The pragmatic structure of indeterminacy: Mapping possibilities as context for action

Abstract

Social psychology studies how situations cause behavior. Situations are partly defined by a matrix of possibilities (including probabilities and contingencies), and so human responses are caused not merely by realities but also by possibilities—even including some possibilities that never materialize. The human mind has complex abilities to recognize, imagine, and deal with possibilities. Two important dimensions of possibility, here labeled horizontal and vertical, differ as to how controllable the outcome is for any particular agent and where the value basis originates. Success/failure is an example of the vertical dimension and normally is only partly controllable, whereas open choice such as ordering off a menu is an example of the horizontal dimension. Possibilities and agency develop complex relationships to time: The future is defined by alternative possibilities whereas the past cannot be changed, though it can be re-imagined counterfactually and also reinterpreted. Last, we highlight the problem of how possibilities and probabilities combine. Statistical analysis of variance strategies offer three models of combination: independent and additive (like main effects), damping versus intensifying each other (as in spreading interactions), or reversing each other’s effects (as in crossover interactions).