![]() ![]() Since these constructs were assessed at the end of the experiment, they could not influence the replicated mirror effect. In order to do that, post- experimental measures of shame and guilt were added. Another main theoretical interest registered prior to data collection was to assess the possible emotional mechanisms involved in the mirror effect. Because the mirror effect may seem surprising at first sight, we decided to preregister the hypotheses and the analysis plan at the Open Science Framework website for a maximum of transparency ( ). In this study, the aim was to replicate the finding that self-awareness alone facilitates access to suicide-related words measured by a lexical decision task similar to the original one. This finding was consistent with previous research and theorizing showing (a) that self-awareness activates unfavorable comparison between one’s actual self-representation and one’s ideal self-representations ( Duval & Wicklund, 1972 Scheier & Carver, 1983 Silvia & Duval, 2001), (b) that when a specific motivation is pursued the most effective means to reach that goal is activated ( Eitam & Higgins, 2010 Kruglanski et al., 2002), and (c) that unfavorable comparison between the actual and ideal self can be sufficient to increase the accessibility of suicide-related thoughts ( Chatard & Selimbegović, 2011 Chatard, Selimbegović, Pyszczynski, & Jaafari, 2017 Tang, Wu, & Miao, 2013). The results of an experiment were consistent with this prediction ( Selimbegović & Chatard, 2013): participants were faster at correctly identifying suicide-related words when tested in front of a mirror, rather than in a no-mirror control condition. Suicide being an efficient and radical means to escape self-awareness ( Baumeister, 1990), mirror exposure could inadvertently increase the accessibility of suicide-related words. Instead, the core idea was that self-awareness would activate a motivation to avoid this aversive state and could therefore bring to mind escape-related constructs. Importantly, the authors did not claim that self-awareness alone could make people more suicidal. Selimbegović and Chatard ( 2013) suggested that mirror exposure may facilitate the detection of suicide-related words in a lexical decision task. The present study focused on one specific consequence of self-awareness, the mirror effect ( Selimbegović & Chatard, 2013). Research also suggests that although the mere presence of a mirror might seem like a mundane detail, it can bring about very negative consequences, such as lowering self-esteem ( Heine et al., 2008 Ickes et al., 1973) and facilitating access to self-destructive thoughts ( Chatard & Selimbegović, 2011 see also Fejfar & Hoyle, 2000 Mor & Winquist, 2002 Smith & Greenberg, 1981). absence) of a mirror in various domains such as implicit behavior priming ( Dijksterhuis & van Knippenberg, 2000), cardiovascular effort and motivation ( Gendolla & Richter, 2010 Silvia, 2012, Study 3), resistance to persuasion ( Hutton & Baumeister, 1992), or semantic category activation ( Selimbegović & Chatard, 2013). The latter might be the most common manipulation of self-awareness, as shown by experiments focusing on the effects of the presence (vs. Studies investigating the effects of self-awareness manipulate self-focus in a variety of manners: by displaying participants’ names ( Silvia, 2012 Silvia & Phillips, 2013), by exposing participants to their own voices ( Ickes, Wicklund, & Ferris, 1973), or to their mirror-reflected images ( Bender, O’Connor, & Evans, 2018 Dijksterhuis & van Knippenberg, 2000 Gendolla & Richter, 2010 Heine, Takemoto, Moskalenko, Lasaleta, & Henrich, 2008 Hutton & Baumeister, 1992). Self-awareness can be defined as the capacity to direct attention towards oneself (self-focus state) and to engage in reflexive thought about oneself ( Carver & Scheier, 1981). Implications for the mirror effect and recommendations for pre-registered replications are discussed. Overall, the results suggest that the original effect was a false positive or that the conditions for obtaining it (in terms of statistical power and/or outlier detection method) are not yet fully understood. An equivalence TOST test did not yield evidence for or against the mirror effect. A multiverse analysis revealed a significant mirror effect only when excluding extreme observations. We found no evidence of the mirror effect in pre-registered analyses. As in the original study, self-awareness was manipulated using a mirror and recognition latencies for accurately detecting suicide-related words, negative words, and neutral words in a lexical decision task were assessed. We attempted to replicate this effect in a pre-registered study (N = 150). When individuals are exposed to their own image in a mirror, known to increase self-awareness, they may show increased accessibility of suicide-related words (a phenomenon labeled “the mirror effect” Selimbegović & Chatard, 2013).
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