Editing Thought (section)

===Counterfactual thinking===
[[Counterfactual thinking]] involves mental representations of non-actual situations and events, i.e. of what is "contrary to the facts".<ref name="Roese">{{cite journal |last1=Roese |first1=Neal J. |title=Counterfactual thinking |journal=Psychological Bulletin |date=1997 |volume=121 |issue=1 |pages=133–148 |doi=10.1037/0033-2909.121.1.133 |pmid=9000895 |url=https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1997-02112-007}}</ref><ref name="KazdinCounterfactual">{{cite book |editor1-last=Kazdin |editor1-first=Alan E. |title=Encyclopedia of Psychology |date=2000 |publisher=American Psychological Association |isbn=978-1-55798-187-5 |url=https://www.apa.org/pubs/books/4600100 |chapter=Counterfactual thought}}</ref> It is usually ''conditional'': it aims at assessing what would be the case if a certain condition had obtained.<ref name="Van Hoeck"/><ref name="Starr"/> In this sense, it tries to answer "What if"-questions. For example, thinking after an accident that one would be dead if one had not used the seatbelt is a form of counterfactual thinking: it assumes, contrary to the facts, that one had not used the seatbelt and tries to assess the result of this state of affairs.<ref name="KazdinCounterfactual"/> In this sense, counterfactual thinking is normally counterfactual only to a small degree since just a few facts are changed, like concerning the seatbelt, while most other facts are kept in place, like that one was driving, one's gender, the laws of physics, etc.<ref name="Roese"/> When understood in the widest sense, there are forms of counterfactual thinking that do not involve anything contrary to the facts at all.<ref name="Starr">{{cite web |last1=Starr |first1=William |title=Counterfactuals: 1.1 What are Counterfactuals? |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/counterfactuals/#WhatCoun |website=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University |access-date=28 October 2021 |date=2021}}</ref> This is the case, for example, when one tries to anticipate what might happen in the future if an uncertain event occurs and this event actually occurs later and brings with it the anticipated consequences.<ref name="Van Hoeck">{{cite journal |last1=Van Hoeck |first1=Nicole |last2=Watson |first2=Patrick D. |last3=Barbey |first3=Aron K. |title=Cognitive neuroscience of human counterfactual reasoning |journal=Frontiers in Human Neuroscience |date=2015 |volume=9 |pages=420 |doi=10.3389/fnhum.2015.00420 |pmid=26257633 |pmc=4511878 |issn=1662-5161|doi-access=free }}</ref> In this wider sense, the term "subjunctive conditional" is sometimes used instead of "[[counterfactual conditional]]".<ref name="Starr"/> But the paradigmatic cases of counterfactual thinking involve alternatives to past events.<ref name="Roese"/>

Counterfactual thinking plays an important role since we evaluate the world around us not only by what actually happened but also by what could have happened.<ref name="KazdinCounterfactual"/> Humans have a greater tendency to engage in counterfactual thinking after something bad happened because of some kind of action the agent performed.<ref name="Van Hoeck"/><ref name="Roese"/> In this sense, many regrets are associated with counterfactual thinking in which the agent contemplates how a better outcome could have been obtained if only they had acted differently.<ref name="KazdinCounterfactual"/> These cases are known as upward counterfactuals, in contrast to downward counterfactuals, in which the counterfactual scenario is worse than actuality.<ref name="Van Hoeck"/><ref name="Roese"/> Upward counterfactual thinking is usually experienced as unpleasant, since it presents the actual circumstances in a bad light. This contrasts with the positive emotions associated with downward counterfactual thinking.<ref name="KazdinCounterfactual"/> But both forms are important since it is possible to learn from them and to adjust one's behavior accordingly to get better results in the future.<ref name="KazdinCounterfactual"/><ref name="Roese"/>