It is premature to regard the ego-depletion effect as ‘too incredible’

The ‘strength’ model conceptualizes self-control as a limited resource (Baumeister et al., 1998). Individuals are able to exert self-control, but only for a limited period after which capacity declines leading to reduced self-control capacity; a state known as ego-depletion. The model has generated a sizable literature confirming the ego-depletion effect in multiple spheres. Our meta-analysis of published ego-depletion studies computed a medium-sized effect (d=0.62) across 198 tests (Hagger et al., 2010). Carter and McCullough (2013) recently applied analyses aimed at testing for publication bias to our data including Schimmack’s (2012) incredibility index and two regression techniques (Egger et al., 1997; Moreno et al., 2009). Regression analyses indicated that the ego-depletion effect was substantially smaller than reported in our analysis and may even be zero, and the incredibility index indicated low statistical power and the chances of finding so many significant effects improbable...