processing information through different mechanisms. The chapter also discusses many empirical findings supporting the conception of action planning and action control having the potential to determine perception and attention.

Intentions to do more good and less bad are reliably associated with actual efforts in the intended directions. However, the link between intention and behavior is modest, largely due to the fact that people, despite having formed strong intentions, fail to act on them. Given this predicament, one wonders what people can do to facilitate the translation of intentions into behavior. This chapter argues that people should engage in a second act of willing by making if-then plans (implementation intentions) that specify how the (goal) intention is to be realized. It asserts that such plans produce automatic action control by intentionally delegating the control of one's goal-directed thoughts, feelings, and behaviors to specific situational cues. Thus, by forming implementation intentions, people can strategically switch from conscious and effortful control of their goal-directed behaviors to being automatically controlled by selected situational cues. This type of automatic action control is strategic automaticity or instant habits.

This chapter tackles the problem of volition from an inductive (instead of deductive) and descriptive (instead of normative) approach. In this “bottom-up” approach, a distinction is made between the high-level properties of human voluntary action and its necessary basic components—the building blocks that are necessary for voluntary action to exist. First reviewed are the documented properties of voluntary processes, including high-level cognitions such as the sense of agency (that is, the sense that the self is responsible for the occurrence of a physical or mental act) and less intuitive properties, including distortions in time perception and the ability to influence that which enters attentional awareness. The chapter then examines how the instantiation of voluntary action rests on three primary components: The phenomenal state (the most basic form of conscious awareness), ideomotor processing (a form of action control), and the skeletal muscle output system (the only effector in the body that is controlled voluntarily). We conclude by discussing how the interdependences among these three components provide a unique insight into the mechanisms of voluntary action and the nature of human agency.

This chapter explicates the mechanisms of if-then planning (i.e. implementation intentions), namely, how verbal action planning leads to subsequent stimulus-driven action control—a mechanism referred to as strategic automaticity. The chapter first reviews evidence from behavioral studies indicating that action control by if-then planning can exhibit features associated with automatic action initiation; it is fast, effortless, and does not depend on another in situ conscious intent. The chapter explicates underlying mechanisms of if-then planning by integrating current simulation theories of cognition and action control into implementation intention theory. The chapter also focuses on subjective agency: on the basis of currently available evidence on how humans gain a feeling of control, it analyzes how if-then planning may affect one’s sense of agency. The chapter focuses on if-then planning as an ideal type of planning; the mechanisms proposed, however, may be relevant to action planning in a more general sense.

If-then planning switches action control from goal-guided to stimulus-triggered action control. After reviewing the effects and mechanisms of planning in promoting goal attainment, this chapter suggests that little is known about its antecedents and explores a potential role for emotions as precursors to planning. The elicitors of discrete emotion prompt fine-tuned cognitive appraisal patterns that share important similarities with specific goal-relevant mindsets identified by the phase model of action. This chapter identifies how the experience of certain emotions leads people to think in styles similar to different mindsets and review recent evidence that establishes differential planning for different emotions. It examines in particular sadness and anger, and finds that whereas the former yields more successful goal setting, the latter prompts more successful goal striving via the formation of plans. The implications of these findings offer intriguing possibilities for future research to consider the relevance and benefit of emotional experience in guiding behavior.

This chapter investigates the idea that the role of emotions in individual psychology is to be explained by their relation to beliefs. It notes that an influential view in the philosophy of psychology is the ‘Humean’ claim that the rational production and control of action is entirely to be explained with reference to the beliefs and desires of the individual subject. The chapter argues that while the only view that has been proposed in the literature along these lines — the claim that emotions are constituted of beliefs — is untenable, there are two more promising solutions for the Humean — that emotions can either be treated as beliefs, or that they are nomologically connected with beliefs.

This book identifies the term bias as a core concept to the study of the neural basis of action control and myriad forms of decision making. This helps researchers to understand neurons' contribution in behavioral control and allows them to apply existing computational tools in this study. The book provides explicit linking propositions with other contemporary analyses of decision making. It aims to stimulate mutual interest among students and professionals from within and outside the area of cognitive neuroscience.