SYNCHRONY AND CONFORMITY 61 heir con cern about potential restrict s on their own freedom of aved in synchron For instance.Wiltermuth (2012)showed ate's reques noise blast to another group o ed that r would i ing othe e in this behavior have the opposite her expected tha d who have knowledge about the ctors hange the nated r reversed by introd his in nd r-related conce ed ir Theoretical Background tsthat are also onc Goals Versus Goal-Directed Behavior Goals and the of atta glanski et al (200 xist ir s possibility For i nemory,each co h a series o te tha concept ald which oftwo animls has more of a physical he goal.The con compose a ing one of sever As tal (2002) h might be part of more than one plan and thus might be relevant eatures of a stimulus ire a dis sition to might be part of a plan for getting social app va a plan for getting a cor wer to an e ing about pro sitions with which an stin sitio between the goal o d with th hat to atta mindset that decre s the infl ce o ands. vior co epts that compose the plar chavi However.they we likely to b mportant in ed the behay sections in the a in s The Effect of Behavioral Mindsets En ing in the Engaging in synchronous behavior can rise sens ehavior required genera have behaved in synchrony with one another show stronger coo The s that underlie the impact of a mindse ration and soc in subs nble tho ynchrony increases participantssense of attachment to the 200)How ver.the unique in several cts.Fo group. extent, they may be particularly sensitive to the constraints on freedom that copying others’ actions requires, and this can increase their concern about potential restrictions on their own freedom of action (Andreoli, Worchel, & Folger, 1974). These feelings may motivate them to affirm their individuality by conforming less to others’ judgments and decisions in a later situation than they would otherwise. On the basis of these considerations, we expected that engaging in synchronous behavior would increase the likelihood of con￾forming to others’ judgments and decisions in a later, unrelated situation, whereas observing other persons engage in this behavior would typically have the opposite effect. We further expected that the difference between actors’ and observers’ reactions to synchro￾nous behavior could be eliminated or reversed by introducing situational factors that change the relative attention that individuals pay to (a) the actors’ behavior per se and (b) the goal of this behavior. In the following sections, we review the theoretical and empirical bases for these predictions and present five experiments that confirm their validity. Theoretical Background Goals Versus Goal-Directed Behavior Goals and the means of attaining them are cognitively linked. Kruglanski et al. (2002) postulated that plan-goal schemas exist in memory, each composed of a goal concept along with a series of behavioral concepts that refer to the actions involved in attaining the goal. The concepts that compose a schema vary in abstractness but can be activated by situation-specific features that exemplify them. As Kruglanski et al. (2002) noted, a behavioral concept might be part of more than one plan and thus might be relevant to the attainment of more than one goal. For example, copying others might be part of a plan for getting social approval, a plan for getting a correct answer to an exam question, and, in the research we report, a plan to achieve synchronous behavior. It is important to distinguish between the goal of synchronous behavior and the actions that are required in order to attain it (attending to and copying others). The goal concept is activated by external demands, and the behavior concepts that compose the plan (copying others, etc.) are activated spontaneously in the course of pursuing this goal. Although this distinction is subtle, it becomes important in conceptualizing the different effects of synchronous behavior on judgments and decisions, as noted in the next two sections. The Effect of Behavioral Mindsets Engaging in synchronous behavior can often give rise to a sense of group cohesiveness (Ehrenreich, 2006; Haidt, 2007; Hove & Risen, 2009; Paladino, Mazzurega, Pavani, & Schubert, 2010; Wiltermuth, 2012; Wiltermuth & Heath, 2009). Wiltermuth and Heath (2009) demonstrated in several experiments that people who have behaved in synchrony with one another show stronger coop￾eration and social attachment in subsequent tasks, even at the cost of personal profit. Hove and Risen (2009) also found that behaving in synchrony increases participants’ sense of attachment to the group. In these studies, however, participants’ feelings of affiliation were directed toward the same individuals with whom they had behaved in synchrony. For instance, Wiltermuth (2012) showed that participants who acted in synchrony with a confederate were more likely than other participants to comply with the confeder￾ate’s request to administer a noise blast to another group of participants. Thus, feelings of emotional connectedness with the confederate mediated the relationship between synchrony and compliance with his or her request. It is unclear from this research whether engaging in synchronous behavior would influence ac￾tions in subsequent, unrelated situations in which different persons are involved who have no knowledge about the actors’ past be￾havior. Nevertheless, a conceptualization of behavioral mindsets pro￾posed by Wyer and Xu (2010) suggests that this influence can indeed occur. This conceptualization is based in part on (a) the effects of knowledge accessibility (Förster & Liberman, 2007; Higgins, 1996; Wyer, 2008) and in part on (b) Kruglanski et al.’s (2002) analysis of the mental representation of goals, as noted earlier. To reiterate, a behavior-related concept can be contained in several plans, each of which pertains to a different goal. Conse￾quently, if pursuing one goal activates concepts that are also part of a plan for attaining a different goal, these concepts, once accessible in memory, are likely to be applied in deciding how to pursue this latter goal as well (for a more formal statement of this process, see Wyer et al., 2012). Several studies exemplify this possibility. For instance, deciding which of two animals has more of a physical attribute can activate a “which-to-choose” mindset, increasing the likelihood of purchas￾ing one of several snacks on sale after the experiment without considering the option of choosing nothing at all (Xu & Wyer, 2008). Individuals who have been induced to focus on global features of a stimulus acquire a general disposition to construe information in terms of abstract concepts that generalizes to a wide variety of unrelated situations (Förster & Dannenberg, 2010). Thinking about propositions with which one disagrees can stimu￾late one to refute the propositions’ validity. Once concepts asso￾ciated with this behavior become accessible in memory, they can induce a “counterarguing” mindset that decreases the influence of a persuasive message that one encounters later (Xu & Wyer, 2012). In each case, individuals were likely to be aware of the behavior they performed. However, they were less likely to be aware that the behavior they performed in attaining the first goal influenced the behavior they decided to apply in pursuing the second. The situation we considered in the present research may also exemplify this phenomenon. The goal of behaving in synchrony may activate a plan-goal schema, concepts of which include the attention to and copying the behavior of others. Engaging in the behavior required to attain this goal may therefore activate general concepts associated with copying others and induce a “copying others” mindset, leading individuals to conform to others’ opinions and behavior in a later situation in pursuit of a quite unrelated goal to which the concepts are also applicable. The cognitive processes that underlie the impact of a mindset resemble those that underlie the effects of knowledge accessibility more generally (Förster & Liberman, 2007; Higgins, 1996; Wyer, 2008). However, the processes are unique in several respects. For one thing, the concepts that mediate the effects of a behavioral This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. SYNCHRONY AND CONFORMITY 61