Cognitive Control Moderates Relations Between Impulsivity and Bulimic Symptoms

Abstract

The present study, involving 128 undergraduate participants, sought to better understand relations between trait impulsivity, cognitive control, and bulimic symptoms. Three models were contrasted. One model posited that impulsivity and cognitive control would be independent, non-interactive predictors of bulimic symptoms. A second model posited that cognitive control deficits would mediate relations between impulsivity and bulimic symptoms. A third model posited that relations between trait impulsivity and bulimic symptoms might be stronger among individuals lower in cognitive control relative to those higher in cognitive control. The latter moderation model was systematically supported across two measures of cognitive control and two measures of bulimic symptoms. Wider implications of the findings are discussed. For example, it is suggested that treatments facilitating higher levels of cognitive control can be recommended among patients high in impulsivity.

A Cognitive Control Perspective of Self-Control Strength and Its Depletion

“…Moeller and Robinson (2009) found that men, relative to women, exhibited this tendency to a lesser extent, consistent with men’s greater levels of behavioral impulsivity (e.g., Eagly & Steffen, 1986). Other related findings can be cited as well (Robinson, Ode, Wilkowski, & Amodio, 2007; Robinson, Pearce, Engel, & Wonderlich, 2009). Thus, a cognitive control model of self‐control strength appears to have considerable value, primarily so far from an individual differences perspective.…”

A systematic review of the relationship between rigidity/flexibility and transdiagnostic cognitive and behavioral processes that maintain psychopathology

“…One study demonstrated that the interaction between perfectionism and perseveration contributed to increased binge eating, while perseveration alone did not (Short et al, 2013). Another study (not included within the systematic review) found that inhibition moderated the relationship between impulsiveness and binging/bulimic symptoms, but inhibition alone was not correlated with impulsiveness (Robinson, Pearce, Engel, & Wonderlich, 2009). This study did not measure the inhibition of task-set but indicates that the use of interaction terms could contribute to an understanding of how rigidity and transdiagnostic processes relate.…”

Toward a Cognitive View of Trait Mindfulness: Distinct Cognitive Skills Predict Its Observing and Nonreactivity Facets

“…One perspective, generally endorsed in the clinical literature, is that some individuals possess higher levels of cognitive control than others, that is, greater capacities to override dominant response tendencies when the task requires it. This capacity-related perspective has been somewhat generative in clinical literatures (e.g., Morgan & Lilienfeld, 2000) but has often not yielded dividends in understanding personality processes of a normal rather than abnormal type (Robinson, Pearce, Engel, & Wonderlich, 2009;Wilkowski & Robinson, 2010). In the absence of brain damage or clinical dysfunction, instead, it is likely more informative to examine cognitive control flexibility, which can be conceptualized in terms of modulating the cognitive control system in a moment-to-moment manner (Miller & Cohen, 2001).…”