A computational perspective on the roles of affect in cognitive control

Grahek, Ivan; Musslick, Sebastian; Shenhav, Amitai

doi:10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2020.02.001

Cited by 47 publications

(46 citation statements)

References 110 publications

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“…Finally, in any domain of self-regulation, emotions influence the cost–benefit analysis (Grahek, Musslick, & Shenhav, 2020). This is, in part, because emotions provide embodied information about the costs and benefits of anticipated action (Zadra & Clore, 2011).…”

Section: An Overview Of the Proposed Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Third and finally, emotions can influence the perceived cost of regulatory effort (Grahek et al, 2020). Emotions influence how effortful it feels to exert control.…”

Section: The Cost–benefit Analysis In Emotion Regulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The analysis predicts that as the likelihood of engaging in effortful emotion regulation decreases, the worse people feel. Unpleasant emotions decrease the likelihood of investing effort in any goal pursuit (Gendolla, 2000; Grahek et al, 2020), but such effects are particularly detrimental when the target of regulation is unpleasant emotions themselves. The more intense the unpleasant emotion, the lower the perceived benefit and the greater the perceived cost of effortful emotion regulation, rendering it less likely.…”

Section: Extensions and Implications For Psychopathology And Well-beingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Whether parsed into these specific categories or others (e.g., for driving and restraining factors, see Kruglanski et al, 2014; for benefits and costs, see Shenhav et al, 2017), information pertaining to rewards and punishments, the likelihood of success, and the costs of effortful control determines the likelihood of engaging in emotion-regulatory behavior and how much effort is invested in it. These elements inform any process of self-regulation, and each of them is informed by current emotions (Grahek et al, 2020). In emotion regulation, however, this means that whether people choose to invest effort to regulate their current emotions and how much effort they choose to invest depend directly on their emotions themselves.…”

Section: The Unique Cost-benefit Analysis In Emotion Regulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Finally, unpleasant emotions increase the perceived cost of mental effort (Grahek et al, 2020). Moreover, the perceived cost of effort scales in a nonlinear fashion with time spent exerting control (Kool et al, 2017).…”

Section: Implications For Psychopathologymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effortful Emotion Regulation as a Unique Form of Cybernetic Control

Tamir

2020

Perspect Psychol Sci

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Emotion regulation is important for psychological well-being, yet we know relatively little about why, when, and how hard people try to regulate emotions. This article seeks to address these motivational issues by considering effortful emotion regulation as a unique form of cybernetic control. In any domain of self-regulation, emotions serve as indices of progress in regulation and inform the expected value of regulation. In emotion regulation, however, emotions also serve as the very target of regulation. This interdependence gives rise to ironic processes that may render people less likely to exert effort in emotion regulation, precisely when they need it most. The proposed analysis complements and extends existing theories of emotion regulation, sheds new light on available findings, carries implications for psychopathology and well-being, and points to new hypotheses that could lead to theoretical and applied advances in the field.

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Section: An Overview Of the Proposed Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Third and finally, emotions can influence the perceived cost of regulatory effort (Grahek et al, 2020). Emotions influence how effortful it feels to exert control.…”

Section: The Cost–benefit Analysis In Emotion Regulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Extensions and Implications For Psychopathology And Well-beingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Unique Cost-benefit Analysis In Emotion Regulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Implications For Psychopathologymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effortful Emotion Regulation as a Unique Form of Cybernetic Control

Tamir

2020

Perspect Psychol Sci

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Task performance errors and rewards affect voluntary task choices

Spitzer,

Musslick,

Janz

et al. 2024

Psychological Research

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Humans are remarkably flexible in adapting their behavior to current demands. It has been suggested that the decision which of multiple tasks to perform is based on a variety of factors pertaining to the rewards associated with each task as well as task performance (e.g., error rates associated with each task and/or error commission on the previous trial). However, further empirical investigation is needed to examine whether task performance still influences task choices if task choices are rewarded but task performance is not. Accordingly, we exposed participants to a novel reward-varying voluntary task switching paradigm where the reward for the performed task gradually decreased while the reward associated for the alternative task was unchanged. Importantly, we rewarded participants’ task choices before participants performed the task to investigate the effect of rewards independent from task performance. We examined the effect of (i) reward, (ii) error rates associated with each of the two tasks, and (iii) error commission in the previous trial on voluntary task choices. As expected, we found that participants’ task selection was influenced by reward differences between task choices. In addition, error rates associated with a task also influenced task selection, with participants requiring larger reward differences to switch to a task associated with relatively higher error rates, compared to switching to a task with relatively lower error rates. However, errors in n − 1 did not influence participants’ probability to switch to the alternative task. These findings contribute to an ongoing discussion on the influence of task performance on task selection.

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