TY - JOUR
T1 - Control Processes and Self-Organization as Complementary Principles Underlying Behavior
AU - Carver, Charles S.
AU - Scheier, Michael F.
PY - 2002/1/1
Y1 - 2002/1/1
N2 - This article addresses the convergence and complementarity between self-regulatory control-process models of behavior and dynamic systems models. The control-process view holds that people have a goal in mind and try to move toward it (or away from it), monitoring the extent to which a discrepancy remains between the goal and one's present state and taking steps to reduce the discrepancy (or enlarge it). Dynamic systems models tend to emphasize a bottom-up self-organization process, in which a coherence arises from among many simultaneous influences, moving the system toward attractors and away from repellers. We suggest that these differences in emphasis reflect two facets of a more complex reality involving both types of processes. Discussion focuses on how self-organization may occur within constituent elements of a feedback system - the input function, the output function, and goal values being used by the system - and how feedback processes themselves can reflect self-organizing tendencies.
AB - This article addresses the convergence and complementarity between self-regulatory control-process models of behavior and dynamic systems models. The control-process view holds that people have a goal in mind and try to move toward it (or away from it), monitoring the extent to which a discrepancy remains between the goal and one's present state and taking steps to reduce the discrepancy (or enlarge it). Dynamic systems models tend to emphasize a bottom-up self-organization process, in which a coherence arises from among many simultaneous influences, moving the system toward attractors and away from repellers. We suggest that these differences in emphasis reflect two facets of a more complex reality involving both types of processes. Discussion focuses on how self-organization may occur within constituent elements of a feedback system - the input function, the output function, and goal values being used by the system - and how feedback processes themselves can reflect self-organizing tendencies.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0036441080&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=0036441080&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1207/S15327957PSPR0604_05
DO - 10.1207/S15327957PSPR0604_05
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:0036441080
VL - 6
SP - 304
EP - 315
JO - Personality and Social Psychology Review
JF - Personality and Social Psychology Review
SN - 1088-8683
IS - 4
ER -