Accessing Self‑Control

Self-control is that which is enacted to align our behaviour with intentions, motives, or better judgment in the face of conflicting impulses of motives. In this paper, I ask, what explains interpersonal differences in self-control? After defending a functionalist conception of self-control, I argue that differences in self-control are analogous to differences in mobility: they are modulated by inherent traits and environmental supports and constraints in interaction. This joint effect of individual (neuro)biology and environmental factors is best understood in terms of access to self-control behaviours. I sketch an account of access as including the three criteria of means, awareness, and non-excessive effort. I further demonstrate that people with disorders such as ADHD have limited access to self-control behaviours and stand therefore at a disadvantage with regard to self-control.

Self-control is that which is enacted to align our behaviour with a motivational commitment, such as an intention or better judgment, in the face of conflicting impulses of motives . It is an umbrella concept, subject to various measures that are distinct but correlated (Duckworth & Kern, 2011). We enact self-control, e.g., to quit intrusive habits and begin new ones, to put down a novel to do the dishes, and to refrain from shouting at a loved one when angry. Some people seem to have more self-control than others: for example, Miguel seems to have an easier time aligning his actions with his better judgment than Rafael, who often finds himself doing something he would not endorse, such as shouting at his mother or putting off doing something he intends to do.

such as the trait self-control scale have been developed in psychology to study the various correlates of individual variation in self-control. Yet Miguel, too, sometimes fails in self-control: for example, while he usually refrains from beef to protect the environment, he sometimes succumbs to the temptation of a freshly grilled steak. Vice versa, it is not unusual for Rafael to succeed in self-control.

Often, successes and failures in self-control are seen as personal successes and failures. We commend Miguel for his self-controlled character. We likewise think Rafael’s persistent troubles in self-control are a personal failure of his and treat his successes in self-control as evidence that had he flexed his ‘mental muscle’3 a bit more, he could have done better at other occasions, as well. I argue that this is mistaken. Rather, self-control depends on whether one has access to such behaviours that serve its function.

There is interpersonal variation in the extent to which various processes and strategies are feasible to us, and in the extent to which we are aware of these forms of self-control. When an agent lacks means M to enact self-control, is not aware of M, or when M requires excessive effort, that agent does not have access to self-control. I have previously gestured towards this radically externalist view of self-control (Koi, 2021); here, I develop it more fully.

To make my case for an access-based account of individual differences in selfcontrol, I must first argue for self-control as subject to multiple realizability, defined by its behavioural function rather than by the presence of any specific mental process or mechanism. However, as I will point out, those who are not persuaded by such a functionalist account of self-control can still adopt a restricted form of the access account.

In this article, my first order of business is to establish that exercises of self-control are constituted by a heterogeneous set of behaviours (including both mental and overt behaviours), pooled together by their applicability to the direction of behaviour5 to match intention. Given their heterogeneity, the environment has a central epistemic and constitutive role in these behaviours. In Sect. 2, I argue for such a functionalist approach to self-control by showing that a ‘process’ view of selfcontrol, such as is found in Sripada (2020), must posit a further feature in virtue of which those processes are self-control, and that a ‘results’ view such as the one defended here provides just that. Further evidence is provided by findings in social psychology, which indicate that skill in self-control tracks the deployment of a variety of strategies.

In Sect. 3, I analyse the concept of access as consisting of means, awareness and non-excessive effort. I show that the presence and absence of environmental constraints and supports modulate the presence of feasible means of self-control, as well as awareness of them. As a result, interpersonal and diachronic differences in self-control are a result of differences in environmental access to self-control behaviours,6 rather than just a result of innate individual differences. To have a capacity for self-control, for this stance, is to have access to self-control behaviours.

It follows that the extent to which one has the capacity for self-control critically hinges on the extent to which they have access to self-control behaviours, and that it is commonplace for access to self-control to be unevenly distributed in ways that favour agents with certain innate and social traits over others. However, this contingency can be significantly ameliorated. Individual differences in self-control thus become a matter of justice. Finally, in Sect. 4, I demonstrate the practical upshots of the access theory and how it can be applied to particular cases by analysing attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as a case where access to self-control is limited.

Self‑Control is a Broad Set of Behaviours

Accounts of self-control in both philosophy and social psychology are highly varied. If there is a consensus, it is that self-control is that which enables one to resolve a motivational conflict and act accordingly: to inhibit a prepotent impulse in order to act intentionally, to follow one’s judgment rather than desire, or to forgo a smaller, sooner reward to pursue a larger, later goal. Sometimes these motivational conflicts further map onto a conception of the mind as divided, e.g., between reason and appetite, or between hot and cool processes. Another compatible conception holds self-control to be roughly equivalent with inhibitory control and describes it as an intramental mechanism, often reducible to the brain ; sometimes, this mechanism is associated with a mysterious faculty dubbed ‘willpower’. Sripada (2020) paints the debate in terms of process views of self-control, which define self-control as a specific process, and results views, in which self-control is defined by its ‘result or behavioural output and can be realized by a variety of processes, skills, and strategies.

Within self-control research, the suppression of unwanted impulses with ‘brute’ inhibition is often treated as a benchmark form of self-control against which other forms of self-control are compared. However, inhibitory control should not be equated with self-control. This is because inhibitory control processes are not specific to self-control, but are also present for other tasks that do not involve motivational conflict. Instead, they undergird much of the skilled action, such as baseball batting (Gray, 2009). In other words, there must be a further feature in virtue of which some instances of inhibition count as self-control. And if there is something in virtue of which some instances of inhibition count as self-control, then could not other processes and mechanisms also count as self-control if they share that feature.

Which Self‑Control Behaviours are Accessible?

That there is a heterogeneous pool of self-control behaviours rather than one such behaviour is fortunate, because it enables substituting one behaviour for another based on which strategies of self-control are a good fit for a given agent and their context. For example, a student sitting in an exam and noticing that her attention is wandering to an attractive classmate cannot physically remove herself from the space without forfeiting the exam, but she may attempt intramental strategies of self-control, as described above. In theory, almost any agent, including agents with cognitive and learning disabilities, could possess a robust ‘toolkit’ of self-control behaviours that are a good fit for them, and select a means out of that set based on contextual fit.

In this section, I argue that individual differences in self-control are best conceived of in terms of access to self-control behaviours. Differences in self-control, for this account, arise from barriers in the social environment. These barriers make many such behaviours unfeasible and therefore unsuitable as means to self-control. Furthermore, epistemic barriers prevent many agents from learning or becoming aware of suitable means to self-control. Unjust structures of the social and built environment thus result in aggravated individual differences in self-control.

When Access is Limited: The Case of ADHD

In this section, I consider the implications of the access theory of self-control for a case where self-control is often limited. As mentioned above, many neurodevelopmental and mental health conditions modulate which self-control behaviours are feasible. Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is only one such condition, but I have chosen it as an example for two reasons: first, it is a fairly common disorder, and second, its symptom presentation, which spans self-control-associated difficulties across various domains from the occupational to the interpersonal, is sufficiently similar to nonclinical self-control problems for it to serve as an illustrative example (by contrast, addictive behaviour, often used as an example in philosophical examinations of self-control, is typically described as involving self-control problems in one domain only). Second, ADHD is associated with deficits on all measures of self-control, from inhibitory control and delayed gratification to trait self-control, and its symptomology corresponds to difficulties in self-control on any theory of self-control.

Our first puzzle is interpersonal variation in self-control in people with ADHD. The symptomology of ADHD is thought to stem from differences in executive functioning. For many people with ADHD, their disorder is reflected in self-control problems across multiple domains, resulting, e.g., in poorer work performance and unstable relationships. There is, however, plenty of anecdotal evidence of high achievers with ADHD. The claim that ADHD involves limitations in self-control may seem at odds with the observation that some people with ADHD lead careers and lives that seem to place significant demands on their self-control capacity, such as entrepreneurial and academic careers.

Conclusions

For the access theory of self-control, self-control is a set of practices and behaviours. Individual differences in self-control are explained by differences in access to these practices and behaviours. Differences in access arise not just from individual biology but also from the past and present environment. If the access theory is true, then individual differences in self-control are not merely a matter of inherent character: they are a matter of justice.

By emphasizing intramental self-control behaviours over environmental ones, present discourse on self-control obscures the availability and efficacy of environmental self-control strategies, setting people with disorders such as ADHD at a disadvantage. Yet these epistemic barriers on self-control can be alleviated by emphasizing the heterogeneity of self-control behaviours. Practical barriers, by contrast, could be lifted by adjusting practices at schools, workplaces, et cetera to allow for a wider range of environmental practices in those contexts. Willpower approaches to self-control have contributed to obscuring the need for actively removing barriers to self-control strategies. Further research on the precise policy changes and educational practices by which access to self-control could best be improved is urgently needed.