Impact Task Performance Research Articles

Impact assessment of stereotype threat on mobile depression screening using Bayesian estimation

Mental illness screening instruments are increasingly being administered through online patient portals, making it vital to understand how the design of digital screening technologies could alter screening scores. Given the strong cross-cultural belief in the gender depression disparity, digital screening technologies are at particular risk of triggering stereotype threat, the phenomenon where a reminder of a stereotype impacts task performance. To assess this risk, we investigate if a reminder about the gender depression disparity influences the scores of digitally administered mental screening instruments. In a comprehensive study, we collect data from 440 participants with a mobile application that reminds half of the participants of the gender depression disparity prior to administering depression and anxiety screening instruments. Our statistical analysis evaluates differences in screening scores with t-tests, and determines credible values for difference of means, of standard deviations, and effect size using Bayesian estimation. While the gender depression disparity reminder had no statistically significant impact on men, it did alter the depression screening scores of women and nonbinary participants. Further, prior depression treatment increased the impact of stereotype threat on women. Our research demonstrates that digital screening technologies are subject to stereotype threat and should thus be designed to avoid biasing mental illness screening scores.

Alterations in motor modules and their contribution to limitations in force control in the upper extremity after stroke.

The generation of isometric force at the hand can be mediated by activating a few motor modules. Stroke induces alterations in motor modules underlying steady-state isometric force generation in the human upper extremity (UE). However, how the altered motor modules impact task performance (force production) remains unclear as stroke survivors develop and converge to the three-dimensional (3D) target force. Thus, we tested whether stroke-specific motor modules would be activated from the onset of force generation and also examined how alterations in motor modules would induce changes in force representation. During 3D isometric force development, electromyographic (EMG) signals were recorded from eight major elbow and shoulder muscles in the paretic arm of 10 chronic hemispheric stroke survivors and both arms of six age-matched control participants. A non-negative matrix factorization algorithm identified motor modules in four different time windows: three “exploratory” force ramping phases (Ramps 1–3; 0–33%, 33–67%, and 67–100% of target force magnitude, respectively) and the stable force match phase (Hold). Motor module similarity and between-force coupling were examined by calculating the scalar product and Pearson correlation across the phases. To investigate the association between the end-point force representation and the activation of the motor modules, principal component analysis (PCA) and multivariate multiple linear regression analyses were applied. In addition, the force components regressed on the activation profiles of motor modules were utilized to model the feasible force direction. Both stroke and control groups developed exploratory isometric forces with a non-linear relationship between EMG and force. During the force matching, only the stroke group showed abnormal between-force coupling in medial-lateral and backward-forward and medial-lateral and downward-upward directions. In each group, the same motor modules, including the abnormal deltoid module in stroke survivors, were expressed from the beginning of force development instead of emerging during the force exploration. The PCA and the multivariate multiple linear regression analyses showed that alterations in motor modules were associated with abnormal between-force coupling and limited feasible force direction after stroke. Overall, these results suggest that alterations in intermuscular coordination contribute to the abnormal end-point force control under isometric conditions in the UE after stroke.

Serial and parallel processing in multitasking: Concepts and the impact of interindividual differences on task and stage levels.

In multitasking research, a central question revolves around whether humans can process tasks in parallel. What "in parallel" refers to, however, differs between research perspectives and experimental approaches. From a task-level perspective, parallel processing can be conceived as to whether complete tasks are processed in an overlapping manner and how this impacts task performance. In contrast, a large body of literature solely focuses on the central stage of response-selection and whether it can run in parallel with other processing stages, an approach we refer to as the stage-level perspective. Importantly, although each perspective addresses related topics and highlights interindividual differences, they evolved through independent lines of research. In 2 experiments, we have taken a first step to investigate if individuals' tendencies for an overlapping versus serial processing mode on the task level are related to vulnerabilities for task interference on the stage level. Individual preferences for either task processing mode were assessed in the task switching with preview (TSWP) paradigm. Individuals' vulnerability for task interference was assessed with the backward crosstalk effect (BCE) in a classical dual task. Our results suggest that individuals who prefer overlapping relative to serial task processing at the task level are less vulnerable to task interference during response selection, indicated by a smaller BCE. This difference, however, only emerged in the second experiment with an increased sample size and with task-stimuli that facilitate a bottom-up separation of tasks in the dual-task. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Exploring Potential Schedule-Related and Gender Biases in Ophthalmology Residency Interview Scores

AbstractPurpose Prior studies have revealed grading discrepancies in evaluation of personal statements and letters of recommendation based on candidate's race and gender. Fatigue and the end-of-day phenomenon can negatively impact task performance but have not been studied in the residency selection process. Our primary objective is to determine whether factors related to interview time and day as well as candidate's and interviewer's gender have a significant effect on residency interview scores.Methods Seven years of ophthalmology residency candidate evaluation scores from 2013 to 2019 were collected at a single academic institution, standardized by interviewer into relative percentiles (0–100 point grading scale), and grouped into the following categories for comparisons: different interview days (Day 1 vs. Day 2), morning versus afternoon (AM vs. PM), interview session (Day 1 AM/PM vs. Day 2 AM/PM), before and after breaks (morning break, lunch break, and afternoon break), residency candidate's gender, and interviewer's gender.Results Candidates in the morning sessions were found to have higher scores than afternoon sessions (52.75 vs. 49.28, p < 0.001). Interview scores in the early morning, late morning, and early afternoon were higher than late afternoon scores (54.47, 53.01, 52.15 vs. 46.74, p < 0.001). Across all interview years, there were no differences in scores received before and after morning breaks (51.71 vs. 52.83, p = 0.49), lunch breaks (53.01 vs. 52.15, p = 0.58), and afternoon breaks (50.35 vs. 48.30, p = 0.21). No differences were found in scores received by female versus male candidates (51.55 vs. 50.49, p = 0.21) or scores given by female versus male interviewers (51.31 vs. 50.84, p = 0.58).Conclusion Afternoon residency candidate interview scores, especially late afternoon, were significantly lower than morning scores, suggesting the need to further study the effects of interviewer's fatigue in the residency interview process. The interview day, presence of break times, candidate's gender, and interviewer's gender had no significant effects on interview score.

More than a muscle: How self‐control motivation, depletion, and self‐regulation strategies impact task performance

SummaryWhen conceptualizing work performance as requiring self‐control, scholars often employ a resource‐depletion perspective. However, this perspective neglects the role of self‐control motivation and self‐regulation strategies. In this diary study, we examine self‐control motivation (viz. motivation to control impulses) and depletion at the beginning of work and at midday as predictors of afternoon task performance. Additionally, we investigate morning aversive tasks as an antecedent of increased depletion and decreased self‐control motivation. Further, we examine the role of self‐regulation strategies (organizing, meaning‐related strategies, and self‐reward) for maintaining and improving performance when depleted or low in self‐control motivation. Data from a 2‐week diary study with three daily measurements (N = 135 employees; n = 991 days) were analyzed. Multilevel path modeling showed that self‐control motivation at the beginning of work and depletion at midday predicted afternoon task performance. We found that self‐reward in the afternoon counteracts the negative relationship between depletion and task performance. Further, we found an indirect effect from morning aversive tasks on task performance via depletion at noon buffered by afternoon self‐reward. Organizing and meaning in the afternoon were positively related to afternoon task performance. Findings suggest that self‐control motivation is important for task performance, in addition to low depletion. Moreover, results highlight that self‐regulation strategies are beneficial for task performance.

Effects of Inaccurate Feedback on Simultaneous Amplitude and Frequency Discrimination Tasks

Humans frequently engage in tasks with the intention of performing well. Many previous studies have explored feedback as a tool to improve this task performance, concluding that feedback improves task performance, but only when coupled with a task performance goal. However, there is no clear consensus on how feedback without goalsetting impacts task performance. This paper aims to investigate feedback’s impact on task performance from a new angle by determining how incorrect feedback affects task performance. Through this investigation, we explored the participant thought process that plays into how the participant uses feedback. This has several implications, for example, in regard to malingering, in which people purposefully provide incorrect feedback for personal gain. To conduct this study, we instructed participants to complete simultaneous tactile discrimination tasks on which they received correct or incorrect feedback. Our results showed a significant difference in task performance between correct and incorrect feedback, and this difference increased for a harder task. Additionally, our results demonstrated that several participants receiving incorrect feedback had longer response times, indicating that they realized they were receiving incorrect feedback. Overall, this study sheds light on how feedback can be used to manipulate task performance.

Image quality assessment by overlapping task-specific and task-agnostic measures: application to prostate multiparametric MR images for cancer segmentation

Image quality assessment (IQA) in medical imaging can be used to ensure that downstream clinical tasks can be reliably performed. Quantifying the impact of an image on the specific target tasks, also named as task amenability, is needed. A <em>task-specific</em> IQA has recently been proposed to learn an image-amenability-predicting controller simultaneously with a target task predictor. This allows for the trained IQA controller to measure the impact an image has on the target task performance, when this task is performed using the predictor, e.g. segmentation and classification neural networks in modern clinical applications. In this work, we propose an extension to this task-specific IQA approach, by adding a <em>task-agnostic</em> IQA based on auto-encoding as the target task. Analysing the intersection between low-quality images, deemed by both the task-specific and task-agnostic IQA, may help to differentiate the underpinning factors that caused the poor target task performance. For example, common imaging artefacts may not adversely affect the target task, which would lead to a low task-agnostic quality and a high task-specific quality, whilst individual cases considered clinically challenging, which can not be improved by better imaging equipment or protocols, is likely to result in a high task-agnostic quality but a low task-specific quality. We first describe a flexible reward shaping strategy which allows for the adjustment of weighting between task-agnostic and task-specific quality scoring. Furthermore, we evaluate the proposed reinforcement learning algorithm, using a clinically challenging target task of prostate tumour segmentation on multiparametric magnetic resonance (mpMR) images. Based on experimental results using mpMR images from 850 patients, it was found that <em>a</em>) The task-agnostic IQA may identify artefacts, but with limited impact on the accuracy of cancer segmentation networks. A Dice score of 0.367±0.017 was obtained after rejecting 10% of low quality images, compared to 0.354±0.016 from a non-selective baseline; <em>b</em>} The task-specific IQA alone improved the performance to 0.415±0.020, at the same rejection ratio. However, this system indeed rejected both images that impact task performance due to imaging defects and due to being clinically challenging; and <em>c</em>) The proposed reward shaping strategy, when the task-agnostic and task-specific IQA are weighted appropriately, successfully identified samples that need re-acquisition due to defected imaging process, as opposed to clinically challenging cases due to low contrast in pathological tissues or other equivocacy in radiological presentation.<br>Our code is available at https://github.com/s-sd/task-amenability/tree/v1

Alternative cue and response modalities maintain the Simon effect but impact task performance

Inhibitory control, the ability to inhibit impulsive responses and irrelevant stimuli, enables high level functioning and activities of daily living. The Simon task probes inhibition using interfering stimuli, i.e., cues spatially presented on the opposite side of the indicated response; incongruent response times (RT) are slower than congruent RTs. Operational applicability of the Simon task beyond finger/hand manipulations and visual/auditory cues is unclear, but important to consider as new technologies provide tactile cues and require motor responses from the lower extremity (e.g., exoskeletons). In this study, twenty participants completed the Simon task under four conditions, each combination of two cue (visual/tactile) and response (upper/lower-extremity) modalities. RT were significantly longer for incongruent than congruent cues across cue-response pairs. However, alternative cue-response pairs yielded slower RT and decreased accuracy for tactile cues and lower-extremity responses. Results support operational usage of the Simon task to probe inhibition using tactile cues and lower-extremity responses relevant for new technologies like exoskeletons and immersive environments.

No effects of rhythmic visual stimulation on target discrimination: An online alpha entrainment experiment.

Previous research established that rhythmic sensory stimulation can affect subsequent stimulus perception, possibly through ‘entrainment’ of oscillations in the brain. Alpha frequency is a natural target for visual entrainment, because fluctuations in posterior alpha oscillations have been linked to visual target detection or discrimination. On the other hand, alpha oscillations also relate to attentional mechanisms, such as attentional orienting or selection. Previous visual alpha entrainment studies focused on differential processing of targets presented in‐phase with the preceding rhythmic stimulation relative to out‐of‐phase targets (an ‘SOA effect’), putatively related to the phase of entrained neuronal alpha oscillations. Fewer studies probed the consequences of rhythmic alpha stimulation for attention mechanisms related to alpha power. Here, we asked whether alpha stimulation of one hemifield has similar effects on reaction times as we see for increased alpha synchronization in magneto/electroencephalography (M/EEG) studies (i.e., more alpha means impaired processing and functional inhibition). We implemented a task inspired by attention studies, assessing reaction times to ipsilateral vs. contralateral visual targets, with and without concurrent presentation of distractors. Yet, in place of any attention cues, we presented a rhythmic, vs. arrhythmic, alpha‐frequency train of visual flashes to one hemifield, in a large sample size (N = 115) in an online experiment. We found clear evidence that flash train rhythmicity did not impact task performance. We also found that the spatial congruence between the unilateral flash train and the subsequent visual target did impact response times but only in the presence of contralateral distractor stimuli. We discuss implications, limitations and future directions.

Is the n-back task a measure of unstructured working memory capacity? Towards understanding its connection to other working memory tasks

Working memory is fundamental to human cognitive functioning, and it is often measured with the n-back task. However, it is not clear whether the n-back task is a valid measure of working memory. Importantly, previous studies have found poor correlations with measures of complex span, whereas a recent study (Frost et al., 2019) showed that n-back performance was correlated with a transsaccadic memory task but dissociated from performance on the change detection task, a well-accepted measure of working memory capacity. To test whether capacity is involved in the n-back task we correlated a spatial version of the test with different versions of the change detection task. Experiment 1 introduced perceptual and cognitive disruptions to the change detection task. This impacted task performance, however, all versions of the change detection task remained highly correlated with one another whereas there was no significant correlation with the n-back task. Experiment 2 removed spatial and non-spatial context from the change detection task. This produced a correlation with n-back. Our results indicate that the n-back task is supported by faculties similar to those that support change detection, but that this commonality is hidden when contextual information is available to be exploited in a change detection task such that structured representations can form. We suggest that n-back might be a valid measure of working memory, and that the ability to exploit contextual information is an important faculty captured by some versions of the change detection task.

Effects of hippocampal interictal discharge timing, duration, and spatial extent on list learning

Interictal epileptiform discharges (IEDs) can impair memory. The properties of IEDs most detrimental to memory, however, are undefined. We studied the impact of temporal and spatial characteristics of IEDs on list learning. Subjects completed a memory task during intracranial EEG recordings including hippocampal depth and temporal neocortical subdural electrodes. Subjects viewed a series of objects, and after a distracting task, recalled the objects from the list. The impacts of IED presence, duration, and propagation to neocortex during encoding of individual stimuli were assessed. The effects of IED total number and duration during maintenance and recall periods on delayed recall performance were also determined. The influence of IEDs during recall was further investigated by comparing the likelihood of IEDs preceding correctly recalled items vs. periods of no verbal response. Across 6 subjects, we analyzed 28 hippocampal and 139 lateral temporal contacts. Recall performance was poor, with a median of 17.2% correct responses (range 10.4–21.9%). Interictal epileptiform discharges during encoding, maintenance, and recall did not significantly impact task performance, and there was no significant difference between the likelihood of IEDs during correct recall vs. periods of no response. No significant effects of discharge duration during encoding, maintenance, or recall were observed. Interictal epileptiform discharges with spread to lateral temporal cortex during encoding did not adversely impact recall. A post hoc analysis refining model assumptions indicated a negative impact of IED count during the maintenance period, but otherwise confirmed the above results. Our findings suggest no major effect of hippocampal IEDs on list learning, but study limitations, such as baseline hippocampal dysfunction, should be considered. The impact of IEDs during the maintenance period may be a focus of future research.

Differential Behavioral and Neural Effects of Regional Cerebellar tDCS

The human cerebellum contributes to both motor and non-motor processes. Within the cerebellum, different subregions support sensorimotor and broader cognitive functions, due to regional patterns in anatomical connectivity with the cerebral cortex and spinal and vestibular systems. We evaluated the effects of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) targeting different cerebellar regions on language task performance and whole-brain functional activation patterns. Functional MRI data were acquired while 43 healthy young adults (15 males, 28 females; 23.3 ± 3.0 years) performed a sentence completion task before and after 20 min of 1.5 mA anodal tDCS. Participants received tDCS targeting either the anterior sensorimotor cerebellum (n = 11; 3 cm right of inion, over lobule V); the right posterolateral cerebellum (n = 18; 1 cm down and 4 cm right of inion, over lobule VII); or sham tDCS (n = 14). TDCS targeting the right posterolateral cerebellum improved task accuracy relative to the sham condition (p = 0.04) and increased activation in left frontal and temporal cortices relevant to task performance (post-tDCS > pre-tDCS; T 3.17, FDR p < 0.05 cluster correction). The regions of increased BOLD signal after right posterolateral cerebellar tDCS fell within the network showing functional connectivity with right cerebellar lobule VII, suggesting specific modulation of this network. In contrast, tDCS targeting the sensorimotor cerebellum did not impact task performance and increased BOLD signal only in one cluster extending into the precentral gyrus. These findings indicate that sensorimotor and cognitive functional cerebellar subregions differentially impact behavioral task performance and task-relevant activation patterns, further contributing to our understanding of the cerebellar modulation of motor and non-motor functions.

Effect of Emotional Response on the Performance of a Simulated Laparoscopic Task.

An emotional state impacts task performance and cognition. However, evidence of the effect of an induced emotional state on laparoscopic performance has not yet been documented. We investigated whether surgical residents in whom a positive emotion had been induced would produce a better laparoscopic task performance than residents in whom a negative emotional state had been induced. This controlled laboratory study recruited a total of 53 junior surgical residents who were divided into 3 groups. Each group was required to watch 1 of 3 ten-minute videos designed to evoke a positive, neutral, or negative emotion before performing a laparoscopic cholecystectomy on a virtual simulation model. Task performances, as evaluated by a global assessment form and psychomotor metrics that included task time, errors, and path lengths, were compared between the 3 groups. Video watching induced different emotions, as measured by a Visual Analog Scale on feelings. The task time was significantly shorter in the positive (13.7 ± 2.5 minutes) than in the neutrally (17.7 ± 3.9 minutes) and the negatively (18.5 ± 3.8 minutes) induced-emotion groups (P < 0.001).Participants in the positive emotion group completed a laparoscopic cholecystectomy with a significantly lower error rate (2 vs. 4 vs. 7, P = 0.036) and shorter right-handed path length (1089.6 ± 250.6 cm vs. 1287.2 ± 355.5 cm vs. 1410.3 ± 304.1 cm, P = 0.010) than the participants in the neutral and negative emotion groups. A positive emotion can enhance a simulated laparoscopic task performance as assessed by task time and path length. The results indicate that we might improve surgical task performance by adjusting the surgeon's emotional state. We plan a future study that will continue to investigate whether positive emotions can facilitate skill learning.

Internal Locus of Control, Task, and Contextual Performance in Multinational Organisations

The study investigates the association of employees’ internal locus of control, employees’ contextual and task performance. Survey questionnaires were gathered from middle-level managers from the banking sector of Pakistan. Regressions analysis was utilized to inspect the impacts of internal locus of control on two dimensions of employees’ performance. Results demonstrate that middle-level managers internal locus of control emphatically impact task performance; internal locus of control uncovers a negative impact on employees’ contextual performance. Besides, a person possessing an internal locus of control may experience a higher positive impact on employee task performance.

Understanding the dual-task costs of walking: a StartReact study

The need to perform multiple tasks more or less simultaneously is a common occurrence during walking in daily life. Performing tasks simultaneously typically impacts task performance negatively. Hypothetically, such dual-task costs may be explained by a lowered state of preparation due to competition for attentional resources, or alternatively, by a ‘bottleneck’ in response initiation. Here, we investigated both hypotheses by comparing ‘StartReact’ effects during a manual squeezing task under single-task (when seated) and dual-task (when walking) conditions. StartReact is the acceleration of reaction times by a startling stimulation (a startling acoustic stimulus was applied in 25% of trials), attributed to the startling stimulus directly releasing a pre-prepared movement. If dual-task costs are due to a lowered state of preparation, we expected trials both with and without an accompanying startling stimulus to be delayed compared to the single-task condition, whereas we expected only trials without a startling stimulus to be delayed if a bottleneck in response initiation would underlie dual-task costs. Reaction times of the manual squeezing task in the flexor digitorum superficialis and extensor carpi radialis muscle were significantly delayed (approx. 20 ms) when walking compared to the seated position. A startling acoustic stimulus significantly decreased reaction times of the squeezing task (approx. 60 ms) both when walking and sitting. Dual-task costs during walking are, therefore, likely the result of lowered task preparation because of competition for attentional resources.

Temporal predictability does not impact attentional blink performance: effects of fixed vs. random inter-trial intervals.

BackgroundDoes the inclusion of a randomized inter-trial interval (ITI) impact performance on an Attentional Blink (AB) task? The AB phenomenon is often used as a test of transient attention (Dux & Marois, 2009); however, it is unclear whether incorporating aspects of sustained attention, by implementing a randomized ITI, would impact task performance. The current research sought to investigate this, by contrasting a standard version of the AB task with a random ITI version to determine whether performance changed, reflecting a change in difficulty, engagement, or motivation.MethodThirty university students (21 female; age range 18–57, Mage= 21.5, SD = 7.4) completed both versions of the task, in counterbalanced order.ResultsNo significant difference in performance was found between the standard AB task and the AB task with the random ITI. Bayesian analyses suggested moderate evidence for the null.ConclusionTemporal unpredictability did not appear to impact task performance. This suggests that the standard AB task has cognitive properties with regards to task difficulty, engagement, and motivation, that are inherently similar to tasks that employ a randomized ITI to measure sustained attention (e.g., the Psychomotor Vigilance Task; PVT; Dinges & Powell, 1985). This finding provides important support for future research which may seek to obtain a more detailed understanding of attention through the comparison of performance on transient and sustained attention tasks.

Inference-Based Decisions in a Hidden State Foraging Task: Differential Contributions of Prefrontal Cortical Areas

SummaryEssential features of the world are often hidden and must be inferred by constructing internal models based on indirect evidence. Here, to study the mechanisms of inference, we establish a foraging task that is naturalistic and easily learned yet can distinguish inference from simpler strategies such as the direct integration of sensory data. We show that both mice and humans learn a strategy consistent with optimal inference of a hidden state. However, humans acquire this strategy more than an order of magnitude faster than mice. Using optogenetics in mice, we show that orbitofrontal and anterior cingulate cortex inactivation impacts task performance, but only orbitofrontal inactivation reverts mice from an inference-based to a stimulus-bound decision strategy. These results establish a cross-species paradigm for studying the problem of inference-based decision making and begins to dissect the network of brain regions crucial for its performance.

Does alpha phase modulate visual target detection? Three experiments with tACS-phase-based stimulus presentation.

In recent years, the influence of alpha (7–13 Hz) phase on visual processing has received a lot of attention. Magneto‐/encephalography (M/EEG) studies showed that alpha phase indexes visual excitability and task performance. Studies with transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) aim to modulate oscillations and causally impact task performance. Here, we applied right occipital tACS (O2 location) to assess the functional role of alpha phase in a series of experiments. We presented visual stimuli at different pre‐determined, experimentally controlled, phases of the entraining tACS signal, hypothesizing that this should result in an oscillatory pattern of visual performance in specifically left hemifield detection tasks. In experiment 1, we applied 10 Hz tACS and used separate psychophysical staircases for six equidistant tACS‐phase conditions, obtaining contrast thresholds for detection of visual gratings in left or right hemifield. In experiments 2 and 3, tACS was at EEG‐based individual peak alpha frequency. In experiment 2, we measured detection rates for gratings with (pseudo‐)fixed contrast. In experiment 3, participants detected brief luminance changes in a custom‐built LED device, at eight equidistant alpha phases. In none of the experiments did the primary outcome measure over phase conditions consistently reflect a one‐cycle sinusoid. However, post hoc analyses of reaction times (RT) suggested that tACS alpha phase did modulate RT for specifically left hemifield targets in both experiments 1 and 2 (not measured in experiment 3). This observation requires future confirmation, but is in line with the idea that alpha phase causally gates visual inputs through cortical excitability modulation.

The Impacts of Face-to-Face and Cyber Incivility on Performance, Helping Behavior, Counterproductive Behaviors, and Physiological Activity

The present experiment compared the immediate impacts of cyber incivility and face-to-face incivility vs. neutral interactions on both behavioral [task performance, creativity, flexibility, helping behavior, and counterproductive behaviors (CBs)] and physiological outcomes [heart rate (HR), heart rate variability (HRV), and skin conductance (SCR)]. We randomly assigned 232 undergraduate students to one of four conditions: (1) face-to-face uncivil, (2) cyber uncivil, (3) face-to-face neutral, or (4) cyber neutral. In the uncivil conditions, two uncivil interactions were delivered with instructions to complete anagrams and list uses for a brick. Physiological responses were measured while participants completed the tasks. Additionally, participants were given the opportunity to help the experimenter by picking up pens that were “accidentally” dropped. Thefts of extra candy, pens, and gift cards served as measures of CBs. After uncivil interactions, participants engaged in significantly more CBs and experienced greater HR increases as compared to neutral interactions. Additionally, participants were most likely to steal pens in the face-to-face uncivil condition. However, HR increased more in cyber conditions than face-to-face conditions. Instances of incivility did not impact task performance, creativity, flexibility, or helping behavior. These findings suggest that although face-to-face incivility led to increased CBs, cyber incivility may have a stronger impact on physiological responses.

Revisiting the Impact of System Use on Task Performance: An Exploitative-Explorative System Use Framework

How information systems impact task performance has attracted a significant amount of attention from information systems researchers and generated high interest among practitioners. A commonly accepted view is that the potential of information systems must be realized through system use. Nevertheless, existing findings regarding the impact of system use on task performance are not yet conclusive. We attributed this to the various conceptualizations of system use and the unclear mechanisms through which system use influences task performance. Thus, this research attempts to create a better understanding of how system use influences task performance. To this end, we developed an exploitative-explorative system use framework in order to reconcile the various conceptualizations of system use and to depict how both exploitative and explorative system use influences task performance through impacting task innovation, management control, and task productivity. We created an instantiation of the framework using USAGE (exploitative system use) and adaptive system use (ASU, explorative system use). We conducted two empirical studies involving two different populations and using two different technologies. The first study consisted of 212 experienced users of MS Office, whereas the second study employed 372 new users of a video-editing tool. Our findings offer insight into how exploitative system use and explorative system use independently and jointly influence task performance constructs and also have implications for research and practices.