Individual Differences In Cognition Research Articles

How individual differences in knowledge over-/underconfidence impede dietary consumer decision making under time pressure

In two studies, we identify a novel moderator (objective time pressure) of the relationship between knowledge over-/underconfidence (O/U) and subjective choice quality. Knowledge O/U is an individual difference variable with behavioral correlates in the consumption realm. As a common decision bias, knowledge overconfidence leads consumers to speed up decision making and to deem their decisions more accurate than those who are less knowledge confident. As knowledge-overconfident consumers accelerate decisions, it is tempting to assume that they would be less affected by objective time pressure than less knowledge confident consumers, who often need more decision time. However, we demonstrate that knowledge-overconfident consumers are more prone to suffer from the effects of objective time pressure. Specifically, in a dietary choice setting, objective time pressure positively moderates the relationship between knowledge O/U and subjective time pressure and perceived choice difficulty, respectively. Taking a moderated-mediation approach, we also investigate perceived choice difficulty and subjective time pressure as mediators of the relationship between knowledge O/U and subjective choice quality and find that objective time pressure moderates these mediating effects.

Meta-mood knowledge moderates the relationship between neuroticism and depression but not between neuroticism and anxiety in a sample of nonclinical adolescents

Research shows a strong link between neuroticism and internalizing psychopathology, such as depression and anxiety. However, it is unclear to what extent meta-mood knowledge (i.e., attention to emotion and emotional clarity) plays a role as a moderator in this relationship. To investigate this, we collected data on meta-mood knowledge, personality traits, depression, and anxiety in a sample of adolescents (N = 244; 53.7% girls) aged 12 to 18 years (M = 14.6, SD = 1.7) from Catalonia, Spain. Regarding the relationship between neuroticism and depression, results showed that emotional clarity buffered this relationship. Although attention to emotion did not, the joint moderating effect of attention to emotion and emotional clarity was significant. The results on the four different combinations of attention to emotion and emotional clarity showed that the relationship between neuroticism and depression was strongest for high attention and low clarity, less strong for low attention and low clarity, and even lower for high attention and high clarity. And importantly, these similar patterns of association disappeared at low attention and high clarity. In contrast to the relationship between neuroticism and depression, we found no statistically significant moderating effects for the relationship between neuroticism and anxiety. Based on these results, we argue the importance of examining individual differences in emotion-based cognition and understanding when the benefits of emotional clarity are associated with fewer disadvantages of excessive attention. These results provide preliminary evidence that the combination of low attention and high clarity may be an adaptive version of emotional self-awareness in relation to neuroticism and depression.

Differentiating Optimists from Pessimists in the Prediction of Emotional Intelligence, Happiness, and Life Satisfaction: A Latent Profile Analysis

What are the differences between optimists and pessimists? The aim of this study is to analyze the differences reported by optimists and pessimists in terms of three psychological variables: emotional intelligence (EI), happiness, and life satisfaction. To answer this question, we examined the extent to which a combination of different levels of optimism and pessimism can differently predict EI, happiness, and life satisfaction in two independent samples (891 adults, 494 adolescents). To do that, we introduced a person-centered approach, which offers several advantages in the study of optimism over the extended, predominant variable-centered approach. Then, using a latent profile analysis, we identified three groups of individuals with a similar optimism–pessimism configuration: optimists, ambivalents, and pessimists. The results obtained supported our hypothesis that optimists report higher EI, happiness, and life satisfaction levels than those reported by pessimists. Low levels of optimism, rather than high levels of pessimism, distinguish optimistic from non-optimistic people in the prediction of external outcomes. Our results suggest that optimism and pessimism can be viewed as separate yet correlated traits that can be grouped together to explain individual affective and cognitive differences, which encourage the refinement of strategies and interventions used in psychology practice.

Difficulty and pleasure in the comprehension of verb-based metaphor sentences: A behavioral study.

What is difficult is not usually pleasurable. Yet, for certain unfamiliar figurative language, like that which is common in poetry, while comprehension is often more difficult than for more conventional language, it is in many cases more pleasurable. Concentrating our investigation on verb-based metaphors, we examined whether and to what degree the novel variations (in the form of verb changes and extensions) of conventional verb metaphors were both more difficult to comprehend and yet induced more pleasure. To test this relationship, we developed a set of 62 familiar metaphor stimuli, each with corresponding optimal and excessive verb variation and metaphor extension conditions, and normed these stimuli using both objective measures and participant subjective ratings. We then tested the pleasure-difficulty relationship with an online behavioral study. Based on Rachel Giora and her colleagues' 'optimal innovation hypothesis', we anticipated an inverse U-shaped relationship between ease and pleasure, with an optimal degree of difficulty, introduced by metaphor variations, producing the highest degree of pleasure when compared to familiar or excessive conditions. Results, however, revealed a more complex picture, with only metaphor extension conditions (not verb variation conditions) producing the anticipated pleasure effects. Individual differences in semantic cognition and verbal reasoning assessed using the Semantic Similarities Test, while clearly influential, further complicated the pleasure-difficulty relationship, suggesting an important avenue for further investigation.

Longitudinal predictors of depression, anxiety, and alcohol use following COVID-19-related stress.

The COVID-19 pandemic imposed profound effects on health and daily life, with widespread stress exposure and increases in psychiatric symptoms. Despite these challenges, pandemic research provides unique insights into individual differences in emotion and cognition that predict responses to stress, with general implications for understanding stress vulnerability. We examined predictors of responses to COVID-19-related stress in an online sample of 450 emerging adults recruited in May 2020 to complete questionnaires assessing baseline stress and psychiatric symptoms, rumination, cognitive reappraisal use and intolerance of uncertainty. Stress and symptoms were re-assessed 3months later (N=200). Greater pandemic-related stressful events were associated with increases in symptoms of depression, anxiety and alcohol use severity. Additionally, individual differences in emotional and cognitive styles emerged as longitudinal predictors of stress responses. Specifically, greater rumination predicted increased depression. Reduced cognitive reappraisal use interacted with stress to predict increases in alcohol use. An unexpected pattern emerged for intolerance of uncertainty, such that stress was associated with increases in depression for those high in intolerance of uncertainty but increases in alcohol use at relatively low levels of intolerance of uncertainty. These results highlight unique vulnerabilities that predict specific outcomes following stress exposure and offer potential prevention targets.

Individual differences in cognition about consensus building in group decision making

Individual differences in cognition about consensus building in group decision making

Reducing Implicit Bias in Maternity Care: A Framework for Action

Reducing Implicit Bias in Maternity Care: A Framework for Action

Accurate but inefficient: Standard face identity matching tests fail to identify prosopagnosia

In recent years, the number of face identity matching tests in circulation has grown considerably and these are being increasingly utilized to study individual differences in face cognition. Although many of these tests were designed for testing typical observers, recent studies have begun to utilize general-purpose tests for studying specific, atypical populations (e.g., super-recognizers and individuals with prosopagnosia). In this study, we examined the capacity of four tests requiring binary face-matching decisions to study individual differences between healthy observers. Uniquely, we used performance of the patient PS (Rossion, 2018), a well-documented case of acquired prosopagnosia (AP), as a benchmark. Two main findings emerged: (i) PS could exhibit typical rates of accuracy in all tests; (ii) compared to age-matched controls and when considering both accuracy and speed to account for potential trade-offs, only the KFMT — but not the EFCT, PICT or GFMT — was able to detect PS's severe impairment. These findings reflect the importance of considering both accuracy and response times to measure individual differences in face matching, and the need for comparing tests in terms of their sensitivity, when used as a measure of human cognition and brain functioning.

Gut microbiome drives individual memory variation in bumblebees

The potential of the gut microbiome as a driver of individual cognitive differences in natural populations of animals remains unexplored. Here, using metagenomic sequencing of individual bumblebee hindguts, we find a positive correlation between the abundance of Lactobacillus Firm-5 cluster and memory retention on a visual discrimination task. Supplementation with the Firm-5 species Lactobacillus apis, but not other non-Firm-5 bacterial species, enhances bees’ memory. Untargeted metabolomics after L. apis supplementation show increased LPA (14:0) glycerophospholipid in the haemolymph. Oral administration of the LPA increases long-term memory significantly. Based on our findings and metagenomic/metabolomic analyses, we propose a molecular pathway for this gut-brain interaction. Our results provide insights into proximate and ultimate causes of cognitive differences in natural bumblebee populations.

The bilingual effect on cognitive development: not an executive function advantage, but a differentiation of mental abilities

ABSTRACT Adopting a different theoretical framework from the one dominating the field, this study explored bilingualism influences on the development and differentiation of mental abilities. Albanian-Turkish bilingual (N = 122) and Albanian-speaking monolingual (N = 129) children, adolescents, and adults were assessed on monitoring, inhibitory control, processing efficiency, fluid reasoning, and vocabulary, and were asked to specify their own language efficiency (a cognizance index). Analyses showed a bilingual advantage in monitoring—adjusting for any fluid reasoning effects—which was larger in children. Moreover, a more pronounced bilingual benefit was observed for the incongruent condition RT of the attention task. Structural equation modelling showed though that the difference between language groups does not lie within the executive function domain (inhibitory control); it rather regards processing efficiency. Analyses also revealed increased differentiation of mental abilities in bilinguals, reflecting enhanced cognitive flexibility. Implications for cognitive developmental and individual differences theories are discussed.

Plumage colour saturation predicts long-term, cross-seasonal social dominance in a mutually ornamented bird

Dominance hierarchies are known to reduce agonistic interactions between individuals and may be influenced by differences in phenotypes such as body size, personality or cognition. Colour ornamentation, especially with melanin-based colours, can also be a badge of status signalling social dominance, but status signalling with carotenoid-based colours is little understood. Here we studied whether different phenotypes, including individual differences in carotenoid-based colour ornamentation, body size, personality-, cognition- and stress-related traits, predict social dominance in the highly social and mutually ornamented common waxbill, Estrilda astrild . We monitored aggressive interactions of waxbills living in seminatural conditions, in a large mesocosm, using data from a radiofrequency identification system in the nonbreeding and breeding seasons over 2 consecutive years. We found the position of individual waxbills in the dominance hierarchy repeatable across seasons and years. Furthermore, the steepness of the dominance hierarchy was greater in the breeding seasons, perhaps because of increased competition over mates or breeding resources. Contrary to previous work with waxbills in birdcages, here body size did not predict social dominance, perhaps because in our more natural setting aggressive encounters were mostly airborne, where large body size may not confer a fighting advantage and may even reduce manoeuvrability. Sex, reactive-to-proactive personality differences and traits related to cognition or stress did not predict social dominance either. Finally, red colour saturation, but not the size of the red patch, strongly predicted social dominance and may thus act as a badge of status. This is one of the few studies testing whether size or saturation of carotenoid-based plumage coloration indicates social dominance and suggests that saturation may more often signal dominance. • Waxbills have mildly steep but stable social hierarchies across years and seasons. • Saturation of carotenoid-based red plumage colour indicates social dominance. • Size of red plumage areas does not correlate with social dominance. • Sex, personality, cognition and size were not related to social dominance.

A tale of two gradients: differences between the left and right hemispheres predict semantic cognition

Decomposition of whole-brain functional connectivity patterns reveals a principal gradient that captures the separation of sensorimotor cortex from heteromodal regions in the default mode network (DMN). Functional homotopy is strongest in sensorimotor areas, and weakest in heteromodal cortices, suggesting there may be differences between the left and right hemispheres (LH/RH) in the principal gradient, especially towards its apex. This study characterised hemispheric differences in the position of large-scale cortical networks along the principal gradient, and their functional significance. We collected resting-state fMRI and semantic, working memory and non-verbal reasoning performance in 175 + healthy volunteers. We then extracted the principal gradient of connectivity for each participant, tested which networks showed significant hemispheric differences on the gradient, and regressed participants’ behavioural efficiency in tasks outside the scanner against interhemispheric gradient differences for each network. LH showed a higher overall principal gradient value, consistent with its role in heteromodal semantic cognition. One frontotemporal control subnetwork was linked to individual differences in semantic cognition: when it was nearer heteromodal DMN on the principal gradient in LH, participants showed more efficient semantic retrieval—and this network also showed a strong hemispheric difference in response to semantic demands but not working memory load in a separate study. In contrast, when a dorsal attention subnetwork was closer to the heteromodal end of the principal gradient in RH, participants showed better visual reasoning. Lateralization of function may reflect differences in connectivity between control and heteromodal regions in LH, and attention and visual regions in RH.

Are there Reliable Qualitative Individual Differences in Cognition? Probably Not.

Rouder and Haaf (2021, this issue) propose a focus shift toward qualitative individual differences in cognition and present a research toolkit for doing so. In this invited commentary, I will argue that the observation of qualitative individual differences may be no more than an indicator that more theoretical and empirical work needs to be done to identify the mechanisms and abilities underlying these individual differences in directionality. I will then move on to discuss how the toolkit can be used though to investigate one of the currently most central current topics in cognitive differential psychology, that is, the question over the existence of true quantitative individual differences in attentional control experimental effects. I conclude that, while highly valuable, no toolkit can save us from facing the challenging theoretical and conceptual questions in this area.

A Plea for Studying Qualitative Individual Differences by Default.

I see great potential in the approach proposed by Rouder and Haaf. First, using an example from unethical decision making, I demonstrate that considering quantitative individual differences alone can make us overlook important psychological phenomena that are only visible at the individual level. Thus, the study of quantitative individual differences should, by default, be complemented by investigation of qualitative individual differences. Second, having powerful tools to study qualitative individual differences in cognition has great potential to advance personality science. Recently, personality psychologists are increasingly working towards obtaining a better understanding of the processes that underlie the expression of personality in behavior. The toolbox provided by Rouder and Haaf may add to this research in meaningful ways.

Are individual differences in cognitive abilities and stylistic preferences related to multilingual adults’ performance in explicit learning conditions?

Research suggests that individual differences in additional language learning may play a more important role in taxing situations when learners are confronted with unfamiliar or difficult tasks. However, studies to date have mostly focused on second language (L2) learners/bilinguals, while individual differences within multilingual populations remain under-researched. Working with university-level multilingual adults, we compared the effectiveness of traditional instruction (familiar) and concept-based instruction (unfamiliar) to teach the past tense/aspect distinction in Spanish. Learners were pre- and post-tested on their knowledge of the target structure and assessed on language learning aptitude, working memory capacity, verbal-imagery cognitive style and attitudes. While both treatment groups demonstrated significantly improved metalinguistic knowledge, we found no statistical differences between the two groups in terms of knowledge gained or attitudes, and individual differences in cognitive ability were not associated with observed gains. This set of results indicates that the cognitive individual differences measured seemingly no longer played a significant role in these multilinguals’ performance in the instructional conditions examined. In addition, neither language learning experience nor typological closeness between known languages had any significant impact. We propose that extensive experience with explicit language instruction may have led to a levelling effect, as previously observed in L2 learners.

Navigating Expected Selves: The Roles of Cognitive Styles, Identity Motives, and Regulatory Focuses

We develop theory to enhance our understanding of how individual differences in cognition (cognitive styles), self-regulatory orientation (promotion and prevention focus), and salient identity motives (authenticity, belonging, and self-expansion) influence employee engagement in differing types of identity work and play. These identity management approaches are triggered in response to everyday identity tensions and conflicts that occur between preferred selves and organizationally-expected selves at work. We conceptualize two major categories of identity work and play: conformity-oriented and resistance-oriented types. Conformity-oriented forms include aligning of preferred and organizationally-expected selves, and distancing, in which an individual superficially conforms to the organizationally-expected identity at work. Resistance-oriented forms are represented by integrating and defending, which ensure that at least some part of the preferred identity is maintained in the work context. Based on social cognitive conceptualizations of the self, we theorize that an analytic cognitive style activates the need for authenticity, whereas holistic cognition is more likely to activate belonging and self-expansion motives. These salient motives, in combination with promotion or prevention regulatory focus, lead individuals to engage in different forms of identity work and play as primary approaches to identity management at work. We discuss implications of our model and directions for future research.

Making the rich richer: Frontoparietal tDCS enhances transfer effects of a single-session distractor inhibition training on working memory in high capacity individuals but reduces them in low capacity individuals

Working memory (WM) performance depends on the ability to extract relevant while inhibiting irrelevant information from entering the WM storage. This distractor inhibition ability can be trained and is known to induce transfer effects on WM performance. Here we asked whether transfer on WM can be boosted by transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) during a single-session distractor inhibition training. As WM performance is ascribed to the frontoparietal network, in which prefrontal areas are associated with inhibiting distractors and posterior parietal areas with storing information, we placed the anode over the prefrontal and the cathode over the posterior parietal cortex during a single-session distractor inhibition training. This network-oriented stimulation protocol should enhance inhibition processes by shifting the neural activity from posterior to prefrontal regions. WM improved after a single-session distractor inhibition training under verum stimulation but only in subjects with a high WM capacity. In subjects with a low WM capacity, verum tDCS reduced the transfer effects on WM. We assume tDCS to strengthen the frontostriatal pathway in individuals with a high WM capacity leading to efficient inhibition of distractors. In contrast, the cathodal stimulation of the posterior parietal cortex might have hindered usual compensational mechanism in low capacity subjects, i.e. maintaining also irrelevant information in memory. Our results thus stress the need to adjust tDCS protocols to well-founded knowledge about neural networks and individual cognitive differences.

Multimodal neuroimaging markers of variation in cognitive ability in older HIV+ men.

This study used converging methods to examine the neural substrates of cognitive ability in middle-aged and older men with well-controlled HIV infection. Seventy-six HIV+ men on antiretroviral treatment completed an auditory oddball task and an inhibitory control (Simon) task while time-locked high-density EEG was acquired; 66 had usable EEG data from one or both tasks; structural MRI was available for 43. We investigated relationships between task-evoked EEG responses, cognitive ability and immunocompromise. We also explored the structural correlates of these EEG markers in the sub-sample with complete EEG and MRI data (N = 27). EEG activity was associated with cognitive ability at later (P300) but not earlier stages of both tasks. Only the oddball task P300 was reliably associated with HIV severity (nadir CD4). Source localization confirmed that the tasks engaged partially distinct circuits. Thalamus volume correlated with oddball task P300 amplitude, while globus pallidus volume was related to the P300 in both tasks. This is the first study to use task-evoked EEG to identify neural correlates of individual differences in cognition in men living with well-controlled HIV infection, and to explore the structural basis of the EEG markers. We found that EEG responses evoked by the oddball task are more reliably related to cognitive performance than those evoked by the Simon task. We also provide preliminary evidence for a subcortical contribution to the effects of HIV infection severity on P300 amplitudes. These results suggest brain mechanisms and candidate biomarkers for individual differences in cognition in HIV.

Exploring predictors of translation performance

The study reported on examined the question of whether translators’ cognitive faculties might be able to predict their performance on a translation task. Research on individual cognitive differences in translation has been a new issue in the realm of Translation Studies. However, the majority of previous studies have targeted single cognitive faculties for the purpose of investigation and we therefore know little about how sets of cognitive faculties can affect the process of translation from one language into another. In this study, three individual cognitive differences were targeted: emotional intelligence (EI), tolerance of ambiguity (TA), and working memory (WM). For the purposes of the study, 54 Iranian MA students of Translation Studies were sampled as participants. The participants completed measures of their EI, TA, and WM. In addition, they were requested to translate an excerpt from English (Source Language) into Persian (Target Language). The results of multiple regression analysis indicated that the regression model, incorporating EI, TA, and WM as its predictors, was able to predict a significant amount of variance in participants’ translation performance. Of the three predictors, the contributions of TA and WM to the total variance in the participants’ translation scores were statistically significant, while the contribution of EI to the total variance was not. The findings of the study have some implications for research and practice in the field of Translation Studies.

Personality and reasoning ability during retirement age: Report from a Swedish population-based longitudinal study

We examined the association between personality and level and change in reasoning ability in a population-based sample of older adults (62–68 years) using a three-year annual follow-up longitudinal study design (HEARTS; N = 3851). Personality traits were measured using the Mini-IPIP scale and reasoning using a short form of Raven’s Matrices. Findings from a structural equation model, controlling for age, education, and sex, revealed that higher levels on extraversion, conscientiousness, and neuroticism were associated with lower reasoning ability (βs: −0.17 to −0.09). Higher levels of openness were associated with better reasoning (β: 0.16). We found no association with rate of change. This evidence replicates previous findings demonstrating that personality traits are associated with individual differences in cognition among older adults.