Search

This study examines the relationship between cognitive and affective flexibility, two critical aspects of adaptability. Cognitive flexibility involves switching between activities as rules change, assessed through task-switching or neuropsychological tests and questionnaires. Affective flexibility, meanwhile, refers to shifting between emotional and non-emotional tasks or states. Although similar conceptually, prior research shows inconsistent findings on their link, especially regarding physiological and self-reported measures. Affective flexibility was operationalized as changes in heart rate variability (HRV) in response to transitioning affective stimuli, while cognitive flexibility was assessed using self-report questionnaires that captured individuals' perceived adaptability. The findings revealed that individuals with extremely high or low cognitive flexibility displayed similar HRV patterns in response to emotional stimuli, while those with medium levels of cognitive flexibility showed distinct responses. The Extreme group exhibited higher baseline autonomic activation that decreased after exposure, whereas the Average group's moderate baseline activation increased post-stimuli. This interaction was mainly seen in long-term HRV indexes, while short-term indexes showed a uniform response across groups, suggesting that differences in flexibility were probably not discernible via state features but rather as traits and long-term attributes. The findings suggest that cognitive and affective flexibility exist on a continuum; extremely high and low cognitive flexibility is linked to intense affective responses, while moderate cognitive flexibility corresponds to balanced physiological regulation, supporting the notion that "in medio stat virtus" (virtue lies in moderation). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Affective flexibility, the capacity to respond to life's varying environmental changes in a dynamic and adaptive manner, is considered a central aspect of psychological health in many psychotherapeutic approaches. The present study examined whether affective two-dimensional (i.e., arousal and valence) temporal variability extracted from voice and facial expressions would be associated with positive changes over the course of psychotherapy, at the session, client, and treatment levels. Method: A total of 22,741 mean vocal arousal and facial expression valence observations were extracted from 137 therapy sessions in a sample of 30 clients treated for major depressive disorder by nine therapists. Before and after each session, the clients self-reported their level of well-being on the outcome rating scale. Session-level affective temporal variability was assessed as the mean square of successive differences between consecutive two-dimensional affective measures. Results: Session outcome was positively associated with temporal variability at the session level (i.e., within clients, between sessions) and at the client level (i.e., between clients). Importantly, these associations held when controlling for average session- and client-level valence scores. In addition, the expansion of temporal variability throughout treatment was associated with steeper positive session outcome trajectories over the course of treatment. Conclusions: The continuous assessment of both vocal and facial affective expressions and the ability to extract measures of affective temporal variability from within-session data may enable therapists to better respond and modulate clients' affective flexibility; however, further research is necessary to determine whether there is a causal link between affective temporal variability and psychotherapy outcomes. What is the public health significance of this article?: The current findings highlight the potential of computerized facial expressions and vocal analyses to capture moment-by-moment processes in psychotherapy sessions. The results suggest that clients' affective flexibility, which in this project was measured by depressed clients' capacity to dynamically shift their emotional states and their arousal levels from one moment to the next, was associated with better session outcomes. The findings support therapeutic interventions aimed at enhancing clients' affective flexibility. Future work is needed to determine the causal links between affective flexibility in depression and outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BackgroundCognitive rigidity and working memory impairment are established features of internalizing syndromes. Growing evidence suggests that deficits in affective control –cognitive control in the context of emotion – may underpin elevated emotion-related impulsivity in various psychiatric disorders.ObjectiveThis study examines two components of affective control (affective flexibility and emotional working memory) as potential neurocognitive processes linking emotion-related impulsivity to internalizing psychopathology.MethodUndergraduate participants (analysis n = 120) completed the Memory and Affective Flexibility Task (MAFT), a novel behavioral assessment designed to assess hot cognition in affective flexibility and emotional working memory performance, alongside self-report measures of impulsivity and symptoms of internalizing disorders.ResultsStructural equation modeling suggested that less accurate working memory during neutral trials (cool cognition) was associated with more symptoms of internalizing psychopathology. However, effects of hot working memory and affective flexibility were not significantly related to emotion-related impulsivity or psychopathology scores.ConclusionsAlthough findings provide no support for the validity of MAFT indices of hot cognition, these results replicate and extend work on the importance of cool working memory and emotion-related impulsivity as correlates of psychopathology.

Few studies have investigated affective flexibility in individuals with high autistic traits. In the present study, we employed affective task-switching paradigm combined with event related potential (ERP) technology to explore affective flexibility in individuals with high autistic traits. Participants were instructed to switch between identifying the gender (gender task) and emotion (emotion task) of presented faces. Two groups of participants were recruited based on the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) scores: a High Autistic Group (HAG) and a Low Autistic Group (LAG). The results confirmed that the HAG exhibited greater behavioral emotion switch costs and increased N2 and decreased P3 components when switching to the emotion task. Additionally, we identified an affective asymmetric switch cost in the HAG, where the switch cost for the emotion task was larger than for the gender task at both behavioral and electrophysiological levels. In contrast, a symmetrical switch cost was observed in the LAG. These findings indicate that the HAG experiences difficulties with affective flexibility, particularly in tasks involving emotional processing. The patterns of affective asymmetric switch costs observed in both groups differed from previous results in autistic children and the general population, suggesting that the relative dominance of gender and emotion tasks may vary between the two groups. We propose that the dominance of emotion tasks declines as autistic traits increase.

Individual differences in affective flexibility may be an important factor in understanding how emotion regulation is associated with adolescents' depressive symptoms. The current study explored the role of affective flexibility as a moderator in the relationship between the use of both adaptive and maladaptive emotion regulation strategies and depressive symptoms in 65 young adolescents (11-13 years). Affective flexibility was indicated by the reaction time and accuracy index on the Emotional Flexible Items Selection Task. Emotion regulation strategies and depressive symptoms were assessed by the use of self-report questionnaires. Contrary to the hypotheses, affective flexibility did not moderate the relationship between emotion regulation and adolescents' depressive symptoms. Instead, only a direct effect of the use of adaptive emotion regulations strategies on adolescents' depressive symptoms was found. Additionally, post-hoc analyses revealed that there may exist an indirect relationship between affective flexibility and adolescents' depressive symptoms through the use of adaptive emotion regulation strategies. These findings help to formulate a better understanding of how emotion regulation and affective flexibility in early adolescents are related to depressive symptoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Affective flexibility is defined as a complex executive function which enables individuals to successfully alternate between distinct emotional and non-emotional features of a given situation in order to attain a specific goal. A large body of research has focused exclusively on flexibility in a non-emotional context, although most of our interactions with our environment are emotionally satiated. Our main aim was to propose a hierarchical framework to describe this construct from a macro-level perspective to a more nuanced and micro-level perspective, including three different levels of affective flexibility: elementary, shifting, and generative. Next, we employed this hierarchical framework to examine the role played by affective flexibility in typical development and different forms of developmental psychopathology. Lastly, we discuss how this knowledge could inform future prevention and intervention programs aimed at reducing cognitive vulnerability to developmental psychopathology.

Individual differences in affective flexibility may be an important factor in understanding how emotion regulation is associated with adolescents’ depressive symptoms. The current study explored the role of affective flexibility as a moderator in the relationship between the use of both adaptive and maladaptive emotion regulation strategies and depressive symptoms in 65 young adolescents (11–13 years). Affective flexibility was indicated by the reaction time and accuracy index on the Emotional Flexible Items Selection Task. Emotion regulation strategies and depressive symptoms were assessed by the use of self-report questionnaires. Contrary to the hypotheses, affective flexibility did not moderate the relationship between emotion regulation and adolescents’ depressive symptoms. Instead, only a direct effect of the use of adaptive emotion regulations strategies on adolescents’ depressive symptoms was found. Additionally, post-hoc analyses revealed that there may exist an indirect relationship between affective flexibility and adolescents’ depressive symptoms through the use of adaptive emotion regulation strategies. These findings help to formulate a better understanding of how emotion regulation and affective flexibility in early adolescents are related to depressive symptoms.

Emotional inertia refers to the resistance to update or change an emotional state and is a hallmark of maladaptive emotional dynamics in psychopathology. Little is known, however, about the role of emotion regulation in negative emotional inertia in dysphoria. The current study aimed to explore the association between inertia of discrete negative emotions, and emotion-specific emotion regulation strategy selection use and efficacy in dysphoria. The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES D) was used to divide university students into a dysphoria (N = 65) and non-dysphoria control (N = 62) group. Using an experience sampling approach delivered via a smartphone app, participants were queried semi-randomly regarding negative emotions and emotion regulation strategies 10 times a day for 7 consecutive days. Temporal network analysis was employed to estimate autoregressive connections for each discrete negative emotion (inertia of negative emotion) and the bridge connections between negative emotion and emotion regulation clusters. Participants with dysphoria showed stronger inertia for anger and sadness in the context of the use of emotion-specific regulation strategies. Specifically, individuals with dysphoria displaying greater inertia of anger were more likely to ruminate about the past to cope with anger, and to ruminate on the past and future when experiencing sadness. Lack of a clinical depression patient group for comparison. Our findings suggest an inflexibility to adaptively shift attention from discrete negative emotions in dysphoria and provide important insights for development of interventions to support wellbeing in this population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When children are confronted with an emotional problem, affective flexibility mobilizes their cognitive and emotional resources to optimally address it. We investigated the contribution of executive functions to cognitive and affective flexibility in preschoolers. We assessed affective flexibility in 67 preschoolers (30 girls; Mmonths = 61.77, SD = 11.08 months) using an innovative measure – the Emotional Flexible Item Selection Task (EM-FIST), plus cool measures of executive functions (working memory, inhibition and cognitive flexibility), anxiety symptoms and intelligence. Findings revealed that affective flexibility improves during the preschool years. While individual differences in age and proactive inhibition predicted cognitive flexibility, a different constellation of predictors (maternal education, proactive inhibition, working memory and age) were significant for affective flexibility. Cognitive flexibility didn't contribute to affective flexibility beyond the predictors mentioned above. Anxiety exerted a negative effect on affective flexibility in a high anxious subgroup of preschoolers, but only when processing negative, relative to happy faces, supporting the Attentional Control Theory which predicts valence-related executive impairments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of emotion on executive functioning is gaining interest. It has led to the differentiation of “cool” Executive Functioning (EF) processes, such as cognitive flexibility, and “hot” EF processes, such as affective flexibility. But how does affective flexibility, the ability to switch between cognitive and affective information, vary as a function of age and sex? How does this construct relate to “cool” executive functioning and cognitive-emotion regulation processes? In this study, 266 participants, including 91 adolescents (M = 16.08, SD = 1.42 years old) and 175 adults (M = 25.69, SD = 2.17 years old), completed a cognitive–affective switching task with specific (as opposed to general) unpredictable switches, as well as measures of inhibition, attention, and cognitive-emotion coping strategies. We expected cognitive to affective switching to be more costly than affective to cognitive switching in females versus males, as well as higher switch costs in adolescents. Using linear mixed modelling, we analysed the effect of age, sex, and types of switching on reaction time. Results show that adolescents are slower switchers than adults, and demonstrate that females, although faster switchers than males, are slower when switching from cognitive to affective content than when they are switching from affective to cognitive content. Multiple regression analyses revealed age-specific associations between cognitive-affective switching and inhibition. These results converge with reported developmental and gender specificities in EF and emotion processing, respectively. Additionally, affective flexibility could relate to differences in vigilance and inhibition.

The impact of emotion on executive functioning is gaining interest. It has led to the differentiation of "cool" Executive Functioning (EF) processes, such as cognitive flexibility, and "hot" EF processes, such as affective flexibility. But how does affective flexibility, the ability to switch between cognitive and affective information, vary as a function of age and sex? How does this construct relate to "cool" executive functioning and cognitive-emotion regulation processes? In this study, 266 participants, including 91 adolescents (M = 16.08, SD = 1.42 years old) and 175 adults (M = 25.69, SD = 2.17 years old), completed a cognitive–affective switching task with specific (as opposed to general) unpredictable switches, as well as measures of inhibition, attention, and cognitive-emotion coping strategies. We expected cognitive to affective switching to be more costly than affective to cognitive switching in females versus males, as well as higher switch costs in adolescents. Using linear mixed modelling, we analysed the effect of age, sex, and types of switching on reaction time. Results show that adolescents are slower switchers than adults, and demonstrate that females, although faster switchers than males, are slower when switching from cognitive to affective content than when they are switching from affective to cognitive content. Multiple regression analyses revealed age-specific associations between cognitive-affective switching and inhibition. These results converge with reported developmental and gender specificities in EF and emotion processing, respectively. Additionally, affective flexibility could relate to differences in vigilance and inhibition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adaptation to the context in which we experience pain requires cognitive flexibility (CF) and affective flexibility (AF). Deficits in both flexibility types may be precursors of more intense and prolonged pain. This study aimed to examine the relation between CF and AF, and the experience of experimentally induced pain. Furthermore, correlations between behavioral and self-report measures of flexibility were explored. CF and AF were assessed with task-switching paradigms, using neutral (numbers ranging from 1 to 9, excluding 5) or affective stimuli (positive and negative pictures), respectively. Pain sensitivity measures, such as pain threshold (°C), pain tolerance (°C), and retrospective pain experience ratings (Visual Analog Scale) were assessed for an experimentally induced heat pain stimulus. Self-reported CF was measured with a questionnaire. Results demonstrated no associations between the flexibility constructs and any of the pain outcome measures. Correlations between the behavioral and self-report measures of CF were absent or weak at best. Current results are discussed against the background of methodological considerations and prior empirical research findings, suggesting the contribution of AF in especially the recovery from pain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deficits in cognitive flexibility have been associated with anxiety and worry, however few studies have assessed cognitive flexibility in the context of emotional stimuli (i.e. affective flexibility). The present study (n = 79) investigated whether individual differences in affective flexibility predict levels of trait anxiety and worry over a period of seven weeks. Affective flexibility was measured using a task-switching paradigm. Results showed that less efficient shifting of attention towards affective aspects of positive stimuli predicted higher anxiety over time. Additionally, more efficient shifting of attention away from affective towards non-affective aspects of negative stimuli predicted higher anxiety and worry over time. This latter finding may be understood by considering theoretical models and empirical evidence associating avoidance of negative information with increased anxiety. The effects were small and require replication in larger, representative samples, but they are an initial indication that anxiety may not be associated with general impairments in cognitive flexibility. Instead, our study emphasises the importance of breaking down cognitive flexibility into different components to investigate more nuanced relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cognitive flexibility – the ability to adjust one’s behavior to changing environmental demands – is crucial for controlled behavior. However, the term ‘cognitive flexibility’ is used heterogeneously, and associations between cognitive flexibility and other facets of flexible behavior have only rarely been studied systematically. To resolve some of these conceptual uncertainties, we directly compared cognitive flexibility (cue-instructed switching between two affectively neutral tasks), affective flexibility (switching between a neutral and an affective task using emotional stimuli), and feedback-based flexibility (non-cued, feedback-dependent switching between two neutral tasks). Three experimental paradigms were established that share as many procedural features (in terms of stimuli and/or task rules) as possible and administered in a pre-registered study plan (N = 100). Correlation analyses revealed significant associations between the efficiency of cognitive and affective task switching (response time switch costs). Feedback-based flexibility (measured as mean number of errors after rule reversals) did not correlate with task switching efficiency in the other paradigms, but selectively with the effectiveness of affective switching (error rate costs when switching from neutral to emotion task). While preregistered confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) provided no clear evidence for a shared factor underlying the efficiency of switching in all three domains of flexibility, an exploratory CFA suggested commonalities regarding switching effectiveness (accuracy-based switch costs). We propose shared mechanisms controlling the 'efficiency' of cue-dependent task switching across domains, while the relationship to feedback-based flexibility may depend on mechanisms controlling switching 'effectiveness'. Our results call for a more stringent conceptual differentiation between different variants of psychological flexibility.

Affective flexibility (AF) is the ability to alternate between processing emotional and non-emotional information. This hot executive function has been understudied during early development. The first aim of our investigation was to generate preliminary construct validity evidence for a new measure of AF: the Emotional Flexible Item Selection Task (EM-FIST). Second, to investigate if AF represented a better predictor of preschoolers' emotion regulation (ER) compared to, cognitive flexibility (CF). Preschoolers (N = 56; 48.2% girls) completed AF and CF measures (also working memory and inhibitory control). ER was measured through maternal report. We found evidence of EM-FIST's validity, as an appropriate measure of AF for preschoolers, by showing that it is related to cool executive functions' measures and to children's ER. Both AF and maternal level of education predicted children's ER while CF did not. Our investigation highlights a stronger relation between ER and AF in preschoolers than with CF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The neurovisceral integration model aims to account for the complex interplay between physiological, cognitive, and emotion regulation processes through their support by common cortico–subcortical neural circuits. According to the model, vagally mediated heart rate variability (HRV) serves as a peripheral index of the functioning of these circuits, with higher levels of resting HRV reflecting more optimal functioning, to support goal-directed behaviour and adaptability to environmental demands. Although increased cognitive flexibility has been related to higher resting HRV, this has not been assessed in the context of emotional information to examine the interplay between cognition and emotion. Therefore, we investigated (n = 109) the relationship between resting HRV and performance on a task-switching paradigm in which participants shift attention between affective and nonaffective aspects of emotional material. Resting HRV was not associated with flexibility in processing of positive material, but more efficient shifting of attention (greater flexibility) from affective to nonaffective aspects of negative information was related to lower resting HRV. The avoidance theory of worry and anxiety, as well as empirical evidence, links anxiety to attentional avoidance of negative information. Our findings therefore support the neurovisceral integration model such that when greater flexibility can facilitate attentional avoidance of negative information—as seen in anxiety—it is related to lower resting HRV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Individuals with active major depressive disorder (MDD) have shown affective biases in cognitive flexibility and memory, particularly for negatively valenced stimuli. We evaluated whether impairments in affective flexibility would remain even during remission (rMDD), potentially representing trait‐ or scar‐like effects of illness. Method: Participants completed the Emotion Card Sort Test (ECST), a measure of cognitive flexibility containing emotionally valenced stimuli, and the Emotion Word Stimulus Test (EWST), a measure of affective biases in delayed recall and recognition memory, and several self‐report measures. Results: Healthy controls (HCs; n = 35) and individuals with rMDD (n = 93) did not differ on performance for any of the three word types on the ECST or EWT. However, individuals with rMDD demonstrated greater negative bias on EWT recognition trials relative to HCs (d = .36). On self‐report measures, individuals with rMDD exhibited greater levels of neuroticism, problems with attentional control, pessimistic attributional style, and negative automatic thoughts compared to HCs. Conclusions: These results provide initial evidence that some performance, but not self‐reported, indices of affective bias may improve during remission from MDD. Results of this study could suggest that some components of affective bias may represent state feature of illness and others trait‐like risk or scar features. Practitioner points: This study suggests that self‐reported affective biases may persist in remission of major depressive disorder (rMDD).Affective attentional biases and affective memory biases were not demonstrated in individuals with rMDD, with the exception of a bias for recognizing negatively versus neutrally valenced stimuli. Cautions or limitations: A limitation of this study was its cross‐sectional design. Under ideal conditions, the same individuals would be studied in both the active and remitted phases of illness.Another limitation of this study was the smaller number of healthy controls relative to individuals with rMDD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Performance on paradigms involving switching between emotional and non-emotional task-sets (affective flexibility) predicts emotion regulation abilities and is impaired in patients with different emotional disorders. A better understanding of how neurostimulation techniques such as transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) influence affective switching may provide support for the improvement of rehabilitation programs. In the current study healthy volunteers received anodal tDCS over the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), the left DLPFC or sham stimulation while performing an affective-switching task. Participants had to repeat or switch between facial judgments of emotional expressions (emotional task-set) or gender (non-emotional task-set). Right tDCS resulted in faster responses in the gender task only when it followed a judgment of emotion. These effects were not observed following left tDCS. Further, switching away from emotion was easier for the right compared to left tDCS group (reduced switch costs for gender), while switching away from gender toward emotion was easier for the left compared to the right group (reduced switch-costs for emotion). In sum, tDCS over the DLPFC may modulate affective flexibility and right stimulation may be particularly helpful to facilitate disengagement from emotional task-sets. The usefulness of tDCS-trained affective switching may be further investigated on larger therapeutic protocols targeting emotional disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The control of emotions is of potentially great clinical relevance. Accordingly, there has been increasing interest in understanding the cognitive mechanisms underlying the ability to switch efficiently between the processing of affective and non-affective information. Reports of asymmetrically increased switch costs when switching toward the more salient emotion task indicate specific demands in the flexible control of emotion. The neural mechanisms underlying affective task switching, however, are so far not fully understood. Using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) (N = 57), we observed that affective task switching was accompanied by increased activity in domain-general fronto-parietal control systems. Blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) activity in the posterior medial frontal and anterolateral prefrontal cortex was directly related to affective switch costs, indicating that these regions play a particular role in individual differences in (affective) task-switching ability. Asymmetric switch costs were associated with increased activity in the right inferior frontal and dorsal anterior medial prefrontal cortex, two brain regions critical for response inhibition. This suggests that asymmetric switch costs might-to a great extent-reflect higher demands on inhibitory control of the dominant emotion task. These results contribute to a refined understanding of brain systems for the flexible control of emotions and thereby identify valuable target systems for future clinical research., (© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press.)

Effective emotion regulation contributes to adapting well to challenging situations. One of the proposed cognitive mechanisms underlying emotion regulation is cognitive flexibility in processing of affective material (i.e. affective flexibility). We investigated (n = 118) effects of affective flexibility on the response to a stressor and on spontaneous use of 'adaptive' and 'maladaptive' emotion regulation strategies. Additionally, we examined how emotion regulation influences stress reactivity and recovery. Affective flexibility was measured with a task-switching paradigm in which participants shift attention between affective and non-affective aspects of emotional material. We investigated changes in emotion and heart rate variability to a stress induction. Affective flexibility did not influence the response to stress, but less efficient shifting of attention towards affective aspects of negative information, and more efficient shifting of attention towards non-affective aspects of positive information were related to more use of maladaptive strategies. Emotion regulation strategy use had limited influence on the perceived and actual physiological response to a stress induction, but especially more use of adaptive regulation strategies reduced negative emotional reactivity. Our findings suggest that individual differences in affective flexibility have limited influence on the (acute) response to a stressful event and recovery afterwards, but do influence spontaneous use of emotion regulation strategies. • Affective flexibility did not influence the (acute) response to a stressful event. • Affective flexibility influenced use of maladaptive emotion regulation strategies. • Greater use of adaptive regulation strategies reduced negative emotional reactivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Depression might be associated with poor affective flexibility, defined as the ability to switch between emotional and non-emotional aspects of a stimulus. However, it is unclear whether affective inflexibility in depression is valence-specific, whether it predicts future depressive symptoms, and whether affective flexibility following a stressor, compared to before a stressor, better predicts depressive symptoms. Before and after a stressor, participants (N = 300) completed an affective switching task during which they categorized pictures either by the valence or by the number of humans present in the pictures. Slower shifting from emotional aspects of negative material before stress was uniquely associated with higher levels of prospective depressive symptoms. This negative bias in affective flexibility may hinder disengagement from negative information, thereby exacerbating depressive symptoms. • Depression may be characterized by poor affective flexibility. • Affective flexibility with negative information uniquely predicts future depression. • The results highlight the importance of affective flexibility as a vulnerability factor for depression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]