Identity Crisis or Hidden Impulse? The Psychological Power of Doubt

This study shows that doubting an important goal doesn't always reduce commitment to it. When people begin to doubt their own doubts, they can, paradoxically, feel more confident and engaged with their identity goals. The effect of the action crisis depends on how the individual evaluates and validates their own thoughts.

Throughout life, people often imagine who they want to become in the future. These mental images of themselves in future states, such as "I want to be a doctor," "I want to be a confident person," or even "I don't want to end up frustrated," are called potential selves or identity goals. They function as internal guides that direct choices, efforts, and persistence over time.

Unlike simple and quick goals, these identity goals usually take years to pursue and achieve, requiring continuous dedication and overcoming obstacles.

During this long journey, it is very common for difficulties, failures, delays, or frustrations to arise. When these setbacks accumulate or seem especially significant, a person may enter a psychological state called an action crisis. This crisis occurs when the individual begins to seriously question whether it is worthwhile to continue pursuing that goal or if it would be better to give up.

In simple terms, it is that moment when thoughts arise such as: "Does this still make sense to me?", "Am I on the right track?", or "Should I keep insisting on this?".

Previous research consistently shows that the greater the action crisis, the lower a person's commitment to their identity goal tends to be. In other words, the more doubt someone feels about continuing or not, the less motivated and engaged they tend to be.

Other studies reinforce this idea, suggesting that deeply questioning an important goal can lead to a negative revision of commitment to it, opening the way for abandoning the goal.

However, the present work proposes that this relationship is not as simple as it seems. The authors suggest that there is a deeper level of psychological processing that can completely change the effect of the action crisis on commitment. This level is called metacognition.

While cognition refers to the thoughts themselves (e.g., "I want to be a doctor"), metacognition refers to what a person thinks about their own thoughts (e.g., "I'm sure I want to be a doctor" or "I don't have much confidence in these thoughts"). In other words, it's not just what we think that matters, but how much we trust those thoughts.

To explore this idea, the study relies on Self-Validation Theory, which proposes that our thoughts only strongly influence our behavior when we trust them. According to this theory, thoughts accompanied by confidence tend to guide decisions and actions, while thoughts accompanied by doubt have less impact.

From this, the authors raise a counterintuitive hypothesis: adding metacognitive doubt to existing doubts about a goal (i.e., doubting one's own doubts) may, paradoxically, strengthen commitment to that goal, rather than weaken it.

To test this idea, Study 1 was conducted. First, participants answered a questionnaire that measured their level of action crisis in relation to their most important identity goal.

Then, they were asked to recall and describe a past situation in which they felt very confident in their own thoughts or, in another group, a situation in which they felt very doubtful about what they were thinking. After that, they answered questions about how committed they were to their identity goal.

The results showed an interesting pattern. When people with high action crisis were prompted to recall an experience of confidence in their thoughts, they showed less commitment to their goals, confirming what previous studies had already indicated.

However, when these same people were prompted to recall an experience of doubt in their thoughts, they showed greater commitment to their goals. In other words, doubting one's own doubts seemed to protect, and even strengthen, the bond with the identity goal.

Study 2 confirmed these results in a different population and using an alternative way to induce metacognitive doubt. Furthermore, this second study showed that the central factor behind this effect was, in fact, the level of confidence people had in their thoughts. Confidence in one's own thinking acted as an explanatory bridge between the action crisis and commitment to the goal, demonstrating that metacognition plays a crucial role in this process.

Taken together, these findings show that an action crisis does not automatically lead to the abandonment of important goals. Depending on how a person relates to their own thoughts, whether they trust them or question them, the crisis can weaken or even strengthen commitment to what gives meaning to their identity.

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Increasing identity goal commitment by inducing doubt in goal doubts

Patrick Carroll

Self and Identity, 1–20. 02 Dec 2025.

https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2025.2597804

Abstract|:

Although most work shows that an action crisis lowers goal commitment, the present work shows that it can lead to more or less commitment depending upon whether one is induced to experience meta-cognitive confidence or doubt. In Study 1, participants first completed the action crisis measure and, then, wrote about a time when they had experienced confidence or doubt in their thinking. Next, they completed the measure of commitment to their most important identity goal. As predicted, whereas people higher on action crisis showed lower commitment than those lower on action crisis when they wrote about an experience of confidence, they showed higher commitment when writing about an experience of doubt. Study 2 replicated and generalized these findings using a different population and induction of doubt. Moreover, Study 2 demonstrated that thought confidence mediated these effects on identity goal commitment.