Generalizability of control across cognitive and emotional conflict.

People can learn to control their thoughts and emotions. The scientific study of control has been conducted mostly independently for cognitive and emotional conflicts. However, recent theoretical proposals suggest a close link between emotional and cognitive control processes. Indeed, mounting evidence from clinical sciences, social and personality psychology, and developmental neuroscience suggests that the ability to control thoughts and behavior goes hand in hand with the ability to control emotions. Yet, the precise interface between control over cognition and emotions remains controversial. The present study investigates the question whether control is a general-purpose mechanism or rather a set of domain-specific mechanisms. Following previous research, we tested participants' control in a cognitive and an emotional Stroop task and assessed the congruency sequence effect (CSE) which has been taken as a marker of cognitive or (implicit) emotional control, respectively. Going beyond previous research, we asked how control in one domain (e.g., cognitive) interacts with control in the other domain (e.g., emotional) on a trial-by-trial basis. In four experiments (N = 259) presented participants with a task-switching design that intermixed cognitive and emotional conflicts. This procedure produced significant CSEs across cognitive-emotional domains, suggesting that control can interact across domains. However, effect sizes of within-domain CSEs were twice as large, indicating that control is also domain-specific. These results neither support the general-purpose account nor the domain-specificity hypothesis of control. Rather, a hybrid account fits the data best, which also reconciles previous behavioral and neurophysiological findings, suggesting domain-general and specific processes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Assessing the influence of cognitive response conflict on balance control: an event-related approach using response-aligned force-plate time series data.

Process interference or sharing of attentional resources between cognitive tasks and balance control during upright standing has been well documented. Attentional costs increase with greater balancing demands of a balance activity, for example in standing compared to sitting. The traditional approach for analyzing balance control using posturography with a force plate integrates across relative long trial periods of up to several minutes, which blends any balance adjustments and cognitive operations within this period. In the present study, we pursued an event-related approach to assess if single cognitive operations resolving response selection conflict in the Simon task interfere with concurrent balance control in quiet standing. In addition to traditional outcome measures (response latency, error proportions) in the cognitive Simon task, we investigated the effect of spatial congruency on measures of sway control. We expected that conflict resolution in incongruent trials would alter short-term progression of sway control. Our results demonstrated the expected congruency effect on performance in the cognitive Simon task and the mediolateral variability of balance control within 150 ms before the onset of the manual response was reduced to a greater degree in incongruent compared to congruent trials. In addition, mediolateral variability before and after the manual response was generally reduced compared to variability following target presentation, where no effect of congruency was observed. Assuming that response conflict in incongruent conditions requires suppression of the incorrect response tendencies, our results may imply that mechanisms of cognitive conflict resolution may also carry over to intermittent balance control mechanisms in a direction-specific manner.

Does body posture reduce the Stroop effect? Evidence from two conceptual replications and a meta-analysis.

Standing compared to sitting, for instance at work, is associated with positive physical and mental health consequences. Indeed, studies suggest that performance in cognitive conflict tasks (e.g., Color Stroop tasks) is improved when subjects perform the task while standing compared to sitting (Rosenbaum et al., 2018; Smith et al., 2019). However, a recent study failed to replicate these findings in five attempts (Caron et al., 2020). We aimed to shed light on these discrepant results by means of two conceptual replications and a meta-analysis. Replication experiments showed typical congruency effects in the Color Stroop task, but failed to find any influence of posture on the Stroop effect even when we subjected data to a more sensitive analysis that controlled for individual variances between participants. Additionally, an explorative Bayesian analysis confirmed that both replications provided strong evidence against an interaction between body posture and the Stroop effect. Meta-analytic results showed that the confidence interval of the overall effect size for a modulation of the Stroop effect by body posture includes the null. Together, our results question whether standing modulates the Stroop effect in Color Stroop tasks and points out limitations of the influence of body posture on cognitive control tasks.

Limitations of cognitive control on emotional distraction - Congruency in the Color Stroop task does not modulate the Emotional Stroop effect.

Emotional information receives prioritized processing over concurrent cognitive processes. This can lead to distraction if emotional information has to be ignored. In the cognitive domain, mechanisms have been described that allow control of (cognitive) distractions. However, whether similar cognitive control mechanisms also can attenuate emotional distraction is an active area of research. This study asked whether cognitive control (triggered in the Color Stroop task) attenuates emotional distraction in the Emotional Stroop task. Theoretical accounts of cognitive control, and the Emotional Stroop task alike, predict such an interaction for tasks that employ the same relevant (e.g., color-naming) and irrelevant (e.g., word-reading) dimension. In an alternating-runs design with Color and Emotional Stroop tasks changing from trial to trial, we analyzed the impact of proactive and reactive cognitive control on Emotional Stroop effects. Four experiments manipulated predictability of congruency and emotional stimuli. Overall, results showed congruency effects in Color Stroop tasks and Emotional Stroop effects. Moreover, we found a spillover of congruency effects and emotional distraction to the other task, indicating that processes specific to one task impacted to the other task. However, Bayesian analyses and a mini-meta-analysis across experiments weigh against the predicted interaction between cognitive control and emotional distraction. The results point out limitations of cognitive control to block off emotional distraction, questioning views that assume a close interaction between cognitive control and emotional processing.

Gait Analysis of Patients After Allogeneic Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation Reveals Impairments of Functional Performance.

Background: After allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (alloHCT), patients often report functional impairments like reduced gait speed and muscle weakness. These impairments can increase the risk of adverse health events similar to elderly populations. However, they have not been quantified in patients after alloHCT (PATs). Methods: We compared fear of falling (Falls Efficacy Scale-International) and temporal gait parameters recorded on a 10-m walkway at preferred and maximum gait speed and under dual-task walking of 16 PATs (aged 31-73 years) with 15 age-matched control participants (CONs) and 17 seniors (SENs, aged >73 years). Results: Groups' gait parameters especially differed during the maximum speed condition: PATs walked slower and required more steps/10 m than CONs. PATs exhibited greater stride, stance, and swing times than CONs. PATs' swing time was even longer than SENs'. The PATs' ability to accelerate their gait speed from preferred to fast was smaller compared with CONs'. PATs reported a greater fear of falling than CONs and SENs. Conclusion: Gait analysis of alloHCT patients has revealed impairments of functional performance. Patients presented a diminished ability to accelerate gait and extending steps possibly related to a notable strength deficit that impairs power-generation abilities from lower extremities. Furthermore, patients reported a greater fear of falling than control participants and even seniors. Slowing locomotion could be a risk-preventive safety strategy. Since functional disadvantages may put alloHCT patients at a higher risk of frailty, reinforcing appropriate physical exercises already during and after alloHCT could prevent adverse health events and reduce the risk of premature functional aging.

Cognitive control of emotional distraction - valence-specific or general?

Emotional information captures attention due to privileged processing. Consequently, performance in cognitive tasks declines (i.e. emotional distraction, ED). Therefore, shielding current goals from ED is essential for adaptive goal-directed- behaviour. It has been shown that ED is reduced when participants recruit cognitive control before or after the presentation of an emotional negative distractor. Following up on this, we asked first, whether cognitive control of ED is negative-valence-specific or valence-general. A valence-general-account predicts that control shields against distracting influence of emotion, irrespective of the specific valence. In contrast, a negative-valence-specific-account predicts that control interacts with the valence and ED is reduced for negative stimuli only. Second, we asked whether this effect of ED differs between control modes operating on different time scales (i.e. proactively or reactively). To test this, we manipulated emotional distractor valence (positive/high-arousal; negative/high-arousal; neutral/low-arousal) and assessed how control interacts with ED. Results showed that ED was reduced for negative and positive valent stimuli when control was triggered before (i.e. proactive control, nExp1 = 141, between-subject-design) and after (reactive control, nExp2 = 37, within-subject-design) the emotional stimuli. Accordingly, control blocks off high-arousing emotional distractors from interfering with goal-directed-actions, irrespective of their valence (i.e. valence-general-account) and for both, proactive and reactive control modes.