Regulatory Mode Scale (RMS)

1. Abstract

The Regulatory Mode Scale (RMS), developed by Arie W. Kruglanski, Erik P. Thompson, E. Tory Higgins, M. Nadir Atash, Antonio Pierro, James Y. Shah, and Scott Spiegel (2000), is a foundational psychometric instrument designed to assess individual differences in two fundamental, functionally distinct dimensions of self-regulation: Locomotion and Assessment. Rooted in Regulatory Mode Theory, the instrument distinguishes between the self-regulatory drive to initiate and sustain continuous, unimpeded psychological and behavioral movement from state to state (“just doing it”) versus the drive to critically evaluate, compare, and appraise multiple goals, means, and alternative outcomes against normative standards (“doing the right thing”). The standard instrument consists of 30 self-report items administered on a 6-point Likert scale (ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 6 = strongly agree), encompassing two primary 12-item subscales alongside 6 social desirability and lie-detection filler items. Extensive empirical validation across cross-cultural, organizational, clinical, and consumer psychology populations demonstrates that the RMS exhibits robust psychometric properties. Both subscales demonstrate consistent internal consistency (Cronbach’s α typically ranging from .75 to .86 for Locomotion and .74 to .84 for Assessment), stable test-retest reliability, and clear factorial independence confirmed via exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. The RMS provides critical theoretical and empirical divergence from related constructs, including Regulatory Focus Theory (promotion vs. prevention), Kuhl’s action-state orientation, Schwartz’s maximizing tendencies, and traditional need for cognition, establishing itself as an essential diagnostic and experimental tool for understanding goal pursuit, affective wellbeing, decision speed, counterfactual thinking, and behavioral velocity.

2. Keywords

Regulatory Mode Scale, Locomotion, Assessment, self-regulation, goal pursuit, Regulatory Mode Theory, Arie Kruglanski, Tory Higgins, decision-making, action orientation, counterfactual thinking, psychometrics

3. Authors

The Regulatory Mode Scale was conceptualized, operationalized, and psychometrically validated through a collaboration of distinguished social and personality psychologists:

• Arie W. Kruglanski, Ph.D. — Distinguished University Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA. Renowned for foundational contributions to human motivation, cognitive closure, and goal systems theory.
• Erik P. Thompson, Ph.D. — Department of Psychology, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA.
• E. Tory Higgins, Ph.D. — Stanley Schachter Professor of Psychology, Professor of Business, and Director of the Motivation Science Center, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA. Internationally recognized for formulation of Regulatory Focus Theory and self-discrepancy theory.
• M. Nadir Atash, Ph.D. — University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA.
• Antonio Pierro, Ph.D. — Professor of Social Psychology, Department of Developmental and Social Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy. Prolific researcher in organizational psychology, leadership dynamics, and cross-cultural applications of regulatory mode theory.
• James Y. Shah, Ph.D. — Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA. Specialist in nonconscious goal pursuit and self-regulation.
• Scott Spiegel, Ph.D. — Department of Psychology, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA.

4. Purpose

The fundamental purpose of the Regulatory Mode Scale (RMS) is to measure individual differences in two orthogo­nal self-regulatory imperatives that govern how human beings approach, execute, and evaluate goal pursuits. In classical cybernetic and control models of human behavior (such as Miller, Galanter, and Pribram’s TOTE model or Carver and Scheier’s feedback loops), self-regulation fundamentally requires two distinct operations: (a) a comparative assessment mechanism that evaluates the current state against a target standard, and (b) an operative locomotion mechanism that acts upon the system to diminish discrepancies and propel transition between states. Prior to the development of the RMS, psychometric tools largely conflated these two processes or focused narrowly on motivational valence (such as approach versus avoidance or promotion versus prevention).

The RMS was designed to isolate the process-oriented aspects of goal dynamics independently of goal content or motivational orientation. Specifically, it enables researchers and practitioners to systematically differentiate between:

• The motivation to initiate, sustain, and maximize dynamic momentum across actions, tasks, and psychological states without pausing for extensive deliberative judgment (Locomotion).
• The motivation to establish benchmarks, compare all potential trajectories, perform critical quality control, and select the optimal alternative based on rigorous comparative criteria (Assessment).

In applied and clinical domains, the scale addresses crucial empirical questions. In organizational and management contexts, the RMS predicts leadership style, employee task completion velocity, workplace burnout, resistance to organizational change, and interpersonal team dynamics. In consumer decision-making, it predicts information search breadth, susceptibility to choice overload, post-decisional buyer’s remorse, and vulnerability to marketing urgency cues. In clinical and educational psychology, the RMS illuminates the differential psychological pathways leading to maladaptive perfectionism, depressive rumination, obsessive-compulsive traits (frequently driven by hyper-assessment), and impulsive, poorly planned task execution or sunk-cost entrapment (frequently driven by hyper-locomotion).

5. Psychological Construct

Regulatory Mode Theory posits that self-regulation is characterized by two independent, orthogonal functional modes: Locomotion and Assessment. Every individual possesses a characteristic chronic disposition toward both dimensions, and either dimension can also be temporarily activated or primed by situational and environmental demands.

Locomotion: The Drive for State-to-State Movement

The Locomotion dimension reflects the aspect of self-regulation committed to moving from a current state to a subsequent state, as well as maintaining that movement smoothly, rapidly, and without interruption. Individuals characterized by high chronic locomotion focus their cognitive and physical resources on action initiation, psychological velocity, and task progression. For a high locomoting individual, the value lies in movement itself (“just doing it”) rather than in lingering over whether the movement represents the absolute best possible choice.

Key behavioral characteristics of high locomotion include:

• Rapid Action Initiation: Minimal latency between the formulation of a behavioral intention and the actual initiation of the task; high locomotion individuals experience low procrastination and high ease of starting work.
• Task Continuity and Intolerance of Delay: A persistent need to remain active and “on the go,” moving immediately from the conclusion of one project into the launch of the next without an extended refractory or reflective period.
• Action-Oriented Resilience: Psychological resilience achieved through continuous forward movement; negative affective events are mitigated not by deep introspection, but by shifting cognitive resources toward subsequent activities.
• Vulnerability to the Sunk-Cost Effect: Because locomotion prioritizes the expenditure of effort and the continuation of behavioral trajectories, individuals high in locomotion can become psychologically committed to finishing projects or investments simply to preserve forward momentum, even when rational analysis dictates disengagement.

Assessment: The Drive for Comparative Evaluation

The Assessment dimension represents the evaluative, critical, and comparative aspect of self-regulation. It is concerned with “doing the right thing” by establishing precise comparative standards, weighing current real states against counterfactual or ideal states, and exhaustively vetting available alternatives to identify the single best pathway or outcome.

Key behavioral manifestations of high assessment include:

• Extensive Information Search and Alternative Generation: Prior to arriving at a decision, high assessors systematically search for additional information, compare product specifications, consider alternative routes, and critique existing plans.
• Rigorous Self-Critique and Counterfactual Reflection: Continuous cognitive appraisal of one’s own behavior, performance, and conversations (“How could I have done that better?”); high assessment is strongly associated with upward counterfactual thinking.
• Social and Normative Comparison: High assessors continually benchmark their progress against peers, external standards, and personal internal ideals to determine relative standing and quality.
• Susceptibility to Decision Paralysis and Regret: Because no single real-world option is ever entirely devoid of trade-offs, individuals with dominant assessment profiles are prone to extensive pre-decisional conflict, choice overload, prolonged decision latency, and acute post-decisional regret.

Mode Combinations and Behavioral Configurations

Because Locomotion and Assessment are statistically and conceptually orthogonal (uncorrelated), individuals can fall into four primary quadrants:

• High Locomotion / High Assessment (Comprehensive Achievers): These individuals generate rigorous comparative standards and simultaneously possess the behavioral drive to execute them rapidly. They are high-performing self-regulators who effectively balance quality evaluation with operational speed, though they experience elevated metabolic and cognitive fatigue.
• High Locomotion / Low Assessment (Action-Oriented Drivers): Characterized by high operational speed, low decision latency, and minimal regret, but vulnerable to tactical misdirection, impulsive errors, and superficial evaluation.
• Low Locomotion / High Assessment (Analytical Deliberators): Highly analytical, perfectionistic, and self-critical individuals who excel at strategic critique and risk identification, but frequently suffer from execution deficits, procrastination, and analytical paralysis.
• Low Locomotion / Low Assessment (Passive Disengaged): Characterized by low motivation to evaluate alternatives and low intrinsic drive to initiate or maintain behavioral action.

6. Theoretical Framework

The theoretical framework underlying the RMS is Regulatory Mode Theory (RMT), formulated by Kruglanski, Higgins, and colleagues as a refinement of the broader cybernetic architecture of human motivation. Historically, social psychology focused predominantly on motivational directionality, most notably instantiated in Regulatory Focus Theory (RFT; Higgins, 1997). RFT posits two motivational orientations based on human needs: Promotion (focused on growth, advancement, aspirations, and ideals; characterized by sensitivity to gains and non-gains) and Prevention (focused on safety, protection, duties, and responsibilities; characterized by sensitivity to losses and non-losses).

While Regulatory Focus answers what type of psychological end-state an individual seeks (ideals vs. obligations; gains vs. security), Regulatory Mode Theory answers how the individual regulates the process of reaching any given end-state:

• Assessment serves the comparative function of the cybernetic loop. It performs the continuous computation: $$\Delta = |\text{Current State} – \text{Reference Standard}|$$ and critically evaluates which available means will minimize that difference in the most optimal manner.
• Locomotion provides the motive force that drives behavioral change, operationalizing the transitional vector from state $S_t$ to state $S_{t+1}$ without pausing to recalculate whether alternative reference standards exist.

Importantly, Regulatory Mode Theory demonstrates that locomotion and assessment can occur within either promotion or prevention orientations. For example, a student pursuing academic excellence can display high locomotion within a promotion focus (rapidly reading numerous supplementary books to gain comprehensive knowledge) or high locomotion within a prevention focus (urgently completing assignments days ahead of time to ensure zero penalties). Conversely, high assessment can serve a promotion focus (deliberating across elite graduate schools to find the one providing the ultimate prestige) or a prevention focus (meticulously checking every calculation on a financial tax return to ensure zero audit liability).

Theoretical precursors and related concepts include Julius Kuhl’s Action-State Orientation Theory. While Kuhl’s construct positions Action Orientation versus State Orientation as bipolar opposites along a single continuum (where action orientation denotes effective volitional control and state orientation denotes volitional inhibition and rumination), Kruglanski and Higgins assert that locomotion and assessment are distinct, orthogonal constructs. Rather than viewing assessment as a pathological or dysfunctional failure of action, RMT recognizes assessment as an essential, functionally adaptive system of appraisal and value maximization that happens to incur specific trade-offs when unbalanced by locomotion.

7. Validity

The psychometric validity of the Regulatory Mode Scale has been demonstrated across dozens of independent empirical investigations involving laboratory experiments, field studies, organizational surveys, and cross-cultural psychometric assessments.

Construct and Factorial Validity

In the seminal validation studies conducted by Kruglanski et al. (2000), exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses consistently established that the 12 locomotion items and 12 assessment items load onto two distinct, uncorrelated latent factors. The correlation between the latent Locomotion and Assessment dimensions across multiple normative university and adult samples was non-significant, ranging typically between $r = -.07$ and $r = .08$, confirming complete construct orthogonality.

Convergent and Discriminant Validity

Extensive correlation matrices established the distinct nomological network of both subscales:

• Locomotion: Correlates positively and moderately with Extraversion ($r \approx .35$), Conscientiousness ($r \approx .30$), optimism ($r \approx .38$), and General Self-Efficacy ($r \approx .45$). It correlates negatively with chronic procrastination ($r \approx -.48$), depression ($r \approx -.25$), and social anxiety. Crucially, locomotion displays low or negligible correlations with Need for Cognition and Neuroticism, confirming that locomotion is not merely intellectual disinterest or affective instability.
• Assessment: Correlates positively with Neuroticism ($r \approx .28$), self-monitoring ($r \approx .34$), social comparison orientation ($r \approx .45$), Need for Cognition ($r \approx .22$), and Schwartz’s Maximization Scale ($r \approx .52$). It exhibits significant positive correlations with counterfactual thinking, depressive rumination, and chronic post-decisional regret ($r \approx .42$). Importantly, assessment correlates near zero with basic intellectual aptitude measures, proving it represents an evaluative motivational disposition rather than cognitive intelligence.

Predictive and Criterion Validity

Empirical laboratory and field experiments demonstrate powerful predictive validity across divergent behavioral paradigms:

• Decision-Making Latency and Choice Set Size: When offered options among consumer goods or academic tasks, high assessment scores directly predict extensive search time, greater numbers of examined options, and persistent dissatisfaction with the final choice. In contrast, high locomotion scores predict rapid selection, minimal deliberation latency, and high satisfaction regardless of choice set size.
• Counterfactual Processing: Following an experimental failure or sub-optimal outcome, high assessment participants generate significantly more upward counterfactual thoughts (“If only I had chosen alternative B…”), leading to diminished self-esteem. High locomotion participants immediately discount counterfactuals and focus on subsequent prospective tasks.
• Sunk-Cost Fallacy: Kruglanski et al. (2000) demonstrated that participants high in locomotion exhibited significantly greater susceptibility to the sunk-cost effect in scenario-based and behavioral simulations, remaining wedded to a failing course of action simply to maintain forward behavioral activity.
• Leadership and Organizational Performance: Field investigations by Pierro, Higgins, and colleagues (2005, 2012) in corporate and military settings demonstrated that locomotion is associated with transformational leadership behaviors, swift organizational restructuring, and high subordinate task velocity, whereas assessment predicts organizational audit accuracy, detailed strategic risk planning, and systemic error reduction.

8. Reliability

The Regulatory Mode Scale demonstrates high internal consistency and temporal stability across diverse populations and cultural adaptations:

Internal Consistency

Across the six initial development samples reported by Kruglanski et al. (2000; total $N > 1,800$), Cronbach’s alpha coefficients demonstrated strong psychometric reliability:

• Locomotion Subscale (12 items): Cronbach’s $\alpha$ coefficients ranged consistently from $.79$ to $.86$. Average inter-item correlations fell comfortably within the recommended psychometric window of $.25$ to $.40$, indicating solid construct coherence without excessive item redundancy.
• Assessment Subscale (12 items): Cronbach’s $\alpha$ coefficients ranged from $.75$ to $.84$. Item-total correlations for all retention items consistently exceeded $.35$.

Subsequent psychometric adaptations in Italian (Pierro et al., 2006), Spanish (Roets et al., 2012), Chinese (Chen et al., 2018), and Japanese (Karasawa et al., 2011) have mirrored these findings, reporting internal consistency values consistently exceeding the standard $.70$ research cutoff (typically ranging between $.76$ and $.84$ across both scales).

Test-Retest Stability

Temporal stability assessments over intervals ranging from 3 weeks to 12 weeks have established that chronic regulatory modes function as stable personality dispositions:

• Over a 4-week interval, test-retest correlations were $r_{tt} = .78$ for Locomotion and $r_{tt} = .76$ for Assessment (Kruglanski et al., 2000).
• Over an extended 10-week academic quarter, Pierro et al. reported test-retest coefficients of $r_{tt} = .74$ for Locomotion and $r_{tt} = .72$ for Assessment, confirming enduring trait properties while preserving responsiveness to targeted experimental manipulations or life stage transitions.

9. Factor Analysis

The factorial integrity of the RMS was rigorously established via both Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) during scale construction.

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

In the initial scale construction phase, an initial pool of over 60 candidate items was administered to undergraduate cohorts. Principal Components Analysis and Maximum Likelihood extraction with both orthogonal (Varimax) and oblique (Promax) rotations were performed. The scree plot clearly indicated a two-factor solution, with eigenvalues for the first two factors decisively exceeding the criteria of Kaiser’s rule (eigenvalues $> 1.0$) and parallel analysis cutoffs, while subsequent factors dropped sharply.

Item selection was governed by strict psychometric retention criteria:

1. Primary factor loadings exceeding $.40$ on the target factor.
2. Cross-loadings on the non-target factor not exceeding $.20$.
3. Conceptual breadth ensuring representation of cognitive, affective, and behavioral manifestations of each mode.

This process yielded the definitive two 12-item sets, with item loadings on their primary latent factor ranging from $.42$ to $.73$, and zero cross-loadings exceeding $.18$.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

Confirmatory factor analyses testing competing structural models have repeatedly confirmed that the theoretical two-factor orthogonal model provides superior fit relative to unidimensional or correlated single-factor models:

• Two-Factor Orthogonal Model: Demonstrates robust fit indices: $\chi^2/df < 2.2$, Comparative Fit Index ($\text{CFI}$) $ge .92$, Tucker-Lewis Index ($\text{TLI}$) $ge .91$, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation ($\text{RMSEA}$) $\approx .045$ to $.055$ ($90% \text{ CI } [.039, .061]$), and Standardized Root Mean Square Residual ($\text{SRMR}$) $le .052$.
• One-Factor Model: Forcing all 24 items onto a single self-regulatory factor results in a catastrophic collapse in model fit: $\chi^2/df > 6.8$, $\text{CFI} < .55$, $\text{RMSEA} > .12$, confirming that Locomotion and Assessment cannot be reduced to a unified latent self-regulatory drive.
• Correlated vs. Uncorrelated Factors: Allowing the covariance between Locomotion and Assessment to be freely estimated yields a parameter estimate not significantly different from zero ($phi = .03, p = .62$), demonstrating that the orthogonal configuration represents the most parsimonious and accurate representation of the latent structure.

10. Instrument / Measurement Tool

The Regulatory Mode Scale is an objective, standardized, paper-and-pencil or computerized psychometric test designed for individual or group administration.

• Instrument Name: Regulatory Mode Scale (RMS)
• Primary Reference: Kruglanski et al. (2000), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
• Target Population: Adolescents and adults (ages 16 and above) with standard reading comprehension
• Total Item Count: 30 items
  • 12 items assessing Locomotion
  • 12 items assessing Assessment
  • 6 filler / social desirability lie-scale items
• Authentic Response Scale: 6-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 6 = strongly agree)
  • 1 = Strongly disagree
  • 2 = Moderately disagree
  • 3 = Slightly disagree
  • 4 = Slightly agree
  • 5 = Moderately agree
  • 6 = Strongly agree
• Scoring and Item Allocations:
  • Locomotion Score: Calculate the mean or sum of the following 12 items: 1, 3, 6, 8, 11, 13, 16, 18, 21, 23, 26, 28. None of the locomotion items are reverse-scored. Higher scores indicate a stronger chronic orientation toward action initiation, momentum, and operational velocity.
  • Assessment Score: Calculate the mean or sum of the following 12 items: 2, 4, 7, 9, 12, 14, 17, 19, 22, 24, 27, 29. Note that Item 12 must be reverse-scored prior to computation ($1 = 6, 2 = 5, 3 = 4, 4 = 3, 5 = 2, 6 = 1$). Higher scores indicate a stronger chronic orientation toward critical appraisal, comparative evaluation, and counterfactual reflection.
  • Filler / Lie Items: Items 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 are interspersed filler items, several of which capture absolute moral perfectionism or social desirability (e.g., “I have never lied to anyone”). These items are excluded from substantive self-regulatory scoring and can be utilized to screen for disingenuous responding or high social desirability bias.
• Administration Time: Approximately 5 to 8 minutes.

11. Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Regulatory Mode Scale was first published in 2000 in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology by the American Psychological Association (APA). The scale was authored by Arie W. Kruglanski, Erik P. Thompson, E. Tory Higgins, M. Nadir Atash, Antonio Pierro, James Y. Shah, and Scott Spiegel.

Licensing and Accessibility: The scale items and scoring methodology were published directly in the academic literature for non-commercial scientific, educational, and research use. Academic researchers, graduate students, and clinical scholars may freely reproduce and utilize the 30-item scale for empirical studies without paying licensing fees, provided that appropriate scholarly attribution is accorded to Kruglanski et al. (2000). Commercial utilization, inclusion in commercial software packages, or proprietary executive coaching platforms may require formal permission or copyright clearance through the American Psychological Association or the primary authors.

12. References

Below is a comprehensive list of primary scholarly literature and foundational psychometric investigations documenting the development, validation, and theoretical deployment of the Regulatory Mode Scale:

• Avnet, T., & Higgins, E. T. (2003). Locomotion, assessment, and regulatory fit: Value transfer from ‘how’ to ‘what’. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 39(5), 525–530. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0022-1031(03)00027-1
• Higgins, E. T. (1997). Beyond pleasure and pain. American Psychologist, 52(12), 1280–1300. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.52.12.1280
• Higgins, E. T., Kruglanski, A. W., & Pierro, A. (2003). Regulatory mode: Locomotion and assessment as distinct orientations. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 35, pp. 293–344). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(03)01005-0
• Kruglanski, A. W., Thompson, E. P., Higgins, E. T., Atash, M. N., Pierro, A., Shah, J. Y., & Spiegel, S. (2000). To ‘do the right thing’ or to ‘just do it’: Locomotion and assessment as distinct self-regulatory imperatives. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79(5), 793–815. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.79.5.793
• Pierro, A., Kruglanski, A. W., & Higgins, E. T. (2006). Regulatory mode and the locomotion vs. assessment trade-off: Psychometric properties of the Italian version of the Regulatory Mode Scale. Giornale Italiano di Psicologia, 33(4), 869–896.
• Pierro, A., Presaghi, F., Higgins, E. T., & Kruglanski, A. W. (2012). Multi-tasking and the locomotion regulatory mode. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 117(2), 296–304. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2011.11.006
• Roets, A., Kruglanski, A. W., Kossowska, M., Pierro, A., & Hong, Y. Y. (2012). The switchboard of the mind: How regulatory mode and need for closure direct attention and action. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 6(9), 652–668. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2012.00456.x
• Schwartz, B., Ward, A., Monterosso, J., Lyubomirsky, S., White, K., & Lehman, D. R. (2002). Maximizing versus satisficing: Happiness is a matter of choice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83(5), 1178–1197. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.83.5.1178

13. Items of the Scale