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Proactive interference (PI) occurs when previously learned information impairs memory for more recently learned information. Most PI studies have employed verbal stimuli, while the role of PI in visual working memory (VWM) has had relatively little attention. In the verbal domain, Johansson and colleagues (2018) found that pupil diameter – a real-time neurophysiological index of cognitive effort – reflects the accumulation and resolution of PI. Here we use a novel, naturalistic paradigm to test the behavioral and pupillary correlates of PI resolution for what-was-where item-location bindings in VWM. Importantly, in our paradigm, trials (PI vs. no-PI condition) are mixed in a block, and participants are naïve to the condition until they are tested. This design sidesteps concerns about differences in encoding strategies or generalized effort differences between conditions. Across three experiments (N = 122 total) we assessed PI's effect on VWM and whether PI resolution during memory retrieval is associated with greater cognitive effort (as indexed by the phasic, task-evoked pupil response). We found strong support for PI's detrimental effect on VWM (even with our spatially distributed stimuli), but no consistent link between interference resolution and effort during memory retrieval (this, even though the pupil was a reliable indicator that higher-performing individuals tried harder during memory encoding). We speculate that when explicit strategies are minimized, and PI resolution relies primarily on implicit processing, the effect may not be sufficient to trigger a robust pupillometric response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Text type influences the translator's decision in taking an overall translation approach and consequently selecting translation techniques. While the majority of studies to date have investigated this phenomenon as an end-product, the effect of text types on the translation process has received little attention in the area of cognitive translation processes, especially from an empirical perspective. To fill this gap, the current study employed eye-tracking and keyboard-logging approaches to investigate the effect of text type (informative text, expressive text, and operative text) on the cognitive efforts demanded in the Human Translation (HT) and Neural Machine Translation Post-Editing (PE) processes. The data was collected from 24 participants (12 professional translators and 12 undergraduate students), who were required to manually translate and post-edit three text types from Chinese into English. From the findings, it appears that text types affect the translator's time investment, mental process, and technical input in both HT and PE processes. The findings also suggest that PE, as one mode of Human–Computer Interaction, emancipates translators from the effortful task of traditional from-scratch translation, and this effort change is also affected by the text type. The study has practical implications for both translators and translator training. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives To develop and validate a novel measure, action entropy, for assessing the cognitive effort associated with electronic health record (EHR)-based work activities. Materials and Methods EHR-based audit logs of attending physicians and advanced practice providers (APPs) from four surgical intensive care units in 2019 were included. Neural language models (LMs) were trained and validated separately for attendings' and APPs' action sequences. Action entropy was calculated as the cross-entropy associated with the predicted probability of the next action, based on prior actions. To validate the measure, a matched pairs study was conducted to assess the difference in action entropy during known high cognitive effort scenarios, namely, attention switching between patients and to or from the EHR inbox. Results Sixty-five clinicians performing 5 904 429 EHR-based audit log actions on 8956 unique patients were included. All attention switching scenarios were associated with a higher action entropy compared to non-switching scenarios (P  < .001), except for the from-inbox switching scenario among APPs. The highest difference among attendings was for the from-inbox attention switching: Action entropy was 1.288 (95% CI, 1.256-1.320) standard deviations (SDs) higher for switching compared to non-switching scenarios. For APPs, the highest difference was for the to-inbox switching, where action entropy was 2.354 (95% CI, 2.311-2.397) SDs higher for switching compared to non-switching scenarios. Discussion We developed a LM-based metric, action entropy, for assessing cognitive burden associated with EHR-based actions. The metric showed discriminant validity and statistical significance when evaluated against known situations of high cognitive effort (ie, attention switching). With additional validation, this metric can potentially be used as a screening tool for assessing behavioral action phenotypes that are associated with higher cognitive burden. Conclusion An LM-based action entropy metric—relying on sequences of EHR actions—offers opportunities for assessing cognitive effort in EHR-based workflows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Making choices about whether and when to engage cognitive effort are a common feature of everyday experience, with important consequences for academic, career, and health outcomes. Yet, despite their hypothesized importance, very little is understood about the underlying mechanisms that support this form of human cost–benefit decision-making. To investigate these mechanisms, we used the Cognitive Effort Discounting Paradigm (Cog-ED) during fMRI scanning to precisely quantify the neural encoding of varying cognitive effort demands relative to reward outcomes, within two distinct cognitive domains (working memory, speech comprehension). The findings provide strong evidence that the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) plays a central and selective role in this decisionmaking process. Trial-by-trial modulations in dACC activation tracked the relative subjective value of the low-effort, low-reward option, with the strongest activity occurring when this was of greater value than the high-effort, high-reward option. In contrast, dACC activity was not modulated by decision difficulty, though such effects were found in other frontoparietal regions. Critically, dACC activity was also strongly correlated across the two decision-making task domains and further predicted subsequent choice behavior in both. Together, the results suggest that dACC activity modulation reflects a domain-general valuation comparison mechanism, which acts to bias participants away from decisions to engage in cognitive effort, when the perceived subjective costs of such engagement outweigh the reward-related benefits. These findings complement work in other cost domains and species by pointing to a clear role of the dACC in representing subjective value differences between choice options during cost–benefit decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Influential theories in psychology, neuroscience, and economics assume that the exertion of mental effort should feel aversive. Yet, this assumption is usually untested, and it is challenged by casual observations and previous studies. Here, we meta-analyze (a) whether mental effort is generally experienced as aversive and (b) whether the association between mental effort and aversive feelings depends on population and task characteristics. We meta-analyzed a set of 170 studies (from 125 articles published in 2019–2020; 358 different tasks; 4,670 unique subjects). These studies were conducted in a variety of populations (e.g., health care employees, military employees, amateur athletes, college students; data were collected in 29 different countries) and used a variety of tasks (e.g., equipment testing tasks, virtual reality tasks, cognitive performance tasks). Despite this diversity, these studies had one crucial common feature: All used the NASA Task Load Index to examine participants' experiences of effort and negative affect. As expected, we found a strong positive association between mental effort and negative affect. Surprisingly, just one of our 15 moderators had a significant effect (effort felt somewhat less aversive in studies from Asia vs. Europe and North America). Overall, mental effort felt aversive in different types of tasks (e.g., tasks with and without feedback), in different types of populations (e.g., university-educated populations and non-university-educated populations), and on different continents. Supporting theories that conceptualize effort as a cost, we suggest that mental effort is inherently aversive. Public Significance Statement: In practice, employers and educators often stimulate employees and students to exert mental effort. On the surface, this seems to work well: Employees and students are indeed often observed to opt for mentally effortful activities. One may be tempted to conclude from this observation that employees and students may readily learn to enjoy mental effort. Our results suggest that this conclusion would be false: Our meta-analysis shows that mental effort feels unpleasant across a wide range of populations and tasks. This insight is important for professionals (e.g., engineers, educators) who design tasks, tools, interfaces, materials, and instructions. When employees and students are required to exert substantial mental effort, it is sensible to support or reward them (e.g., by providing structure, by balancing demanding tasks with tasks that foster engagement, or by highlighting achievements). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People often choose suboptimal attentional control strategies during visual search. This has been at least partially attributed to the avoidance of the cognitive effort associated with the optimal strategy, but aspects of the task triggering such avoidance remain unclear. Here, we attempted to measure effort avoidance of an isolated task component to assess whether this component might drive suboptimal behavior. We adopted a modified version of the Adaptive Choice Visual Search (ACVS), a task designed to measure people's visual search strategies. To perform optimally, participants must make a numerosity judgment—estimating and comparing two color sets—before they can advantageously search through the less numerous of the two. If participants skip the numerosity judgment step, they can still perform accurately, albeit substantially more slowly. To study whether effort associated with performing the optional numerosity judgment could be an obstacle to optimal performance, we created a variant of the demand selection task to quantify the avoidance of numerosity judgment effort. Results revealed a robust avoidance of the numerosity judgment, offering a potential explanation for why individuals choose suboptimal strategies in the ACVS task. Nevertheless, we did not find a significant relationship between individual numerosity judgment avoidance and ACVS optimality, and we discussed potential reasons for this lack of an observed relationship. Altogether, our results showed that the effort avoidance for specific subcomponents of a visual search task can be probed and linked to overall strategy choices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To find a target in visual search, it is often necessary to filter out task-irrelevant distractors. People find the process of distractor filtering effortful, exerting physical effort to reduce the number of distractors that need to be filtered on a given search trial. Working memory demands are sufficiently costly that people are sometimes willing to accept aversive heat stimulation in exchange for the ability to avoid performing a working memory task. The present study examines whether filtering distractors in visual search is similarly costly. The findings reveal that individuals are sometimes willing to accept an electric shock in exchange for the ability to skip a single trial of visual search, increasingly so as the demands of distractor filtering increase. This was true even when acceptance of shock resulted in no overall time savings, although acceptance of shock was overall infrequent and influenced by a plurality of factors, including boredom and curiosity. These findings have implications for our understanding of the mental burden of distractor filtering and why people seek to avoid cognitive effort more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Cognitive assessment is based on performance in different tests. However, this performance might be hindered by lack of effective effort on the one hand, and by too much stress on the other hand. Despite their known impact, there are currently no effective tools for measuring cognitive effort or stress effect during cognitive assessment. We developed real‐time electrophysiological markers for cognitive effort and for stress effect, which could be used during cognitive assessment. Methods: We assessed these markers during the use of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) before and after cardiac surgery, which is known to involve cognitive decline in up to 30%–50% of elderly patients. Results: The major findings of the study, for the largest group of patients, with preoperative MoCA in the intermediate range, were that the decline is significantly associated (1) with higher preoperative cognitive effort and (2) with higher postoperative stress effect during the test. Conclusions: These findings, as well as preliminary additional ones, suggest a potential importance for monitoring cognitive effort and stress effect during assessment in general, and specifically during perioperative assessment. Significance: Easy‐to‐use markers could improve the efficacy of cognitive assessment and direct treatment generally, and specifically for perioperative decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the exertion of mental effort improves performance on cognitive tasks, the neural mechanisms by which motivational factors impact cognition remain unknown. Here, we used fMRI to test how changes in cognitive effort, induced by changes in task difficulty, impact neural representations of working memory (WM). Participants (both sexes) were precued whether WM difficulty would be hard or easy. We hypothesized that hard trials demanded more effort as a later decision required finer mnemonic precision. Behaviorally, pupil size was larger and response times were slower on hard compared with easy trials suggesting our manipulation of effort succeeded. Neurally, we observed robust persistent activity during delay periods in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), especially during hard trials. Yet, details of the memoranda could not be decoded from patterns in prefrontal activity. In the patterns of activity in the visual cortex, however, we found strong decoding of memorized targets, where accuracy was higher on hard trials. To potentially link these across-region effects, we hypothesized that effort, carried by persistent activity in the PFC, impacts the quality ofWM representations encoded in the visual cortex. Indeed, we found that the amplitude of delay period activity in the frontal cortex predicted decoded accuracy in the visual cortex on a trial-wise basis. These results indicate that effort-related feedback signals sculpt population activity in the visual cortex, improving mnemonic fidelity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Task-irrelevant stimuli often capture our attention despite our best efforts to ignore them. It has been noted that tasks involving perceptually complex displays can lead to reduced interference from distractors. The mechanism behind this effect is debated, with some accounts emphasizing the "perceptual load" of the stimuli themselves and others emphasizing the role of proactive control. Here, in three experiments, we investigated the roles of perceptual load, proactive control, and reward motivation in determining distractor interference. Participants performed a visual search task of high, low, or intermediate load, with flanking task-irrelevant distractors. Each trial was preceded by a cue indicating the level of perceptual load (Experiments 1–3) as well as the potential reward that could be earned (Experiments 2 and 3). In all three experiments, the attentional set induced by the preceding trial and cued proactive expectation of perceptual load interacted to determine flanker interference, which was significant for all trial types except trials cued as high load which were also preceded by high load. These effects were not modulated by reward motivation, although in the final experiment reward did significantly improve performance overall. Thus, successful distractor exclusion does not depend upon motivation or load per se but does require an expectation of high load. Public Significance Statement: We all experience distraction by irrelevant stimuli which can impair our performance of tasks, even when we are motivated to ignore them. There has been considerable debate as to which factors determine whether or not a distractor will capture our attention. We investigated several factors, including the prospect of obtaining a reward and proactive preparation based on the expected task difficulty. Our results suggest that both the expectation of a difficult task and the recent experience combine to allow us to effectively and proactively ignore distractors. In contrast, rewards could improve performance overall but did not affect the extent to which distractors captured attention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates how cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility (i.e. to coordinate with others, to structure work tasks and to organize work and private obligations) relate to work–home outcomes among health care professionals. To understand the underlying psychological mechanisms of the relationship between cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home outcomes, we combined the challenge–hindrance approach with role theory. We hypothesized a positive relationship between cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home conflict via cognitive effort (strain process) and between cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home enrichment via learning to self‐organize (learning process). Eighty‐eight health care professionals working in eldercare homes participated in a diary study and provided 407 day‐level datasets. They completed questionnaires twice a day over 5 working days. Our analyses show that the relationships between daily cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility and work–home outcomes depend on strain and learning processes. Furthermore, our results demonstrate that cognitive demands resulting from employer‐oriented flexibility, although ambivalently related to work–home outcomes on the person level, trigger distinct strain and learning processes on the day level: daily coordinating with colleagues and daily structuring work tasks were related to work–home conflict via cognitive effort, whereas daily organizing work and family obligations was associated with work–home enrichment via learning to self‐organize. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Everyday life situations characterized by poor controllability because of restrictions and uncertainty about action outcomes may attenuate motivational states and executive control. This article explores the interaction of a prior experience with COVID-19 and the susceptibility to respond to a challenging situation with low action-outcome predictability. We assessed cognitive effort readiness as the willingness to invest in cognitively demanding tasks. Individuals with a COVID-19 history exhibited a more pronounced reduction in cognitive effort readiness after experiencing experimentally induced action-outcome unpredictability compared to controls. These results suggest a generalization of perceived loss of action-outcome control among individuals with a COVID-19 history. These findings contribute to conceptualizing and assessing the long-term consequences of pandemic-induced emotional and motivational problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although mental effort is a frequently used term, it is poorly defined and understood. Consequently, its usage is frequently loose and potentially misleading. In neuroscience research, the term is used to mean both the cognitive work that is done to meet task demands and the subjective experience of performing that work. We argue that conflating these two meanings hampers progress in understanding cognitive impairments in neuropsychiatric conditions because cognitive work and the subjective experience of it have distinct underlying mechanisms. We suggest that the most coherent and clinically useful perspective on mental effort is that it is a subjective experience. This makes a clear distinction between cognitive impairments that arise from changes in the cognitive apparatus, as in dementia and brain injury, and those that arise from subjective difficulties in carrying out the cognitive work, as in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, depression, and other motivational disorders. We review recent advances in neuroscience research that suggests that the experience of effort has emerged to control task switches so as to minimize costs relative to benefits. We consider how these advances can contribute to our understanding of the experience of increased effort perception in clinical populations. This more specific framing of mental effort will offer a deeper understanding of the mechanisms of cognitive impairments in differing clinical groups and will ultimately facilitate better therapeutic interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction Resistance training volume is a key determinant of muscle hypertrophy and strength development. However, mental fatigue can significantly impact this volume, ultimately affecting performance. One prominent source of mental fatigue in modern gym environments is smartphone use, which has become pervasive and may reduce workout efficiency and overall training volume. Purpose This review examines the dual effects of smartphone use on resistance training outcomes and offers strategies to balance these impacts effectively. Conclusions Smartphone-induced mental fatigue increases perceived exertion, leading to reduced performance during resistance training by lowering volume-load and endurance, particularly in low- and moderate-intensity exercises. Despite this, maximal strength appears to remain unaffected. Additionally, smartphone use diverts cognitive resources, resulting in mental fatigue and impairing both physical and technical performance due to distractions during workouts. It can also unintentionally prolong rest periods, which disrupts the balance between muscle recovery and mental readiness, further decreasing training efficiency. However, smartphones also offer valuable benefits, such as access to fitness apps, progress tracking, and motivational music, which can help maintain or even enhance performance by improving focus and motivation. To minimize distractions and optimize training outcomes, strategies such as using airplane mode or scheduling specific times for phone use are recommended. While excessive smartphone use can impair training efficiency, careful management and strategic use can enable athletes to capitalize on its benefits and improve resistance training results. Future research should focus on developing best practices for incorporating smartphone use in fitness settings to balance its advantages while minimizing its downsides.

Individual differences in cognitive effort-based decision-making can be used to reveal human motivations to invest effort into a given task. Preferences among options that differ by dimensions related to demand levels (i.e., the interaction of task characteristics and performance measures) are also heavily influenced by how likely a person can succeed at a given option. However, most existing cognitive effort-based research has focused primarily on demand-related factors, leading to confounding inferences about the motivation behind these choices. This study used an adaptive algorithm to adjust relative demand levels for three cognitive tasks to investigate general and individual differences in demand preferences. The results highlight an overall pattern of individual differences in intrinsic motivation to perform challenging tasks, supporting research that found cognitive effort aversive to some but attractive to others. These results suggest that relative demand levels and intrinsic task factors drive the motivation to select an action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When a movement triggers effects with incompatible features, conflict between action and effect features creates costs for action planning and initiation. We investigated whether such action control costs also factor into action choices in terms of the principle of least effort. Participants completed a reaction-time experiment, where they were instructed to perform left and right mouse swipes in response to directional cues presented on the screen. Participants could select between two action options on each trial: Depending on which part of the screen (upper or lower) the action was performed in, the swipe resulted in a visual stimulus moving in the same (compatible) or in the opposite (incompatible) direction as the mouse. Incompatible action–effect mappings did indeed incur action control costs. In accordance with effort avoidance, the proportion of compatible choices was significantly above chance level, suggesting that action selection and initiation costs factor into participants preferences. Interestingly, however, participants' choice tendencies were not predicted by the actual increase in action-initiation costs in the incompatible condition. This indicates that effort-related decisions are not simply based on monitoring performance in the actual task, but they are also influenced by preestablished notions of action-planning costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The now-classic goal-gradient hypothesis posits that organisms increase effort expenditure as a function of their proximity to a goal. Despite nearly a century having passed since its original formulation, goalgradient-like behavior in human cognitive performance remains poorly understood: Are we more willing to engage in costly cognitive processing when we are near, versus far, from a goal state? Moreover, the computational mechanisms underpinning these potential goal-gradient effects--for example, whether goal proximity affects fidelity of stimulus encoding, response caution, or other identifiable mechanisms governing speed and accuracy--are unclear. Here, in two experiments, we examine the effect of goal proximity, operationalized as progress toward the completion of a rewarded task block, upon task performance in an attentionally demanding oddball task. Supporting the goal-gradient hypothesis, we found that participants responded more quickly, but not less accurately, when rewards were proximal than when they were distal. Critically, this effect was only observed when participants were given information about goal proximity. Using hierarchical drift diffusion modeling, we found that these apparent goal-gradient performance effects were best explained by a collapsing bound model, in which proximity to a goal reduced response caution and increased information processing. Taken together, these results suggest that goal gradients could help explain the oft-observed fluctuations in engagement of cognitively effortful processing, extending the scope of the goal-gradient hypothesis to the domain of cognitive tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

AbstractThis study aimed to analyze the validity and reliability of a smartphone app (i.e., Encephalapp Stroop) to measure cognitive performance. Ten physically active individuals (mean age: 25.2 ± 4.3 years) participated in three laboratory visits. In a randomized sequence, subjects completed cognitive assessments using the app and a computer separately. The response times from 100 measurements for congruent and incongruent stimuli were compared between the two devices (app and computer) using the intraclass correlation coefficient, Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient (r), Cronbach’s alpha (α), and Bland-Altman plots. There was excellent agreement between the computerized Stroop and the app version for response times for congruent (ICC = 0.806, p < 0.001; Bland-Altman bias = 41.3 ± 56.4 ms, p < 0.001) and incongruent stimuli (ICC = 0.755, p < 0.001; Bland-Altman bias = 76.4 ± 75.1 ms, p < 0.001). In comparison to the computerized version, the app demonstrated a moderate correlation for response times of congruent (r = 0.678, p < 0.001) and incongruent (r = 0.623, p < 0.001) stimuli. The results of the present study indicate that the response times of congruent and incongruent stimuli can be easily, accurately, and reliably evaluated using a mobile app. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The wide use of virtual communication has raised a need to understand its effect on communication effectiveness and the ways its different forms influence users' information processing. To that end, this study proposes the Dynamical Interpersonal Communication Systems Model and posits that the amount of information directly perceived affects individual and dyadic information processing. This proposition is tested by examining how visual information influences physiological patterns, known to underlie information processing, during in-person, video, and audio-only conferences. Results indicate that while audio-only communication sustained emotional intensity better, visual-based communication required less initial cognitive effort. Visual information in combination with physical presence (in-person communication) resulted in consistently lower cognitive effort and stronger synchronization of positive emotions, compared to contexts involving visual but without embodied information (video communication). This study shows the importance of investigating interpersonal communication simultaneously across multiple systems and at the intra- and inter-personal levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study aimed to analyze the acute effect of mental fatigue on the maximum number of repetitions in a resistance exercise session with different intensities in resistance‐trained adults. Eighteen young men aged between 18 and 25 years old (age, 22.1 ± 2.0 years; body weight, 82.5 ± 6.6 kg; height, 177.4 ± 5.2 cm; half‐back squat 1‐RM, 106.7 ± 21.9 kg) were recruited for the study. Each participant performed two trials (i.e., control and mental fatigue) in a random and balanced order for 30‐min. The participants performed three sets of half back‐squat exercise to failure, with intensities of 50%, 70%, and 90% of 1RM with a passive recovery interval of 5‐min between sets. The intensity was randomized and counterbalanced, and the order was maintained in both conditions for the same subject. We assessed resistance training using the number of repetitions to failure and perceived effort and checked the mental fatigue subjectively and objectively. The participants in the mental fatigue condition presented a significantly increased perception of mental fatigue (p < 0.05) and reduced pupil diameter (p < 0.05). The number of repetitions were significantly lower for the 50 (p < 0.05) and 75% 1RM (p < 0.05) in the mental fatigue condition, but the 90% 1RM remained similar (p > 0.05). Also, the perceived effort showed significantly higher results for the 50 (p < 0.05) and 75% 1RM (p < 0.05) in the mental fatigue condition, but the 90% 1RM remained similar (p > 0.05). Then, this study showed that mental fatigue reduced resistance exercise performance for low‐ and mid‐intensity but not for high‐intensity. Highlights: Mental fatigue reduces the number of repetitions to failure during low‐ and moderate‐intensity resistance exercise.Mentally fatigued individuals experience a higher‐than‐normal perception of effort during low‐ and moderate‐intensity resistance exercise.Measuring mental fatigue immediately before a resistance exercise session might be a rapid and valuable tool to autoregulate the exercise intensity and/or volume of resistance training sessions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The objective is to clarify the nature of cooperative moving behavior that realizes smooth traffic with others from the viewpoint of the trade-off between self-benefit and others' benefit in the shared space. Background: The shared space is not constrained by formal rules or behavioral norms, and is a potentially ambiguous situation where it is not clear who has priority. Therefore, the nature of cooperative behavior in the shared space is unclear. Method: An experimental task was conducted to compare cooperative and nonurgent moving behavior regarding completion time (self-benefit), the amount of interruption (others' benefit), and the amount of operation (cognitive effort). Results: First, cooperative behavior benefits others. Second, although cooperative behavior decreases self-benefit compared to the baseline without any instructions, it can obtain relatively more self-benefit than nonurgent behavior without considering self-benefit. Third, cooperative behavior requires cognitive effort. Conclusion: Cooperative behavior provides benefit to both oneself and others by spending cognitive effort in not interrupting others. Application: If the nature of the cooperative behavior can be clarified, a cooperative module can be implemented into the algorithms of various mobilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gaze and pupil metrics are used to represent higher cognitive processes in a variety of contexts. One growing area of research is the real-time assessment of workload and corresponding effort in gamified or simulated cognitive and motor tasks, which will be reviewed in this paper. While some measurements are consistent across studies, others vary and are likely dependent on the nature of the effort required by the task and the resulting changes in arousal. Pupil diameter is shown to consistently increase with task effort and arousal; however, the valence of arousal must be considered. In many cases, measures of pupil diameter were sensitive to both excessive and insufficient challenge. Overall, it is evident that gaze and pupil metrics are valuable to assess the cognitive state during gamified and simulated tasks, and further research is indicated regarding their use in clinical populations in rehabilitation to inform optimally engaging interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Objective Cognitive assessment is based on performance in different tests. However, this performance might be hindered by lack of effective effort on the one hand, and by too much stress on the other hand. Despite their known impact, there are currently no effective tools for measuring cognitive effort or stress effect during cognitive assessment. We developed real‐time electrophysiological markers for cognitive effort and for stress effect, which could be used during cognitive assessment. Methods We assessed these markers during the use of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) before and after cardiac surgery, which is known to involve cognitive decline in up to 30%–50% of elderly patients. Results The major findings of the study, for the largest group of patients, with preoperative MoCA in the intermediate range, were that the decline is significantly associated (1) with higher preoperative cognitive effort and (2) with higher postoperative stress effect during the test. Conclusions These findings, as well as preliminary additional ones, suggest a potential importance for monitoring cognitive effort and stress effect during assessment in general, and specifically during perioperative assessment. Significance Easy‐to‐use markers could improve the efficacy of cognitive assessment and direct treatment generally, and specifically for perioperative decline.

The rapid adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies by many organizations has recently raised concerns that AI may eventually replace humans in certain tasks. In fact, when used in collaboration, machines can significantly enhance the complementary strengths of humans. Indeed, because of their immense computing power, machines can perform specific tasks with incredible accuracy. In contrast, human decision makers (DMs) are flexible and adaptive but constrained by their limited cognitive capacity. This paper investigates how machine-based predictions may affect the decision process and outcomes of a human DM. We study the impact of these predictions on decision accuracy, the propensity and nature of decision errors, and the DM's cognitive efforts. To account for both flexibility and limited cognitive capacity, we model the human decision-making process in a rational inattention framework. In this setup, the machine provides the DM with accurate but sometimes incomplete information at no cognitive cost. We fully characterize the impact of machine input on the human decision process in this framework. We show that machine input always improves the overall accuracy of human decisions but may nonetheless increase the propensity of certain types of errors (such as false positives). The machine can also induce the human to exert more cognitive efforts, although its input is highly accurate. Interestingly, this happens when the DM is most cognitively constrained, for instance, because of time pressure or multitasking. Synthesizing these results, we pinpoint the decision environments in which human-machine collaboration is likely to be most beneficial. This paper was accepted by Jeannette Song, operations management. Supplemental Material: The data files and online appendices are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2023.4744. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is general consensus among interpreting practitioners and scholars that numbers pose particular problems in simultaneous interpreting. Adopting the view that fluency disruptions in interpreters' renditions are signals of cognitive processing problems, the authors aim to isolate those contextual and textual factors which increase the likelihood of disfluencies when rendering numbers present in a source speech. In the reported study, we analyse data from the European Parliament Translation and Interpreting Corpus (EPTIC): we focus on target-text segments whose corresponding source segment contains a number and we find the best predictors of disfluencies by applying a generalized linear mixed model. Our approach is confirmatory and so the model accounts for factors that have been suggested in earlier studies as being associated with interpreting fluency. These factors include the nativeness of the original speaker, the type of number, the frequency of numbers in the same sentence, omission, language pair and whether the text was originally delivered impromptu or read out, and at what pace. The outcomes suggest that important predictors of disfluent renditions include omission, the frequency of numbers in a sentence and the type of number; these can be said to contribute to interpreters' cognitive load when they process numbers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This meta‐analytic research delves into the influence of expertise on cognitive interpreting, emphasizing time efficiency, accuracy, and cognitive effort, in alignment with prevailing expertise theories that link professional development and cognitive efficiency. The study assimilates empirical data from 18 eye‐tracking studies conducted over the past four decades, encompassing a sample of 1581 interpreters. The objective is to elucidate the role of expertise in interpretative performance while tracing the evolution of these dynamics over time. Findings suggest that expert interpreters outperform novices in time efficiency and accuracy and exhibit lower cognitive effort, especially in sight and consecutive interpreting. This effect is particularly pronounced in the English‐Chinese language pair and with the use of E‐prime and Tobii eye‐tracking systems. Further, fixation count and pupil size are essential metrics impacting cognitive effort. These findings have vital implications for interpreter training programs, suggesting a focus on expertise development to enhance efficiency and accuracy, reduce cognitive load, and emphasize the importance of sight interpreting as a foundational skill. The selection of technology and understanding of specific ocular metrics also emerged as essential for future research and practical applications in the interpreting industry. This article is categorized under:Psychology > Theory and MethodsLinguistics > Cognitive [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The reward after-effect of effort expenditure refers to the phenomenon that previous effort investment changes the subjective value of rewards when obtained. However, the neural mechanisms underlying the after-effects of effort exertion are still not fully understood. We investigated the modulation of reward after-effects by effort type (cognitive vs. physical) through the lens of neural dynamics. Thirty-two participants performed a physically or cognitively demanding task during an effort phase and then played a simple gambling game during a subsequent reward phase to earn monetary rewards while their electroencephalogram (EEG) was recorded. We found that previous effort expenditure decreased electrocortical activity during feedback evaluation. Importantly, this effort effect occurred in a domain-general manner during the early stage (as indexed by the reward positivity) but in a domain-specific manner during the later and more elaborative stage (as indexed by the P3 and delta oscillation) of reward evaluation. Additionally, effort expenditure enhanced P3 sensitivity to feedback valence regardless of effort type. Our findings suggest that cognitive and physical effort, although bearing some surface resemblance to each other, may have dissociable neural influences on the reward after-effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Failure to provide effortful performance on cognitive testing is not uncommon for participants in clinical trials and can significantly impact sensitivity to treatment effect. Whether poor effort on cognitive testing might relate to other behaviors of interest is unknown. In the current investigation, we examined whether effort on baseline cognitive testing in a randomized controlled trial to enhance resiliency in US Army Officers predicted subsequent success in Ranger school. Methods: Baseline data on six cognitive tests were obtained from 237 US Army Officers entering a military training program prior to attempting Ranger School. Participation was voluntary and the Army was not informed of test scores. "Poor effort" was defined by chance-level accuracy or extreme outlier scores. Logistic regression examined likelihood of Ranger success according to the number of tests with poor effort. Results: Overall, 170 (72%) participants provided good effort on all tests. For these participants, 47% were successful in Ranger, versus 32% with poor effort on one test and 14% with poor effort on two tests. Logistic regression analysis found poor effort on baseline testing predicted reduced likelihood of Ranger success, β =−.486, p =.005. Discussion: A substantial number of participants exhibited poor effort on testing, and poor effort was predictive of failure in Ranger school. Findings highlight the importance of assessing effort in clinical trials involving cognitive outcomes and suggest application of cognitive effort testing in trials where other motivated behavior is targeted. Registration: Clinical Trials.gov NCT02908932. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Individual differences in cognitive effort-based decision-making can be used to reveal human motivations to invest effort into a given task. Preferences among options that differ by dimensions related to demand levels (i.e., the interaction of task characteristics and performance measures) are also heavily influenced by how likely a person can succeed at a given option. However, most existing cognitive effort-based research has focused primarily on demand-related factors, leading to confounding inferences about the motivation behind these choices. This study used an adaptive algorithm to adjust relative demand levels for three cognitive tasks to investigate general and individual differences in demand preferences. The results highlight an overall pattern of individual differences in intrinsic motivation to perform challenging tasks, supporting research that found cognitive effort aversive to some but attractive to others. These results suggest that relative demand levels and intrinsic task factors drive the motivation to select an action.

Suhao Peng,1 Dan Tao,2 Bin Xuan1 1Department of Psychology, School of Education, Anhui Normal University, Wuhu, People’s Republic of China; 2School of Early-Childhood Education, Nanjing Xiaozhuang University, Nanjing, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Suhao Peng, Email pengsuhao120@163.comPurpose: Social exclusion has been found to have a significant impact on cognitive control processing. However, the existing research on this topic has yielded inconsistent findings, possibly due to variations in the type of exclusion and individuals’ cognitive effort. Two studies were conducted to explore the influence of social rejection and ostracism on cognitive effort avoidance.Participants and Methods: Study 1 involved forty-six adults who were randomly divided into a rejection group and a control group using a get-acquainted paradigm. The demand selection task (DST) was used to measure cognitive effort avoidance. In Study 2, forty-eight adults were recruited, Cyberball and DST paradigms were used to evoke ostracism and test cognitive effort avoidance, respectively.Results: The results of study 1 showed that individuals who were socially rejected by their partners exhibited impaired response accuracy of cognitive control and increased cognitive effort avoidance. This indicates that social rejection has a negative impact on cognitive control processing and that individuals may be more likely to avoid cognitive effort when experiencing social rejection. The results of study 2 showed that ostracism had an impact on both response speed and accuracy, but it did not significantly affect cognitive effort avoidance. This indicates that social rejection affects cognitive control processing differently than ostracism, and individuals are more likely to avoid cognitive effort when experiencing social rejection.Conclusion: These findings suggest that social rejection and ostracism have different effects on cognitive effort, which may contribute to the inconsistent cognitive performance during social exclusion. Future research may explore the underlying mechanisms that lead to these differences and examine how individuals can mitigate the negative effects of social exclusion on cognitive control processing.Keywords: social rejection, ostracism, demand selection task, cognitive control, cognitive effort

This article is an attempt to bridge the divide between translation process research (TPR) which has investigated how translators as specialised bilingual professionals use their expertise to translate texts and translation reception which explores how the texts are read and received by the target language readers. Over the last thirty years, TPR has provided empirically grounded findings to demonstrate the complexity of the cognitive processes in the translator's mind but much less empirical interest has been paid to how translated texts are read and processed by the readers. To redress this imbalance, we hypothesise that the cognitive effort invested in reading a translated text can be taken as proof of how successful the translation process has been. We report on an exploratory study in which two groups of participants read a high-quality and a low-quality translation of the same text while their eye movements were recorded by an eyetracker. We compare the readers' cognitive effort indexed by character-adjusted dwell time, number of runs and re-reading in the second and third run with the translators' character-adjusted cognitive effort invested in producing the target texts. The results show that the relationship between the translation process and the reading experience is not straightforward and depends on the quality of the target text.

Prolonged cognitive effort can be considered one of the core determinants of mental fatigue and may negatively affect the efficacy and efficiency of cognitive performance. Metacognition—understood as a multi-componential set of skills concerning awareness and control of one's own cognition—might reduce such negative outcomes. This study aimed to explore the relation between metacognitive skills, neurocognitive performance, and the level of mental effort as mirrored by electrophysiological (EEG) markers of cognitive load and task demand. A challenging cognitive task was used to prompt and collect metacognition reports, performance data (accuracy and response times—RTs), and physiological markers of mental effort (task-related changes of spectral power for standard EEG frequency bands) via wearable EEG. Data analysis highlighted that different aspects of metacognitive skills are associated with performance as measured by, respectively, accuracy and RTs. Furthermore, specific aspects of metacognitive skills were found to be consistently correlated with EEG markers of cognitive effort, regardless of increasing task demands. Finally, behavioral metrics mirroring the efficiency of information processing were found to be associated with different EEG markers of cognitive effort depending on the low or high demand imposed by the task. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We aimed to analyze the effect of brain endurance training on maximum oxygen consumption (VO2máx), time‐to‐exhaustion, and inhibitory control in amateur trained runners. We employed a mixed experimental design, with the group as the between‐participant factor and time as the within‐participant factor. 45 participants attended 36 training sessions over 12 weeks. The cognitive training group (CT) performed the Stroop word‐color task [trials of each type (congruent, incongruent, and neutral) were randomly presented during each training session], the endurance training group (ET) participated in a running training program (intensity was 60%Δ of maximal aerobic velocity and performed on a motor‐driven treadmill), and the brain endurance training group (BET) make cognitive and endurance training simultaneously over 12 weeks. The total time of each session (i.e., 20–40 min) was identical in the experimental groups. VO2máx, time‐to‐exhaustion, and inhibitory control tests were measured before (baseline) and after (post‐experiment) the 12‐week intervention. A significant effect of interaction (group × time) for VO2máx (p < 0.05) was found. A post‐hoc test showed an increase in VO2máx from baseline to post‐experiment only for ET (Δ% = 2.98) and BET (Δ% = 3.78) groups (p < 0.05). Also, the analyses showed a significant interaction (group × time) for time‐to‐exhaustion (p < 0.05), and a post‐hoc test revealed an improvement in time‐to‐exhaustion for ET (Δ% = 8.81) and BET (Δ% = 11.01) (p < 0.05). No group × time interaction was found for accuracy and response time in the inhibitory control task (p > 0.05). The results conclude that BET was not superior to ET for improving VO2máx and time‐to‐exhaustion. Also, the findings conclude that BET improved inhibitory control similar to CT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Impairments in effort-cost decision-making have been consistently observed in people with schizophrenia (SZ) and may be an important mechanism of negative symptoms. However, the processes that give rise to impairments in effort-cost decision-making are unclear, leading to limited progress in identifying the most relevant treatment targets. Drawing from cognitive models of negative symptoms and goal-directed behavior, this study aimed to examine how and under what type of task conditions defeatist performance beliefs contribute to these decision-making processes. Outpatients with SZ (n = 30) and healthy controls (CN; n = 28) completed a cognitive effort allocation task, the Cognitive Effort-Discounting (COGED) task, which assesses participants' willingness to exert cognitive effort for monetary rewards based on parametrically varied working memory demands (completing N-back levels). Results showed that although participants with SZ demonstrated reduced willingness to work for rewards across N-back levels compared to CN participants, they showed less choice modulation across different N-back conditions. However, among SZ participants with greater defeatist performance beliefs, there was a reduced willingness to choose the high effort option at higher N-back levels (N-back levels 3, 4, and 5 versus 2-back). Results suggest that compared to CN, the SZ group's subjective willingness to expend effort largely did not dynamically adjust as cognitive load increased. However, defeatist beliefs may undermine willingness to expend cognitive effort, especially when cognitive task demands are high. These beliefs may be a viable treatment target to improve effort-cost decision-making impairments in people with SZ. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We aimed to analyze the effect of a head‐to‐head virtual race on 20‐km time trial performance in well‐trained mentally fatigued cyclists. A total of 24 male professional cyclists participated in the present study, which was conducted in a within‐factors design [four experimental conditions × four times (throughout 20‐km time trial cycling)]. An avatar representing the participant on the racecourse was visible during the time trials. Then, a second virtual avatar representing the opponent was projected onto the screen in the mental fatigue head‐to‐head and control head‐to‐head experimental conditions. Measurements [rating of perceived exertion, heart rate, and eye‐tracking measures (i.e., pupil diameter)] were performed every 5‐km throughout the 20‐km time trial. As a result, impaired total time, power output, and cadence throughout the 20‐km cycling time trial were found for mental fatigue compared to mental fatigue head‐to‐head, control head‐to‐head, and control conditions (p < 0.05). Also, impaired 20‐km time trial performance (total time, power output, and cadence) was found for mental fatigue head‐to‐head compared to control head‐to‐head (p < 0.05). Moreover, lower RPE was found for the control and control head‐to‐head conditions than mental fatigue head‐to‐head and mental fatigue experimental conditions (p < 0.05). Higher pupil diameter was also found for mental fatigue head‐to‐head, control head‐to‐head, and control than the mental fatigue experimental condition (p < 0.05). In summary, the overall performance throughout the 20‐km cycling time trial was improved by the presence of a virtual opponent for the mentally fatigued cyclists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Graphical representation formats (e.g., icon arrays) have been shown to lead to better understanding of the benefits and risks of treatments compared to numbers. We investigate the cognitive processes underlying the effects of format on understanding: how much cognitive effort is required to process numerical and graphical representations, how people process inconsistent representations, and how numeracy and graph literacy affect information processing. Methods: In a preregistered between-participants experiment, 665 participants answered questions about the relative frequencies of benefits and side effects of 6 medications. First, we manipulated whether the medical information was represented numerically, graphically (as icon arrays), or inconsistently (numerically for 3 medications and graphically for the other 3). Second, to examine cognitive effort, we manipulated whether there was time pressure or not. In an additional intervention condition, participants translated graphical information into numerical information before answering questions. We also assessed numeracy and graph literacy. Results: Processing icon arrays was more strongly affected by time pressure than processing numbers, suggesting that graphical formats required more cognitive effort. Understanding was lower when information was represented inconsistently (v. consistently) but not if there was a preceding intervention. Decisions based on inconsistent representations were biased toward graphically represented options. People with higher numeracy processed quantitative information more efficiently than people with lower numeracy did. Graph literacy was not related to processing efficiency. Limitations: Our study was conducted with a nonpatient sample, and the medical information was hypothetical. Conclusions: Although graphical (v. numerical) formats have previously been found to lead to better understanding, they may require more cognitive effort. Therefore, the goal of risk communication may play an important role when choosing how to communicate medical information. Highlights: This article investigates the cognitive processes underlying the effects of representation format on the understanding of statistical information and individual differences therein. Processing icon arrays required more cognitive effort than processing numbers did. When information was represented inconsistently (i.e., partly numerically and partly graphically), understanding was lower than with consistent representation, and decisions were biased toward the graphically represented options. People with higher numeracy processed quantitative information more efficiently than people with lower numeracy did. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greater sensitivity to the cost of effortful engagement has long been implicated in the development of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). The current study evaluated preferential choice to engage in demanding tasks, and did so in combination with computational methods to interrogate the process of choice. Children aged 8–12 with (n = 49) and without (n = 36) ADHD were administered the cognitive effort discounting paradigm (COG-ED, adapted from Westbrook et al., 2013). Diffusion modelling was subsequently applied to the choice data to allow for a better description of the process of affective decision making. All children showed evidence of effort discounting, but, contrary to theoretical expectations, there was no evidence that children with ADHD judged effortful tasks to be lower in subjective value, or that they maintained a bias towards less effortful tasks. However, children with ADHD developed a much less differentiated mental representation of demand than their non-ADHD counterparts even though familiarity with and exposure to the experience of effort was similar between groups. Thus, despite theoretical arguments to the contrary, and colloquial use of motivational constructs to explain ADHD-related behavior, our findings strongly argue against the presence of greater sensitivity to costs of effort or reduced sensitivity to rewards as an explanatory mechanism. Instead, there appears to be a more global weakness in the metacognitive monitoring of demand, which is a critical precursor for cost–benefit analyses that underlie decisions to engage cognitive control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gaze and pupil metrics are used to represent higher cognitive processes in a variety of contexts. One growing area of research is the real-time assessment of workload and corresponding effort in gamified or simulated cognitive and motor tasks, which will be reviewed in this paper. While some measurements are consistent across studies, others vary and are likely dependent on the nature of the effort required by the task and the resulting changes in arousal. Pupil diameter is shown to consistently increase with task effort and arousal; however, the valence of arousal must be considered. In many cases, measures of pupil diameter were sensitive to both excessive and insufficient challenge. Overall, it is evident that gaze and pupil metrics are valuable to assess the cognitive state during gamified and simulated tasks, and further research is indicated regarding their use in clinical populations in rehabilitation to inform optimally engaging interventions.

Serotonin is implicated in the valuation of aversive costs, such as delay or physical effort. However, its role in governing sensitivity to cognitive effort, for example, deliberation costs during information gathering, is unclear. We show that treatment with a serotonergic antidepressant in healthy human individuals of either sex enhances a willingness to gather information when trying to maximize reward. Using computational modeling, we show this arises from a diminished sensitivity to subjective deliberation costs during the sampling process. This result is consistent with the notion that serotonin alleviates sensitivity to aversive costs in a domain-general fashion, with implications for its potential contribution to a positive impact on motivational deficits in psychiatric disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]