MOTIVATION AND PERFORMANCE IN CONTEXT: THE INFLUENCE OF GOAL ORIENTATIONS AND INSTRUCTIONAL SETTING ON SITUATIONAL APPRAISALS AND TASK PERFORMANCE

Abstract Recent studies in mice reveal widespread cortical signals during task performance; however, the various task-related and task-independent processes underlying this activity are incompletely understood. Here, we recorded wide-field neural activity, as revealed by GCaMP6s, from dorsal cortex while simultaneously monitoring orofacial movements, walking, and arousal (pupil diameter) of head-fixed mice performing a Go/NoGo visual detection task and examined the ability of task performance and spontaneous or task-related movements to predict cortical activity. A linear model was able to explain a significant fraction (33–55% of variance) of widefield dorsal cortical activity, with the largest factors being movements (facial, walk, eye), response choice (hit, miss, false alarm), and arousal and indicate that a significant fraction of trial-to-trial variability arises from both spontaneous and task-related changes in state (e.g., movements, arousal). Importantly, secondary motor cortex was highly correlated with lick rate, critical for optimal task performance (high d′), and was the first region to significantly predict the lick response on target trials. These findings suggest that secondary motor cortex is critically involved in the decision and performance of learned movements and indicate that a significant fraction of trial-to-trial variation in cortical activity results from spontaneous and task-related movements and variations in behavioral/arousal state.

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The effect of dynamic correlated colour temperature changes on alertness and performance

Lighting Research and Technology ◽

10.1177/1477153518755617 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 50 (7) ◽

pp. 1070-1081 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

M Ye ◽

SQ Zheng ◽

ML Wang ◽

M Ronnier Luo

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

Human Performance ◽

Temperature Cycle ◽

Acute Effects ◽

Temperature Changes ◽

Colour Temperature ◽

Cycle Times ◽

Circadian Phase ◽

And Performance ◽

And Task

Light can have acute effects on human performance, including task performance, alertness and circadian phase shift. Most studies have investigated these effects using static light. This study investigates the effects of dynamic light with different cycle times and different ranges of correlated colour temperature on human alertness and task performance. Ten participants took part in the experiment using six conditions of dynamic light with each observing session lasting 4.5 hours. An electroencephelogram, measurements of critical flicker frequency, performance on various cognitive tasks and alertness and sleepiness questionnaires were used to evaluate the human responses. The results showed that participants appeared more alert and performed better under lighting of higher correlated colour temperature range but different correlated colour temperature cycle times had little effect.

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Role of Model's Affect in Test Anxiety

Psychological Reports ◽

10.2466/pr0.1980.47.3.956 ◽

1980 ◽

Vol 47 (3) ◽

pp. 956-958

Author(s):

David R. Olson ◽

Robert S. Schlottmann

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

State Anxiety ◽

Task Demands ◽

Before And After ◽

Anxiety Levels ◽

And Performance ◽

State Scale ◽

High Test ◽

And Task

Thirty high test-anxious and 30 low test-anxious undergraduate females were exposed to either an anxious model, a non-anxious model or no model before performing on a spatial visualization task. The STAI A-State scale was also given before and after performance to determine the effects of model conditions and task performance on state anxiety levels. Subjects were then asked to evaluate their performance. Highly test-anxious subjects performed more poorly, reported higher levels of anxiety, and evaluated their performance more negatively than low test-anxious subjects. Type of model had no differential effect on the anxiety level and performance of subjects. Thus, the vicarious effects of a model may sometimes be superceded by task demands even on highly test-anxious subjects.

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Relationship of Self-Esteem, IQ, and Task Performance for a Sample of USA Undergraduates

Psychological Reports ◽

10.2466/pr0.1985.56.3.955 ◽

1985 ◽

Vol 56 (3) ◽

pp. 955-962 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Alex D. Lynch ◽

Peter Clark

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

Cognitive Task ◽

Self Esteem ◽

Sample Problem ◽

Correct Analysis ◽

And Performance ◽

Relationship Of ◽

And Task

Assessments of self-esteem, IQ, and performance on a cognitively demanding task were obtained from 45 college undergraduates. In addition, subjects were asked to predict how well they thought they would do on the “cognitive task” after having seen one sample problem, to estimate how well they thought they had done after completing all of the problems, how difficult they thought each problem was, and how certain they were that their answer was correct. Analysis indicated that self-esteem was significantly related to performance, independently of the covarying effect of intelligence. Contrary to expectations, however, individuals high in self-esteem did not predict that they would do better, and they did not express more confidence in their answers to the problems. Methodological and substantive implications pertaining to the mechanism whereby self-esteem influences achievement are discussed.

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Linking Challenge–Hindrance Stressors to Safety Outcomes and Performance: A Dual Mediation Model for Construction Workers

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph17217867 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 17 (21) ◽

pp. 7867

Author(s):

Junwei Zheng ◽

Xueqin Gou ◽

Hongyang Li ◽

Hong Xue ◽

Hongtao Xie

Keyword(s):

Stress Management ◽

Task Performance ◽

Occupational Injuries ◽

Construction Workers ◽

Conservation Of Resources ◽

Safety Outcomes ◽

Hindrance Stress ◽

And Performance ◽

The Relationship ◽

And Task

Occupational stressors have long been recognized as an important risk factor for injury accidents. The mechanisms underlying the relationships among challenge stressors, hindrance stressors, safety outcomes (occupational injuries), emotional experiences (attentiveness), and job performance (task performance) were investigated from the perspectives of the challenge–hindrance stress model and the conservation of resources theory. This study collected multi-source data over two timepoints for 105 safety supervisors and 379 construction workers in China. Results revealed that both challenge and hindrance stressors were positively related to occupational injuries, but only challenge stressors were positively associated with attentiveness. In addition, occupational injuries mediated the relationship between both challenge and hindrance stressors and task performance, while attentiveness mediated only the relationship between challenge stressors and task performance. These findings contribute to our knowledge of stress management in the construction project context and provide recommendations for stress management for front-line workers at construction sites.

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Promoting Optimal User Experience through Composite Challenge Tasks

Applied Sciences ◽

10.3390/app9194106 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 9 (19) ◽

pp. 4106

Author(s):

Ricardo Cruz ◽

Luis A. Pineda

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

User Experience ◽

Motor Skills ◽

Task Complexity ◽

Interactive Systems ◽

The Other ◽

Movement Interaction ◽

And Performance ◽

Performance Results ◽

And Task

Optimal user experience or flow is a theory with great impact on user experience. Promoting flow has become a competitive advantage for interactive systems, including rehabilitation. This can be achieved through an engaging interface that provides a rewarding experience and motivates the user to use the system again. This theory sustains that promoting a state of flow and improving task performance depends heavily on the balance between the challenges posed by the system and the skills deployed by the user. We further claim that balanced mental and motor skills demanded by the task improve flow and task performance. This paper presents an experiment supporting these claims. For this, we built two movement-interaction rehabilitation systems called SIBMER and Macoli (arm in Náhuatl). Both systems have two versions, one with a balanced load of mental and motor skills, and the other with an unbalanced one. Both versions are compared in terms of their potential to promote the state of flow and to improve task performance. Results show that a balance demand of mental and motor skills promotes flow, independently of the task complexity. Likewise, the experiment shows a correlation between flow and performance.

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Attentional Control and Performance Across Increasing Degrees of Unreliable Automation

Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting ◽

10.1177/1071181320641294 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 64 (1) ◽

pp. 1238-1241

Keyword(s):

Task Performance ◽

Cognitive Processes ◽

Attentional Control ◽

Positive Correlation ◽

Out Of The Loop ◽

And Performance ◽

High Level ◽

The Relationship ◽

And Task

Automation is becoming increasingly pervasive across various technological domains. As this trend continues, work must be done to understand how humans interact with these automated systems. However, individual differences can influence performance during these interactions, particularly as automation becomes more complex, potentially leaving operators out-of-the-loop. Much of the current research investigates the role of working memory and performance across low and high levels of unreliable automation. There is little work investigating the connection between other high-level cognitive processes such as attentional control and performance. Foroughi et al. (2019) found a positive correlation between attentional control and task performance. However, they only included a low-level form of automation. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between attentional control and performance using increasing degrees of unreliable automation. Our results demonstrated a positive correlation between attentional control and performance using high-level unreliable automation.

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The Motivation–Cognition Interface in Learning and Decision Making

Current Directions in Psychological Science ◽

10.1177/0963721410364008 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 19 (2) ◽

pp. 106-110 ◽

Cited By ~ 31

Author(s):

W. Todd Maddox ◽

Arthur B. Markman

Keyword(s):

Stereotype Threat ◽

Task Performance ◽

Task Demands ◽

Future Research ◽

Psychological Processes ◽

Performance Pressure ◽

And Performance ◽

Local Incentives ◽

Three Factor ◽

And Task

In this article we discuss how incentive motivations and task demands affect performance. We present a three-factor framework that suggests that performance is determined from the interaction of global incentives, local incentives, and the psychological processes needed to achieve optimal task performance. We review work that examines the implications of the motivation–cognition interface in classification and choice and on phenomena such as stereotype threat and performance pressure. We show that, under some conditions, stereotype threat and pressure accentuate performance. We discuss the implications of this work for neuropsychological assessment and outline a number of challenges for future research.

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Effects of Leadership Status and Performance Feedback on Self and other Attributions and Task Performance

Psychological Reports ◽

10.2466/pr0.1986.59.2.999 ◽

1986 ◽

Vol 59 (2) ◽

pp. 999-1006 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Thomas Li-Ping Tang ◽

Theresa Li-Na Tang

Keyword(s):

Social Context ◽

Task Performance ◽

Laboratory Study ◽

Performance Feedback ◽

Field Work ◽

Attributions Of Responsibility ◽

Self And Other ◽

And Performance ◽

And Task

Subjects' attributions of self and others were examined as a function of leadership status (supervisor vs subordinate) and feedback on performance (positive, negative, or no feedback). Each group had one supervisor and two subordinates (one confederate and one subordinate-subject). Bogus performance feedback was given to each group at random. In their attribution of success, subjects rated confederates as having more success on the task than themselves, so they presented themselves modestly in a social context. Supervisors assigned much less responsibility to themselves than to confederates and subordinates. However, subordinates' attributions of responsibility for self and others were not significantly different. Supervisors and subordinates performed equally well on “quantity” of performance, yet the former were able to maintain a significantly better “qualify” of performance than the latter. Generalization from a laboratory study to actual work situations is not appropriate until justified by appropriate field work.

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Psychological Considerations for Children and Adolescents in Sport and Performance

Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Psychology ◽

10.1093/acrefore/9780190236557.013.177 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Mary Fry ◽

Candace M. Hogue

Keyword(s):

Interpersonal Relationships ◽

Sport Participation ◽

Youth Sport ◽

Well Being ◽

Goal Orientations ◽

Psychological Benefits ◽

Young Athletes ◽

Perspective Theory ◽

And Performance ◽

And Task

There is a large literature base within the field of sport psychology that provides tremendous direction to coaches and parents on how to structure youth sport so that young athletes develop sport skills and concurrently reap psychological benefits from their sport participation. Much of this research has employed Nicholls’ Achievement Goal Perspective Theory and a Caring Framework to (a) identity the processes children undergo as their cognitive development matures across the elementary years, allowing them to accurately judge their ability by adolescence, (b) formulate their personal definitions of success in sport (develop their goal orientations), and (c) note features of the team and overall sport climate created by coaches and parents. Of particular importance is athletes’ perceptions of the motivational climate prevailing on their teams. Athletes can perceive a caring and task-involving climate where coaches reward effort, improvement, and cooperation among teammates, make everyone feel they play an important role on the team, and treat mistakes as part of the learning process. In contrast, athletes can also perceive an ego-involving climate where the coach rewards ability and performance outcome, fosters rivalry among teammates, punishes mistakes, and gives most of the recognition to a few “stars.” When athletes perceive a caring and task-involving climate on their teams, they are more likely to have fun, exert high effort, experience intrinsic motivation, have better interpersonal relationships with coaches and athletes, display better sportsperson-like values and behaviors, have better psychological well-being, and even perform better. In contrast, when athletes perceive an ego-involving climate on their teams they experience fewer adaptive and positive motivational outcomes and greater problematic outcomes (e.g., increased cortisol; greater endorsement of unsportsperson-like behaviors). Research has clearly identified the benefits of coaches and parents creating a caring and task-involving climate for young athletes, yet there are still many ego-involving climates in the youth sport world. A number of organizations are committed to helping coaches and parents transform youth sport culture into a positive arena where young people can develop their athletic skills and have a rewarding sport experience.

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