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This study investigated objective and subjective cognitive effort as a function of task difficulty in schizophrenia, based on the principles of motivational intensity theory. Thirty individuals with schizophrenia and 30 healthy controls worked on four levels of a working memory task ranging from easy to extremely difficult. We assessed objective effort as cardiovascular activity during task performance and subjective effort via self-report. In addition, we assessed participants' task performance, negative symptoms, amotivation, depression, and fatigue. Cardiovascular activity during the task increased only in the healthy control group, but not in the schizophrenia group, indicating attenuated objective effort in schizophrenia. However, individuals with schizophrenia reported similar levels of subjective effort as healthy controls. Moreover, we found a negative association between fatigue and cardiovascular activity only in the schizophrenia group. Our results show a dissociation between objective and subjective effort in schizophrenia, which may explain decreased willingness to mobilize cognitive resources in individuals with schizophrenia. Moreover, our results highlight the importance of fatigue in effort in schizophrenia, a variable rarely considered in the current literature., Author(s): Amandine Décombe [sup.1] [sup.2] , Kerstin Brinkmann [sup.3] , Marine Merenciano [sup.1] [sup.2] , Delphine Capdevielle [sup.2] [sup.4] , Guido H. E. Gendolla [sup.3] , Stéphane Raffard [sup.1] [sup.2] [...]

Dysphoric individuals perceive mental tasks as more demanding and show increased cardiovascular responses during the performance of easy cognitive tasks. Recent research on action shielding indicates that providing individuals with personal control over their tasks can mitigate the effects of manipulated affective states on cardiovascular responses reflecting effort. We investigated whether the shielding effect of personal choice also applies to the effect of dispositional negative mood on effort. N = 125 university students with high (dysphoric) versus low (nondysphoric) depressive symptoms engaged in an easy cognitive task either by personal choice or external assignment. As expected, dysphoric individuals showed significantly stronger cardiac PEP reactivity during task performance when the task was externally assigned. Most importantly, this dysphoria effect disappeared when participants could ostensibly personally choose their task. Our findings show that the previously observed shielding effect of personal action choice against incidental affective stimulation also applies to dispositional negative affect. Dysphoric individuals show increased cardiovascular responses when performing easy cognitive tasks. This study revealed that personal control over the task to be performed can attenuate the effects of dispositional negative affect on effort‐related cardiovascular responses. The present study extends recent research on action shielding. The shielding effect of personal choice against incidental affective stimulation also applies to dispositional negative affect related to individuals' depressive symptoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since personal choice fosters commitment and shields action execution against potentially conflicting influences, two laboratory experiments with university students (N = 228) tested whether engaging in action by personal choice versus external assignment of task characteristics moderates the effect of irrelevant acoustic noise on cardiovascular responses reflecting effort. Participants who could personally choose the stimulus color of moderately difficult cognitive tasks were expected to be shielded against the irrelevant noise. By contrast, when the stimulus color was externally assigned, we predicted receptivity for the irrelevant noise to be high. As expected, in both experiments, participants in the assigned color condition showed stronger cardiac pre‐ejection period reactivity during task performance when exposed to noise than when working in silence. On the contrary, participants who could choose the stimulus color were shielded against the noise effect on effort. These findings conceptually replicate and extend research on the action shielding effect by personal choice and hold practical implications for occupational health. Acoustic noise during cognitive task performance can increase effort. Our two studies identify an important moderator of this effect: personal choice. In both studies, the opportunity to personally choose task characteristics shielded sympathetically mediated cardiovascular reactivity reflecting effort against noise influences during the performance of moderately difficult cognitive tasks. As predicted, sympathetically mediated cardiovascular reactivity was the strongest in tasks with externally assigned characteristics under noise exposure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Implicitly processed pictures of facial expressions of emotions have been found to systematically influence sympathetically mediated cardiovascular reactivity during task performance. According to the Implicit‐Affect‐Primes‐Effort model, this happens because different affect primes activate the concepts of performance ease versus performance difficulty. Grounded in a recent action shielding model, our laboratory experiment (N = 129 university students) tested whether engaging in action by personal choice can immunize against those implicit affective influences on effort. Participants worked on an objectively difficult cognitive task, which was either externally assigned or ostensibly personally chosen. As predicted, participants in the assigned task condition showed weaker cardiac pre‐ejection period reactivity during task performance, reflecting disengagement, when they were primed with sadness than when they were exposed to anger primes. Most relevant, this affect prime effect disappeared when participants could ostensibly choose their task themselves. These findings replicate previous research on implicit affect's impact on sympathetically mediated cardiac response and extend the literature on action shielding by personal choice effects to implicit affective influences on action execution. This study extends evidence on the action‐shielding model to affect prime effects on sympathetically mediated cardiovascular response. Personal task choice could shield against the effect of implicitly processed sadness primes on sympathetically mediated cardiac response that were evident when the task was assigned. Importantly, the present study also adds to the list of moderators for implicit affective influences on effort. The results suggest that implicit priming is less automatic and uncontrollable as previously thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A quasi experiment (N = 100 university students) tested whether individual differences in action‐state orientation moderate task difficulty effects on resource mobilization assessed as cardiovascular response. According to action control theory, action‐oriented individuals have higher self‐regulation capacities in demanding situations than state‐oriented persons. Action‐orientated individuals should also self‐generate positive affect in face of obstacles. Therefore, drawing on Wright's (1998) ability extension of motivational intensity theory and research on affective influences on effort‐related cardiovascular response, we expected that action‐orientation should lead to stronger effort‐related cardiovascular responses in a difficult task, while state‐orientation should do so in an easy task. Reactivity of cardiac pre‐ejection period (PEP) during performance on a short‐term memory task corroborated this hypothesis. The present findings provide the first evidence of a link between action‐state orientation and effort‐related responses in the cardiovascular system. Action‐control theory predicts that individual differences in action‐state orientation—an action‐control capacity—moderate task difficulty effects on effort intensity. Our experiment found the first conclusive evidence for this idea. As predicted, action‐oriented individuals showed stronger cardiac pre‐ejection period reactivity in a difficult short‐term memory task, while state‐oriented participants did so when the task was easy. That is, action‐state orientation moderates task difficulty effects on effort‐related cardiac response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ample evidence suggests that pain leads to additional demand in cognitive functioning, presumably due to its negative affective component and its propensity to capture attention. To highlight the role of motivational incentive, two experiments tested the combined effect of pain and monetary incentive on effort‐related cardiovascular response during cognitive performance. In both studies, healthy volunteers received individually adjusted painful or nonpainful thermal stimulations during a difficult cognitive task (4‐back task in Experiment 1; short‐term memory task in Experiment 2) and expected high (12 Swiss Francs in both experiments) or low monetary incentive (1 Swiss Franc in Experiment 1; 0.10 Swiss Francs in Experiment 2) for successful performance. Effort was primarily assessed as changes in cardiac pre‐ejection period (PEP). We predicted pain to increase subjective task difficulty during cognitive performance. Moreover, according to motivational intensity theory, we expected this to increase effort only when high effort was justified by high monetary incentive. Correspondingly, pain should lead to low effort (disengagement) when monetary incentive was low. Effort in the nonpainful conditions was expected to fall in between these conditions. The results of both studies support our predictions. Our findings provide the first evidence for the moderating effect of monetary incentive on physical pain's impact on effort‐related cardiovascular response. Accordingly, motivational incentives can counteract effort deficits associated with pain. The current findings further advance our understanding of pain's impact on effort‐related cardiovascular response by showing for the first time the moderating effect of monetary incentive. This suggests that it is possible to counteract effort deficits associated with pain, which may be beneficial from a clinical perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two experiments with N = 221 university students investigated the impact of primed cognitive conflict on effort assessed as cardiac response in tasks that were not conflict‐related themselves. Manifest cognitive conflict in cognitive control tasks is confounded with objective response difficulty (e.g., in incongruent Stroop task trials). This makes conclusions about the effortfulness of cognitive conflict itself difficult. We bypassed this problem by administrating pictures of congruent versus incongruent Stroop task stimuli as conflict primes. As predicted, primed cognitive conflict increased cardiac pre‐ejection period (PEP) responses in an easy attention task in Experiment 1. Accordingly, cognitive conflict itself is indeed effortful. This effect was replicated in an easy short‐term memory task in Experiment 2. Moreover, as further predicted, the primed cognitive conflict effect on PEP reactivity disappeared when participants could personally choose task characteristics. This latter effect corresponds to other recent evidence showing that personal action choice shields against incidental affective influences on action execution and especially on effort‐related cardiovascular response. Cognitive conflict is said to be effortful, but conclusive evidence is lacking. One problem is that conflict in cognitive control tasks is confounded with response difficulty. We bypassed this problem by administrating pictures of congruent vs incongruent Stroop task stimuli as conflict primes. Primed conflict indeed increased responses of cardiac pre‐ejection period in tasks that were neither difficult nor conflict‐related themselves. Furthermore, participants' personal choice of task characteristics could eliminate the conflict effect on effort. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the Implicit-Affect-Primes-Effort (IAPE) model (Gendolla, 2012, 2015), the present experiment investigated the role of prime visibility as a moderator of fear and anger primes' effect on cognitive performance. Previous research has revealed inconsistent effects. Participants worked on a d2 mental concentration task with integrated pictures of fearful vs. angry faces, which were presented either masked (25 ms) or clearly visible (775 ms). Cognitive performance was assessed in terms of response accuracy and reaction times. Prime visibility significantly moderated the affect primes' effect on response accuracy: When the primes were visible, fear expressions resulted in significantly lower response accuracy than anger primes. The opposite pattern occurred when the affect primes were masked. Additionally, visible primes led to slower responses in general, suggesting controlled prime processing. The observed performance effects corroborate recent findings on physiological measures of resource mobilization in the context of the IAPE model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]