Multifinality in Implicit Choice Woo Young Chun Chungnam National University Arie W. Kruglanski University of Maryland David Sleeth-Keppler Strategic Business Insights, Menlo Park, California Ronald S. Friedman State University of New York at Albany This research examines the possibility that people’s choices in the service of an explicit focal goal may also reflect their tendency to fulfill implicit background goals and in that sense are multifinal. We carried out 5 experimental studies to investigate this notion. In Experiment 1, a primed implicit goal affected individuals’ choices even when those avowedly served an explicit “focal” goal. Experiment 2 replicated this finding with a different type of implicit goals. Experiment 3 found that primed implicit goals had no effect on choices where the options that served them undermined the explicit goal. Experiment 4 found that a primed implicit goal served by a multifinal option does not privilege it over a unifinal option if that goal had been already attained by a different means. Finally, Experiment 5, via 3 types of control groups, showed that choices were affected by both the explicit and implicit goals in isolation, and they shifted toward multifinality when these goals were conjointly present. The discussion considers the integrative potential of the multifinality framework and its implications for a variety of phenomena in the domain of motivated cognition. Keywords: multifinality, implicit choice, unconscious goal, goal systems theory, motivated cognition Choices that people make may be driven by two types of goals: ones that they pursue consciously and deliberately and others of which they may not be explicitly cognizant. In many everyday cases, people’s choices are guided by volitional goals of which they are acutely aware (Bagozzi & Dholakia, 1999; Simonson, 2005). Yet, recent social cognitive research suggests that goals constitute cognitive structures that (as other such structures) can be primed by subtle environmental stimuli and exert their effects without the actors’ conscious awareness of their origination (see, e.g., Bargh, 2002; Dijksterhuis, Smith, van Baaren, & Wigboldus, 2005; Fishbach, Friedman, & Kruglanski, 2003; Kruglanski et al., 2002; Morsella, Bargh, & Gollwitzer, 2009; Shah, Friedman, & Kruglanski, 2002; Shah & Kruglanski, 2002, 2003). Unconscious goal activation has been shown to influence cognition, behavior, and affect (Fitzsimons & Bargh, 2003; Kruglanski et al., 2002). Given that both explicit and implicit goals can affect individu- als’ choices, an intriguing possibility is that choices may be driven by an interplay of explicit and implicit goals (Chun & Kruglanski, 2005; Simonson, 2005). In this article, based on goal systems theory (Kruglanski et al., 2002), we explore how implicit “back- ground” goals may affect individuals’ choices even when their decisions avowedly are in the service of explicit and deliberately pursued “focal” goals. The Cognitive Architecture of Goal Systems: Equifinality and Multifinality Configurations Goal systems theory (Kruglanski et al., 2002) depicts the rela- tion between goals and means in terms of an interconnected cognitive architecture, wherein a superordinate goal is connected to lower level subordinate goals that, in turn, are linked to their own means of attainment. Major goal-systemic configurations are those of (a) equifinality, wherein several means are linked to the same goal, and (b) multifinality, in which several goals are linked to the same means. For example, the goal of finding a good quality T-shirt can be gratified by purchasing either a red T-shirt or a blue one. In present terminology, these represent equifinal means to the same end (possession of a T-shirt). The equifinality configuration poses the problem of choice between the means. How is such choice carried out? The Problem of Choice According to goal systems theory (Kruglanski et al., 2002), choice among equifinal means to a given focal goal may be This article was published Online First May 16, 2011. Woo Young Chun, Department of Psychology, Chungnam National University, Daejeon, Korea; Arie W. Kruglanski, Department of Psychol- ogy, University of Maryland; David Sleeth-Keppler, Strategic Business Insights, Menlo Park, California; Ronald S. Friedman, Department of Psychology, State University of New York at Albany. This research was supported by Mid-Career Researcher Program through a National Research Foundation grant funded by Korean Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (NO. R01-2009-0083837) to Woo Young Chun and by National Science Foundation Grant 0314291/0313483 to Arie W. Kruglanski. We thank Namhee Kim for her assistance in data collection. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Woo Young Chun, Department of Psychology, Chungnam National University, 220 Gung-Dong, Yusung-Gu, Daejeon 305-764, Korea, or Arie W. Krug- lanski, Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. E-mail: wooyoung@cnu.ac.kr or kruglanski@gmail.com Journal of Personality and Social Psychology © 2011 American Psychological Association 2011, Vol. 101, No. 5, 1124 –1137 0022-3514/11/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0023778 1124 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.