Psychological Characteristics of Individuals Who Put Forth Inadequate Cognitive Effort in a Secondary Gain Context

Abstract

The current study sought to characterize the psychological architecture of individuals who put forth inadequate effort. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, 2nd Edition-Restructured Form was used to identify dimensions of psychological functioning in a mixed outpatient sample of U.S. Veterans referred for neuropsychological evaluation as part of their clinical care. After accounting for external financial incentive and symptom overreporting, results showed that the inadequate effort group (n = 23, mean age = 42.48) scored higher than the adequate effort group (n = 29, mean age = 44.31) on neurologic complaints (NUC) and lower on behavioral/externalizing dysfunction (BXD), antisocial behaviors (RC4), and disconstraint (DISC-r). Lower scores on BXD, RC4, and DISC-r could indicate higher behavioral constraint-a psychological characteristic that has been linked to the pursuit of high-value future rewards. Alternatively, lower scores on these scales could have reflected a self-presentation strategy aimed at minimizing externalizing and RC4 in order to appear more psychological healthy. Implications of each of these interpretations are discussed.

The development and initial validation of the cognitive response bias scale for the personality assessment inventory

“…Additionally, two items (242 and 304) that had extremely poor factor loadings were re-examined, as such poor loadings could suggest unique content related to response bias that is overly unique and would not be captured in the initial factor analyses. Content analysis of these items indicated they could plausibly fall under the domain of a positive form of response bias: a tendency to minimize faults of the self, which is consistent content in the cognitive response bias literature (e.g., Lees-Haley, 1991;Patrick & Horner, 2014). Including these two items in the scale added substantial classification accuracy (i.e., area under the curve increase from 0.70 to 0.72), and their unique content justified their inclusion, as such rationale is common in measurement research (Thorndike & Thorndike-Christ, 2010).…”

“…From a construct standpoint, it seems logical to distinguish between PVT and SVT because reporting symptoms and characteristics on a self-report inventory is simply a different process than engaging in a performance-based cognitive task (Larrabee, 2012). As PVTs and SVTs both fall under the umbrella of response bias, it nonetheless remains plausible that they would be related, and generally research has demonstrated a weak to modest relationship between PVTs and SVTs (e.g., Gaasedelen, Whiteside, & Basso, 2017;Keiski, Shore, Hamilton, & Malec, 2015;Patrick & Horner, 2014;Temple, McBride, Horner, Taylor, 2003).…”

“…Additional research has suggested that there are two general symptom response patterns on the MMPI-2 for individuals who fail PVTs: 1) a global complaint pattern, which is characterized by broad over reporting across all symptoms, and 2) a cognitive/somatic complaint pattern, which is characterized by over-reporting of cognitive/somatic symptoms, and under reporting, or a defensive style of reporting, of psychological symptoms (Larrabee, 2007;Patrick & Horner, 2014;Temple, et al, 2003). Patrick & Horner (2014) conclude these findings regarding the defensive group could reflect a self-presentation strategy to appear more psychologically healthy, and lay the emphasis on their 'neurological' impairment.…”

“…A response style refers to a pattern of responding engaged in by the patient on a self-report inventory, and several different response styles, such as a tendency to respond "yes" or a tendency to over-report psychiatric symptoms, have been documented (Ben-Porath, 2012). Exploring patterns of responses could help uncover personality features of individuals who exhibit invalid responding on PVTs, which could in turn help with understanding overall test validity (Patrick & Horner, 2014). This research could also suggest specific personality features that may be contributing to poor performance on PVTs.…”

“…Paulhus (1984) presented research supporting the notion that people engage in self-deception, thereby fully believing their own self-report, and that some people engage in impression management, where there is a conscious attempt to provide disingenuous responses in order to appear more favorable towards others. Examinees have also been observed to underreport psychological symptoms and deny personal faults when external incentives are present (Lees-Haley, English, & Glenn, 1991;Patrick & Horner, 2014;Temple, McBride, Horner, Taylor, 2003).…”