Effortful control, executive attention, and emotional regulation in 7–10-year-old children

In this study, self-regulation was investigated in 7- to 10-year-old children using three different measures: (1) parent and child report questionnaires measuring temperamental effortful control, (2) a conflict task assessing efficiency of executive attention, and (3) the mistaken gift paradigm assessing social smiling in response to an undesirable gift. Both efficiency in executive attention and smiling to the undesired gift increased over age. Executive attention was related to both parent-reported temperamental effortful control and smiling, suggesting links between attentional capacities, broad temperament measures, and social situations requiring attentional control.     

And deplete us not into temptation: Automatic attitudes, dietary restraint, and self-regulatory resources as determinants of eating behavior

Linking contemporary models of self-regulation to recent research on automatic attitudes, the present study investigated the impact of automatic candy attitudes, dietary restraint standards, and self-regulation resources on eating behavior. Participants were assigned to either an emotion suppression task (low self-regulation resources) or an emotion flow task (high self-regulation resources), and were then given an opportunity to taste candies. When self-regulation resources were high, candy consumption was uniquely related to dietary restraint standards (but not automatic candy attitudes). In contrast, when self-regulation resources were low, candy consumption was primarily predicted by automatic candy attitudes, with dietary restraint standards showing a tendency for counterintentional effects. These results indicate that the behavioral impact of automatic attitudes and personal standards depends on available control resources. Implications for research on automatic attitudes and self-regulation are discussed.     

Going the distance: Extra-symbolic contributions to the symbolic control of spatial attention

Over the past 30 years, researchers have used symbolic cues such as spatial words and arrows to direct observers' attention to the location of target objects that appear at a single, fixed distance in simple visual environments; however, they have done so by using symbolic cues that provide only partial—directional—information about the spatial location of target objects. Thus, it remains unclear whether observers can only shift their attention broadly in the cued direction in response to these cues or whether they can shift their attention to the specific location of the target by combining an expectation about direction (derived from apprehension of the directional cue) with an expectation about distance (derived from some extra-symbolic cue). The results of two experiments showed that observers do shift their attention to relatively coarse spatial locations by combining expectancies about direction and distance, and that the extent to which observers do so is modulated by the presence of visible markers and the expected distance of the target. These findings are important because they provide the first evidence that extra-symbolic information about distance contributes to the symbolic control of spatial attention.     

Sources of individual differences in the speed of naming objects and actions: The contribution of executive control

We examined the contribution of executive control to individual differences in response time (RT) for naming objects and actions. Following Miyake et al., executive control was assumed to include updating, shifting, and inhibiting abilities, which were assessed using operation span, task-switching, and stop-signal tasks, respectively. Experiment 1 showed that updating ability was significantly correlated with the mean RT of action naming, but not of object naming. This finding was replicated in Experiment 2 using a larger stimulus set. Inhibiting ability was significantly correlated with the mean RT of both action and object naming, whereas shifting ability was not correlated with the mean naming RTs. Ex-Gaussian analyses of the RT distributions revealed that updating ability was correlated with the distribution tail of both action and object naming, whereas inhibiting ability was correlated with the leading edge of the distribution for action naming and the tail for object naming. Shifting ability provided no independent contribution. These results indicate that the executive control abilities of updating and inhibiting contribute to the speed of naming objects and actions, although there are differences in the way and extent these abilities are involved.     

Two types of behavioral inhibition: Relations to effortful control and attention in school children

This study aimed to examine the relationship of two types of behavioral inhibition, social inhibition and nonsocial inhibition, to effortful control and attention in 7–9-year olds. Social and nonsocial inhibition and effortful control were assessed by questionnaires. The child version of the Attention Network Task was used to measure attention including alerting, orienting and executive attention. Results indicated that in girls, social inhibition was negatively related to effortful control and alerting, while nonsocial inhibition was positively related to orienting; there was an interaction between social and nonsocial inhibition in predicting executive attention in boys. Thus, it is of great significance to differentiate social and nonsocial inhibition when examining the association between behavioral inhibition and effortful control and attention in school-age children.     

Working-memory capacity predicts the executive control of visual search among distractors: The influences of sustained and selective attention

Variation in working-memory capacity (WMC) predicts individual differences in only some attention-control capabilities. Whereas higher WMC subjects outperform lower WMC subjects in tasks requiring the restraint of prepotent but inappropriate responses, and the constraint of attentional focus to target stimuli against distractors, they do not differ in prototypical visual-search tasks, even those that yield steep search slopes and engender top-down control. The present three experiments tested whether WMC, as measured by complex memory span tasks, would predict search latencies when the 1–8 target locations to be searched appeared alone, versus appearing among distractor locations to be ignored, with the latter requiring selective attentional focus. Subjects viewed target-location cues and then fixated on those locations over either long (1,500–1,550 ms) or short (300 ms) delays. Higher WMC subjects identified targets faster than did lower WMC subjects only in the presence of distractors and only over long fixation delays. WMC thus appears to affect subjects' ability to maintain a constrained attentional focus over time.     

The effect of emotional clarity and attention to emotion on job satisfaction: A mediating role of emotion regulation among Chinese medical staff

The present study examined the relationships among attention to emotion, emotional clarity, emotion regulation, and job satisfaction, and tested whether the plausible associations between emotional processes (e.g., attention to emotion, emotional clarity) and job satisfaction can be mediated by emotion regulation in a sample of Chinese medical staff. In total, 1,766 medical staff in Guangdong province completed questionnaires including the demographics, the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire, Emotional Clarity, Attention to Emotion, and the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. Results showed significant direct effect of emotional clarity, but not attention to emotion on job satisfaction. Cognitive reappraisal significantly mediated the associations between emotional processes (e.g., attention to emotion, emotional clarity) and job satisfaction whereas expressive suppression was not a statistically significant mediator. These results suggest that attention to emotion and emotional clarity contribute to job satisfaction by increasing certain emotion regulation strategies such as reappraisal. Intervention or medical education programs targeting enhancing emotional clarity and reappraisal may be beneficial for increasing job satisfaction of medical staff in China.     

The role of inhibitory control and ADHD symptoms in the occurrence of involuntary thoughts about the past and future: An individual differences study

In everyday life, people often experience involuntary thoughts about their personal past and future events in response to incidental cues in the environment. Yet, despite the abundance of such cues, our consciousness is not constantly flooded by these involuntary autobiographical memories (IAMs) and involuntary future thoughts (IFTs). The main goal of the present study was to further investigate the possibility that cognitive inhibitory control keeps these involuntary cognitions at bay. To test this inhibition hypothesis, we conducted a large-scale study (n = 157) in which groups of participants with different levels of inhibitory control (low, medium, high) and individuals with ADHD spectrum symptoms were engaged in a laboratory vigilance task in which the frequency of IFTs and IAMs was assessed. Contrary to predictions, although participants across groups differed significantly in terms of their individual inhibitory control capacity, the number of IFTs and IAMs reported during the vigilance task was comparable. In addition, individuals with the ADHD spectrum symptoms did not report more spontaneous thoughts compared to other groups. Together, these findings lend little support for the idea that inhibition is a key mechanism that regulates the occurrence of IAMs and IFTs in everyday life. Other possible mechanisms and avenues for future research are discussed.     

The association between attention control,anxiety, and depression: the indirect effects of repetitive negative thinking and mood recovery

Background and objectives: Attention control deficits and repetitive negative thinking (RNT; i.e., rumination) may be key factors in the development and persistence of depression and anxiety, although their role in symptom development remains poorly understood. This represents a gap in the literature, as interventions targeting attention control and associated RNT may enhance interventions and prevent costly relapse. The current study was designed to examine the serial indirect effects of transdiagnostic RNT and negative affect recovery following a lab-induced stressor on the association between attention control deficits and trait anxiety and depression.

Methods: Participants were N?=?583 university students who completed validated measures of RNT, anxiety, depression, and mood ratings pre- and post-stressor. Stress was induced using a modified version of the Trier Social Stress Test.

Results: Results of cross-sectional indirect effects models indicated that RNT and mood recovery explained the association between attention control deficits and trait anxiety and depression. Results from reversed models indicated that only the indirect effect of RNT was significant.

Conclusions: Findings suggest that RNT and mood recovery processes play an important role in explaining anxiety and depression symptoms. Additional work is needed to examine their role in symptom development and maintenance over time.