The Cognition of Conflict: Ontology, Dynamics, and Ideology - Conflict and Multimodal Communication: Social Research and Machine Intelligence - page 8

Fig. 1.2 Goals vs Functions

1.2.6 Conflicts with One's Own Interests

“Interest” (in one of its meanings) is a very crucial motivational notion; when we
say “P would be in Y's best interest,” this of course presupposes some goal G1 in
Y's mind, and P would like to realize or favor that goal 4 , but it is not already a goal
of Y (instrumental to G1). Only if Y believes/knows that his best interest for G1 is
P will he formulate the subgoal that P (G2).
Interests are potential goals of an agent. This possible ignorance of our own
interests is what is really important in this notion.
In fact, since it is possible that Y does not understand which is in his best interest,
he will not act in that direction; he will use bad or self-defeating strategies for his
goals. Thus, it may be that while pursuing his goal G3 Y acts in objective conflict
with some other goals of his, like G1.
For example, I do not realize that selling my stocks for a good price now is
actually against my financial interest because they will be continue to increase in
price. Or I do not realize that as a strike breaker I am going against my group or
class interest and in the long term against my personal interests.

4 While “contrary to Y's best interest” means that P creates an obstacle or frustrates Y's goals.