Cognitive Dynamics of Religiosity and Intertemporal Choice Behavior

2020 ◽  
Vol 51 (9) ◽  
pp. 719-739
Author(s):  
Cinzia Calluso ◽  
Mohammad Amin Zandi ◽  
Maria Giovanna Devetag
Keyword(s):  
Implicit Association Test ◽  
Choice Behavior ◽  
Intertemporal Choice ◽  
Temporal Discounting ◽  
Cognitive Conflict ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Implicit Association ◽  
Mouse Tracking ◽  
Control Groups ◽  
Cognitive Dynamics

The preference for smaller-sooner rewards over larger-delayed ones (temporal discounting, TD) has been suggested to be influenced by religiosity, through its role in enhancing self-control. Here we investigate this issue in Muslims, Catholics, and two control groups of Italian and Iranian atheists, by measuring implicit religiosity (implicit association test, IAT) and the cognitive dynamics underlying TD (using mouse tracking). Results showed that Muslims are the most farsighted, while Catholics are the most shortsighted and both atheists’ groups fall in between these two extremes; additionally, these results are also shaped by implicit religiosity (IAT). Mouse tracking analyses reveal that Muslims show higher cognitive conflict compared to the other groups, which arises only in later stages of processing. This indicates that farsighted behavior in Muslims requires the recruitment of self-control in order to regulate intertemporal decision-making. Our findings suggest that the highly demanding religious precepts enforced in (most) Islamic communities may help strengthen self-control abilities.

scholarly journals Increased Capacity to Delay Reward in Anorexia Nervosa

2012 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 773-780 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanna E. Steinglass ◽  
Bernd Figner ◽  
Staci Berkowitz ◽  
H. Blair Simpson ◽  
Elke U. Weber ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Anorexia Nervosa ◽  
Food Restriction ◽  
Intertemporal Choice ◽  
Temporal Discounting ◽  
Choice Task ◽  
Reward Processing ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Life Threatening ◽  
Neuropsychological Characteristics ◽  
Secondary Analyses

AbstractIndividuals with anorexia nervosa (AN) are often characterized as possessing excessive self-control and are unusual in their ability to reduce or avoid the consumption of palatable foods. This behavior promotes potentially life-threatening weight loss and suggests disturbances in reward processing. We studied whether individuals with AN showed evidence of increased self-control by examining the tendency to delay receipt of a monetary, non-food related, reward. Underweight AN (n = 36) and healthy controls (HC, n = 28) completed a monetary intertemporal choice task measuring delay discounting factor. Individuals with AN reduced the value of a monetary reward over time significantly less than HC (F[1,61] = 5.03; p = 0.029). Secondary analyses indicated that the restricting subtype of AN, in particular, showed significantly less discounting than HC (F[1,46] = 8.3; p = 0.006). These findings indicate that some individuals with AN show less temporal discounting than HC, suggestive of enhanced self-control that is not limited to food consumption. This is in contrast to other psychiatric disorders, for example, substance abuse, which are characterized by greater discounting. Though preliminary, these findings suggest that excessive self-control may contribute to pathological processes and individuals with AN may have neuropsychological characteristics that enhance their ability to delay reward and thereby may help to maintain persistent food restriction. (JINS, 2012, 18, 1–8)

scholarly journals Temporal delay discounting in acutely ill and weight-recovered patients with anorexia nervosa

2015 ◽  
Vol 45 (6) ◽  
pp. 1229-1239 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Ritschel ◽  
J. A. King ◽  
D. Geisler ◽  
L. Flohr ◽  
F. Neidel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Anorexia Nervosa ◽  
Delay Discounting ◽  
Intertemporal Choice ◽  
Temporal Discounting ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Hyperbolic Model ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Monetary Rewards ◽  
Cross Sectional Design ◽  
Age Range

Background.Patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) are characterized by a very low body weight but readily give up immediate rewards (food) for long-term goals (slim figure), which might indicate an unusual level of self-control. This everyday clinical observation may be quantifiable in the framework of the anticipation-discounting dilemma.Method.Using a cross-sectional design, this study compared the capacity to delay reward in 34 patients suffering from acute AN (acAN), 33 weight-recovered AN patients (recAN) and 54 healthy controls. We also used a longitudinal study to reassess 21 acAN patients after short-term weight restoration. A validated intertemporal choice task and a hyperbolic model were used to estimate temporal discounting rates.Results.Confirming the validity of the task used, decreased delay discounting was associated with age and low self-reported impulsivity. However, no group differences in key measures of temporal discounting of monetary rewards were found.Conclusions.Increased cognitive control, which has been suggested as a key characteristic of AN, does not seem to extend the capacity to wait for delayed monetary rewards. Differences between our study and the only previous study reporting decreased delay discounting in adult AN patients may be explained by the different age range and chronicity of acute patients, but the fact that weight recovery was not associated with changes in discount rates suggests that discounting behavior is not a trait marker in AN. Future studies using paradigms with disorder-specific stimuli may help to clarify the role of delay discounting in AN.

scholarly journals Validating Mouse-Tracking: How Design Factors Influence Action Dynamics in Intertemporal Decision Making

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Schoemann ◽  
Malte Lüken ◽  
Tobias Grage ◽  
Pascal J. Kieslich ◽  
Stefan Scherbaum
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Processing ◽  
Intertemporal Choice ◽  
Temporal Discounting ◽  
Process Tracing ◽  
Cognitive Effects ◽  
Continuous Processing ◽  
Mouse Tracking ◽  
Mouse Movements ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Tracing Method

Mouse-tracking is an increasingly popular process-tracing method. It builds on the assumption that the continuity of cognitive processing leaks into the continuity of mouse movements. As this assumption is the prerequisite for a meaningful reverse inference, it is an important question whether the assumed interaction between continuous processing and movement might be influenced by the methodological setup of the measurement. Here, we study the impact of three commonly occurring methodological variations on the quality of mouse-tracking measures, and hence, the reported cognitive effects. We used a mouse-tracking version of a classical intertemporal choice task that had previously been used to examine the dynamics of temporal discounting and the date-delay effect (Dshemuchadse, Scherbaum, & Goschke, 2013). The data from this previous study also served as a benchmark condition in our experimental design. Between studies, we varied the starting procedure. Within the new study, we varied the response procedure and the stimuli position. The starting procedure had the strongest influence on common mouse-tracking measures and therefore the cognitive effects. The effect of the response procedure and the stimuli position was weaker and less pronounced. The results suggest that the methodological setup crucially influences the interaction between continuous processing and mouse movement. We conclude that the methodological setup is of high importance for the validity of mouse-tracking as a process-tracing method. Finally, we discuss the need for standardized mouse-tracking setups for which we provide recommendations, and present two promising lines of research to obtain an evidence-based gold standard of mouse-tracking.

Effect of the Implicit Association Test on Self-Control Strength

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dikla Shmueli ◽  
Heather Rosman ◽  
Mark Muraven ◽  
Andrew Philip
Keyword(s):  
Implicit Association Test ◽  
Association Test ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Implicit Association ◽  
Control Strength

scholarly journals The Decimal Effect: Behavioral and Neural Bases for a Novel Influence on Intertemporal Choice in Healthy Individuals and in ADHD

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (11) ◽  
pp. 2455-2468 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Fassbender ◽  
Sebastien Houde ◽  
Shayla Silver-Balbus ◽  
Kacey Ballard ◽  
Bokyung Kim ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Intertemporal Choice ◽  
Temporal Discounting ◽  
Behavioral Effect ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Hyperactivity Disorder ◽  
Brain Responses ◽  
Intertemporal Preferences ◽  
Reward Bias ◽  
Deliberative Processes ◽  
Intertemporal Choices

We identify a novel contextual variable that alters the evaluation of delayed rewards in healthy participants and those diagnosed with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). When intertemporal choices are constructed of monetary outcomes with rounded values (e.g., $25.00), discount rates are greater than when the rewards have nonzero decimal values (e.g., $25.12). This finding is well explained within a dual system framework for temporal discounting in which preferences are constructed from separate affective and deliberative processes. Specifically, we find that round dollar values produce greater positive affect than do nonzero decimal values. This suggests that relative involvement of affective processes may underlie our observed difference in intertemporal preferences. Furthermore, we demonstrate that intertemporal choices with rounded values recruit greater brain responses in the nucleus accumbens to a degree that correlates with the size of the behavioral effect across participants. Our demonstration that a simple contextual manipulation can alter self-control in ADHD has implications for treatment of individuals with disorders of impulsivity. Overall, the decimal effect highlights mechanisms by which the properties of a reward bias perceived value and consequent preferences.

scholarly journals Temporal discounting when outcomes are experienced in the moment: Validation of a novel paradigm and comparison with a classic hypothetical intertemporal choice task

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. e0251480
Author(s):  
Virginie M. Patt ◽  
Renee Hunsberger ◽  
Dominoe A. Jones ◽  
Margaret M. Keane ◽  
Mieke Verfaellie
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Trait Anxiety ◽  
Choice Behavior ◽  
Intertemporal Choice ◽  
Temporal Discounting ◽  
Logistic Function ◽  
Individual Variability ◽  
Choice Task ◽  
State And Trait Anxiety ◽  
Intertemporal Choices

When faced with intertemporal choices, people typically devalue rewards available in the future compared to rewards more immediately available, a phenomenon known as temporal discounting. Decisions involving intertemporal choices arise daily, with critical impact on health and financial wellbeing. Although many such decisions are “experiential” in that they involve delays and rewards that are experienced in real-time and can inform subsequent choices, most studies have focused on intertemporal choices with hypothetical outcomes (or outcomes delivered after all decisions are made). The present study focused on experiential intertemporal choices. First, a novel intertemporal choice task was developed and validated, using delays experienced in real time and artistic photographs as consumable perceptual rewards. Second, performance on the experiential task was compared to performance on a classic intertemporal choice task with hypothetical outcomes. Involvement of distinct processes across tasks was probed by examining differential relations to state and trait anxiety. A two-parameter logistic function framework was proposed to fit indifference point data. This approach accounts for individual variability not only in the delay at which an individual switches from choosing the delayed to more immediate option, but also in the slope of that switch. Fit results indicated that the experiential task elicited temporal discounting, with effective trade-off between delay and perceptual reward. Comparison with the hypothetical intertemporal choice task suggested distinct mechanisms: first, temporal discounting across the two tasks was not correlated; and second, state and trait anxiety both were associated with choice behavior in the experiential task, albeit in distinct ways, whereas neither was significantly associated with choice behavior in the hypothetical task. The engagement of different processes in the experiential compared to hypothetical task may align with neural evidence for the recruitment of the hippocampus in animal but not in classic human intertemporal choice studies.

Men Are Hierarchical, Women Are Egalitarian: An Implicit Gender Stereotype

2004 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 107-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marianne Schmid Mast
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Implicit Association Test ◽  
Gender Stereotype ◽  
Association Test ◽  
Implicit Association ◽  
Two Samples

The goal of the present study was to provide empirical evidence for the existence of an implicit hierarchy gender stereotype indicating that men are more readily associated with hierarchies and women are more readily associated with egalitarian structures. To measure the implicit hierarchy gender stereotype, the Implicit Association Test (IAT, Greenwald et al., 1998) was used. Two samples of undergraduates (Sample 1: 41 females, 22 males; Sample 2: 35 females, 37 males) completed a newly developed paper-based hierarchy-gender IAT. Results showed that there was an implicit hierarchy gender stereotype: the association between male and hierarchical and between female and egalitarian was stronger than the association between female and hierarchical and between male and egalitarian. Additionally, men had a more pronounced implicit hierarchy gender stereotype than women.

What Does the Implicit Association Test Measure? A Test of the Convergent and Discriminant Validity of Prejudice-Related IATs

2002 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 171-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bertram Gawronski
Keyword(s):  
Implicit Association Test ◽  
Discriminant Validity ◽  
Association Test ◽  
Recent Criticism ◽  
Implicit Association ◽  
East Asians ◽  
Student Sample ◽  
Convergent And Discriminant Validity ◽  
Explicit Prejudice ◽  
Turkish People

Abstract. Drawing on recent criticism of the Implicit Association Test (IAT), the present study tested the convergent and discriminant validity of two prejudice-related IATs to corresponding explicit prejudice measures in a German student sample (N = 61). Confirming convergent validity, (a) an IAT designed to assess negative associations related to Turkish people was significantly related to the explicit endorsement of prejudiced beliefs about Turkish people, and (b) an IAT designed to assess negative associations related to East Asians was significantly related to explicit prejudice against East Asians. Moreover, confirming discriminant validity, (c) the Asian IAT was unrelated to the explicit endorsement of prejudiced beliefs about Turkish people, and (d) the Turkish IAT was unrelated to explicit prejudice against Asian people. These results further corroborate the assumption that the IAT is a valid method to assess the strength of evaluative associations in the domain of prejudice and stereotypes.

Items’ Cross-Category Associations as a Confounding Factor in the Implicit Association Test

2001 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melanie C. Steffens ◽  
Inga Plewe
Keyword(s):  
Implicit Association Test ◽  
Confounding Factor ◽  
Reaction Times ◽  
Association Test ◽  
The Other ◽  
Reaction Time Difference ◽  
Implicit Association ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Research Activities ◽  
Degree Of Association

Abstract. The introduction of the Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998 ) has stimulated numerous research activities. The IAT is supposed to measure the degree of association between concepts. Instances have to be assigned to these concepts by pressing appropriate keys as quickly as possible. The reaction time difference between certain conditions, termed the IAT effect, is used as an indicator of the degree of the concepts’ association. We tested the hypothesis that the degree of association between one concept (or category) and the instances of the other presented concept also influences reaction times. In our experiment, the instances in the target categories, male and female names, were kept constant. The adjectives in the evaluative categories were manipulated: Either the pleasant adjectives were female-associated and the unpleasant adjectives were male-associated, or vice versa. These stereotypic associations were indeed found to exert a substantial influence on the size of the IAT effect. This finding casts doubt on the assumption that the IAT effect may be interpreted as a pure measure of the degree of association between concepts.

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