Emotional mood states and memory: elaborative encoding, semantic processing, and cognitive effort

The effects of experimentally induced mood states on recall of target words embedded in sentences or alone were examined in three experiments. All experiments focused on the role of a depressed-mood induction on recall and looked at the effects of elaborative encoding, semantic processing, or cognitive effort. The overall effect of the depressed-mood state was to reduce recall in all three situations; however, the opportunity to process information semantically still led to superior recall in the depressed condition. In contrast, the superiority of recall of high-effort items disappeared in the depressed condition, suggesting that subjects may differentially allocate resources when under a depressed-mood state. The results are briefly discussed within the framework of a resource allocation theory.     

Subjective time: cognitive and physical secondary tasks affect timing differently

Humans were trained on a temporal discrimination to make one response when the stimulus duration was short (2 s) and a different response when the stimulus duration was long (8 s). They were then tested with stimulus durations in between to determine the bisection point. In Experiment 1, we examined the effect of a secondary cognitive task (counting backwards by threes) on the bisection point when participants were trained without a cognitive load and were tested with a cognitive load or the reverse (relative to appropriate controls). When the cognitive load increased from training, the psychophysical function plotting long responses against the increase in stimulus duration shifted to the right (as if the internal clock slowed down), and when the cognitive load decreased from training the psychophysical function shifted to the left (as if the internal clock speeded up). In Experiment 2, when the secondary task consisted of exerting continuous force on a transducer (a physically effortful task), it had the opposite effect. When the required force increased from training, the psychophysical function shifted to the left (as if the internal clock speeded up), and when the required force decreased from training, the psychophysical function shifted to the right (as if the internal clock slowed down). The results support an attentional view of the subjective passage of time. A cognitive secondary task appears to decrease attention to temporal cues, resulting in the underestimation of the passage of time, whereas a force requirement appears to increase attention to temporal cues, resulting in the overestimation of the passage of time.     

SCRIPTKELL: A tool for measuring cognitive effort and time processing in writing and other complex cognitive activities

We present SCRIPTKELL, a computer-assisted experimental tool that makes it possible to measure the time and cognitive effort allocated to the subprocesses of writing and other cognitive activities. SCRIPTKELL was designed to easily use and modulate Kellogg’s (1986) triple-task procedure, which consists of a combination of three tasks: a writing task (or another task), a reaction time task (auditory signal detection), and a directed retrospection task (after each signal detection during writing). We demonstrate how this tool can be used to address several novel empirical and theoretical issues. In sum, SCRIPTKELL should facilitate the flexible realization of experimental designs and the investigation of critical issues concerning the functional characteristics of complex cognitive activities.     

Mental capacity,mental effort,and cognitive style

This study tests the relationship between two theoretical models of human attentional capacity: Pascual-Leone's mental capacity and Kahneman's mental effort. It was found that significant and positive correlations exist between the empirical measures of the above constructs, and the relationship is demonstrated via construct validation by showing that the two constructs relate in the same manner to the subject's cognitive style (i.e., field-dependence/independence).     

Evaluative language,cognitive effort and attitude change

The present article deals with the effects of the use of evaluatively biased language on attitudes, and with the role of cognitive effort. We tested whether active information processing — formulating arguments on the basis of evaluatively biased language — was a necessary condition for attitude change. Results of the present study support the prediction that using evaluative language can infuence attitudes, but that these effects depend on the amount of cognitive effort.     

A dynamic,self-regulatory model of affect and performance: Interactions between states,traits and task demands

State–trait consistency and valence principles were integrated within a dynamic self-regulatory framework to predict interactive effects of state affect, trait affect and task demands on performance. State affect and performance were measured repeatedly as individuals completed a complex and dynamic decision-making task. Task demands were manipulated at the within-person level. The beneficial effect of state positive affect was strongest for individuals with high trait positive affect; however this effect was only evident under high task demands. The detrimental effect of state negative affect was weakest for individuals with high trait negative affect, with this effect being constant across task demand levels. This study demonstrated that state–trait inconsistency can be bad for individuals with high trait positive affect and consistency can be good for individuals with high trait negative affect.     

Meditation states and traits: EEG, ERP, and neuroimaging studies

Neuroelectric and imaging studies of meditation are reviewed. Electroencephalographic measures indicate an overall slowing subsequent to meditation, with theta and alpha activation related to proficiency of practice. Sensory evoked potential assessment of concentrative meditation yields amplitude and latency changes for some components and practices. Cognitive event-related potential evaluation of meditation implies that practice changes attentional allocation. Neuroimaging studies indicate increased regional cerebral blood flow measures during meditation. Taken together, meditation appears to reflect changes in anterior cingulate cortex and dorsolateral prefrontal areas. Neurophysiological meditative state and trait effects are variable but are beginning to demonstrate consistent outcomes for research and clinical applications. Psychological and clinical effects of meditation are summarized, integrated, and discussed with respect to neuroimaging data.     

Effects of topic knowledge on the allocation of processing time and cognitive effort to writing processes

Conditions of low and high knowledge about the topic of a writing task were compared in terms of the time and cognitive effort allocated to writing processes. These processes were planning ideas, translating ideas into text, and reviewing ideas and text during document composition. Directed retrospection provided estimates of the time devoted to each process, and secondary task reaction times indexed the cognitive effort expended. Topic knowledge was manipulated by selecting subjects in Experiment 1 and by selecting topics in Experiment 2. The retrospection results indicated that both low- and high-knowledge writers intermixed planning, translating, and reviewing during all phases of composing. There was no evidence that low- and high-knowledge writers adopt different strategies for allocating processing time. About 50% of writing time was devoted to translating throughout composition. From early to later phases of composing, the percentage of time devoted to planning decreased and that devoted to reviewing increased. The secondary task results showed that the degree of cognitive effort devoted to planning, translating, and reviewing depended on the task. Also, the high-knowledge writers expended less effort overall than did the low-knowledge writers; there was no difference in allocation strategy across planning, translating, and reviewing.     

Approach, avoidance, and inhibition: Personality traits predict cognitive control abilities

The extent to which approach and avoidance personality trait sensitivities are associated with specific cognitive control abilities as well as with verbal and nonverbal domains remains unclear. In the current study, we investigated whether approach and avoidance trait sensitivities predict performance on verbal and nonverbal versions of the Stroop task, which taps the specific cognitive control ability of inhibiting task-irrelevant information. The findings from the current study indicate that whereas approach (specifically, Extraversion) sensitivity was predictive of verbal Stroop performance, avoidance (specifically, Behavioral Inhibition System) sensitivity was predictive of nonverbal Stroop performance. These results provide novel evidence suggestive of the integration of motivational personality traits and the ability to inhibit task-irrelevant information in a domain-specific fashion.     

Subjective time and perceptual skill

Subjective time estimation was hypothesized as correlated with the number of discrete events one discerns per interval and one's attentiveness, interest in the experience, and efficiency. It was predicted that one who recognizes many discrete events per interval and rates high on these personality traits tends to underestimate time. For personality attributes, tapped by questionnaire, high scores denote an individual who shows the predicted characteristics of underestimaters. Estimations were made of a 3-min. tone of 191 Hz by 40 college men. Pearson correlation between questionnaire scores and time estimates was -.30. All 8 subjects with scores below 100 overestimated.     

Challenge and threat states: Cardiovascular,affective, and cognitive responses to a sports-related speech task

This study examined the relationship among cardiovascular responses indicative of challenge and threat states, self-efficacy, perceived control, and emotions before an upcoming competition. Using a repeated-measures design, 48 collegiate athletes talked about an upcoming competition (sport-specific speech task) and the topic of friendship (control speech task), whilst cardiovascular responses (heart rate, preejection period, cardiac output, and total peripheral resistance) were collected and self-report measures of self-efficacy, perceived control, and emotions completed. Findings showed that participants with a physiological threat response reported higher levels of self-efficacy and excitement. Further, none of the other emotions or the cognitive appraisals of challenge and threat predicted cardiovascular patterns indicative of either a challenge or threat state. Thus, cardiovascular responses and self-report measures of self-efficacy, perceived control, and emotions did not correlate in the manner predicted by the theory of challenge and threat states in athletes. This finding may reflect methodological aspects, or that perhaps highly efficacious individuals believe they can perform well and so the task itself is more threatening because failure would indicate under-performance.     

Hindsight bias doesn't always come easy: causal models, cognitive effort, and creeping determinism

Creeping determinism, a form of hindsight bias, refers to people's hindsight perceptions of events as being determined or inevitable. This article proposes, on the basis of a causal-model theory of creeping determinism, that the underlying processes are effortful, and hence creeping determinism should disappear when individuals lack the cognitive resources to make sense of an outcome. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants were asked to read a scenario while they were under either low or high processing load. Participants who had the cognitive resources to make sense of the outcome perceived it as more probable and necessary than did participants under high processing load or participants who did not receive outcome information. Experiment 3 was designed to separate 2 postulated subprocesses and showed that the attenuating effect of processing load on hindsight bias is not due to a disruption of the retrieval of potential causal antecedents but to a disruption of their evaluation. Together the 3 experiments show that the processes underlying creeping determinism are effortful, and they highlight the crucial role of causal reasoning in the perception of past events.     

Dreaming and the brain: toward a cognitive neuroscience of conscious states

Sleep researchers in different disciplines disagree about how fully dreaming can be explained in terms of brain physiology. Debate has focused on whether REM sleep dreaming is qualitatively different from nonREM (NREM) sleep and waking. A review of psychophysiological studies shows clear quantitative differences between REM and NREM mentation and between REM and waking mentation. Recent neuroimaging and neurophysiological studies also differentiate REM, NREM, and waking in features with phenomenological implications. Both evidence and theory suggest that there are isomorphisms between the phenomenology and the physiology of dreams. We present a three-dimensional model with specific examples from normally and abnormally changing conscious states.     

Exploring the hardship of ease: Subjective and objective effort in the ease-of-processing paradigm

Numerous studies examined the role of processing effort in judgments using the “ease-of-processing” paradigm in which participants generate or retrieve few or many issue-relevant thoughts. Because earlier studies only assessed the subjective effort, it is unclear if this paradigm also mobilizes objective effort, and how such effort relates to subjective effort. These questions were addressed in two experiments modeled on standard tasks from the processing effort literature: “ease of argument generation” (Study 1) and “ease of retrieval” (Study 2). In both experiments we simultaneously measured subjective effort (via self-report) and objective effort (via cardiovascular reactivity). The results showed that processing ease manipulations (generation or retrieval of few vs. many exemplars) influence not only subjective effort, but also objective effort, as reflected especially by increases of systolic blood pressure in the many exemplars condition. However, only subjective effort was related to judgment. In the discussion, we consider the role of various forms of effort and other relevant variables in “processing ease” effects.     

Mental states in animals: cognitive ethology

This article addresses the question of mental states in animals as viewed in 'cognitive ethology'. In effect, this field of research aims at studying naturally occurring behaviours such as food caching, individual recognition, imitation, tool use and communication in wild animals, in order to seek for evidence of mental experiences, self-awareness and intentionality. Cognitive ethologists use some philosophical concepts (e.g., the 'intentional stance') to carry out their programme of the investigation of natural behaviours. A comparison between cognitive ethology and other approaches to the investigation of cognitive processes in animals (e.g., experimental animal psychology) helps to point out the strengths and weaknesses of cognitive ethology. Moreover, laboratory attempts to analyse experimentally intentional behaviours such as deception, the relationship between seeing and knowing, as well as the ability of animals to monitor their own states of knowing, suggest that cognitive ethology could benefit significantly from the conceptual frameworks and methods of animal cognitive psychology. Both disciplines could, in fact, contribute to the understanding of which cognitive abilities are evolutionary adaptations.     

Observer states and traits and the imitative process: A test of a new formulation

In three studies the formulation was tested that characteristics of the observer have an effect on imitation only in situations which provide little information concerning appropriate or expected behaviors. In Experiment I, female college students of high, medium, and low need for social approval underwent either a high or low arousal manipulation. Subjects observed a videotaped model who engaged in a size judgment task. For half the subjects the model received verbal reward (high information); for the other half the model received no feedback (low information). Subsequently, the model and subject responded alternately in the task during which no feedback was given. Neither need for social approval nor manipulated arousal was found to be systematically related to imitation in either information condition. However, the hypothesized relationships were found when subjects' arousal or anxiety levels were determined by self ratings. These results were replicated in a second, similar experiment. In a third experiment, which involved an improved arousal manipulation, the hypothesized relationships were confirmed.     

A latent markov model for the analysis of longitudinal data collected in continuous time: states, durations, and transitions

Markov models provide a general framework for analyzing and interpreting time dependencies in psychological applications. Recent work extended Markov models to the case of latent states because frequently psychological states are not directly observable and subject to measurement error. This article presents a further generalization of latent Markov models to allow for the analysis of rating data that are collected at arbitrary points in time. This extension offers new ways of investigating change processes by focusing explicitly on the durations that are spent in latent states. In an experience sampling application the author shows that such duration analyses can provide valuable insights about chronometric features of emotions.