Browsing by Author "Dunn, Timothy L."

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    Anticipating cognitive effort: roles of perceived error-likelihood and time demands
    (Springer, 2019) Dunn, Timothy L.; Inzlicht, Michael; Risko, Evan F.
    Why are some actions evaluated as effortful? In the present set of experiments we address this question by examining individuals’ perception of effort when faced with a trade-off between two putative cognitive costs: how much time a task takes versus how error-prone it is. Specifically, we were interested in whether individuals anticipate engaging in a small amount of hard work (i.e., low time requirement, but high error- likelihood) versus a large amount of easy work (i.e., high time requirement, but low error-likelihood) as being more effortful. In between-subject designs, Experiments 1 through 3 demonstrated that individuals anticipate options that are high in perceived error-likelihood (yet less time consuming) as more effortful than options that are perceived to be more time consuming (yet low in error-likelihood). Further, when asked to evaluate which of the two tasks was (a) more effortful, (b) more error-prone, and (c) more time consuming, effort-based and error-based choices closely tracked one another, but this was not the case for time-based choices. Utilizing a within-subject design, Experiment 4 demonstrated overall similar pattern of judgments as Experiments 1 through 3. However, both judgments of error-likelihood and time demand similarly predicted effort judgments. Results are discussed within the context of extant accounts of cognitive control, with considerations of how error-likelihood and time demands may independently and conjunctively factor into judgments of cognitive effort.
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    Cue awareness in avoiding effortful control
    (Elsevier, 2019) Dunn, Timothy L.; Gaspar, Connor; Risko, Evan F.
    Based on a recent metacognitive account, cognitive effort is the result of an inferential evaluation made over explicitly available cues. Following from this account, we present here a pre-registered experiment that tested the specific hypothesis that explicit awareness of cues that are aligned with cognitive demand is a prerequisite in avoiding effortful lines of action. We attempted to modulate levels of effort avoidance behavior by introducing an incentive (between-subjects) to monitor two lines of action that, unbeknownst to individuals, varied in the probability of a task switch. Importantly, previous research has demonstrated that the difference in these probabilities is relatively opaque to individuals. We did not find strong evidence for our incentive manipulation having an effect on demand avoidance as indexed by individuals’ choices in a block of the task where avoiding effort was instructed. However, we do find that being aware of the task- switching cue appears to increase the likelihood of demand avoidance. We consider these results within the context of the metacognition of cognitive effort.