The claim
CLAIM-468’s positive half takes evidence that positive affect lowers a goal’s priority (Orehek et al., LIT-1854; Thürmer, Scheier and Carver, LIT-1878) as evidence that stronger valence can go with a weaker hold of the prevailing ordering. That identifies one goal’s priority with the ordering’s hold, and the account the evidence comes from does not.
Fulford et al. (LIT-1860, p. 1021) restate Carver 2003 (LIT-1445, unread): positive affect “may mean that the goal to which it relates can assume a lower priority; less effort would be expended toward this goal, which would free attention and resources for other needs. If another goal needs attention at that point, effort might shift to it; this again represents a reordering of priorities.” The result is satisficing across goals. On that reading, coasting on the goal that is ahead and shifting to the one behind is a decision about the set of goals, and an ordering of the system’s own states by their bearing on its maintenance, CLAIM-440’s potential, could be what makes it. Thürmer et al.’s shift went to the competing goal, and Orehek et al.’s lowering appeared only when another goal was salient, both as that reading expects.
So the readings show a goal losing priority. Whether the prevailing ordering loses its hold is a further fact, and CLAIM-468 needs it.
What it does not say
- That CLAIM-468’s negative half fails. Hesp et al.’s fall in γ is a fall in how far the preference ordering governs policy selection at all, with habit taking over, and this claim says nothing against it.
- That the prevailing ordering does direct the shift. It says only that it may, and that nothing read rules it out.
Note of 2026-10-30: what holds it back
No reading measures where the effort released by positive affect goes relative to an ordering of the system’s states: Fulford et al. measured no other goal, and Thürmer et al. and Orehek et al. had two goals set by the experimenter, not an ordering the participants’ own conflicts reveal.