SOC 104 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: Santa Barbara City College, Cognitive Load, The Automatic
Document Summary
Thought suppression - the attempt to avoid thinking about something a person would prefer to forget. The automatic part of the system (the monitoring process) searches for evidence that the unwanted thought is about to intrude on consciousness. Once the unwanted thought is detected, the more controlled part of the system (the operating process) comes into play: this is the effortful, conscious attempt to distract oneself by finding something else to think about. Example: uoft and uofbc got samples of religious and nonreligious students (christians) Put thought into their head jesus is crazy and homeless man. Asked how much they"ve been trying not to think about it. The ones who try the most have higher levels of depression. One purpose of controlled thinking is to provide checks and balances for automatic thinking. Thus when trouble occurs, controlled thinking may kick in .
