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Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance

When people carry out cognitive tasks, they sometimes suffer from distractions, that is, drops in performance that occur close in time to task-irrelevant stimuli. In this research, we examine how the pursuit of rewards contributes to distractions. In two experiments, participants performed a math ta...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Rusz, Dorottya, Bijleveld, Erik, Kompier, Michiel A. J.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6171909/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30286146
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0205091
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author Rusz, Dorottya
Bijleveld, Erik
Kompier, Michiel A. J.
author_facet Rusz, Dorottya
Bijleveld, Erik
Kompier, Michiel A. J.
author_sort Rusz, Dorottya
collection PubMed
description When people carry out cognitive tasks, they sometimes suffer from distractions, that is, drops in performance that occur close in time to task-irrelevant stimuli. In this research, we examine how the pursuit of rewards contributes to distractions. In two experiments, participants performed a math task (in which they could earn monetary rewards vs. not) while they were exposed to task-irrelevant stimuli (that were previously associated with monetary rewards vs. not). In Experiment 1, irrelevant cues that were previously associated with rewards (vs. not) impaired performance. In Experiment 2, this effect was only replicated when these reward-associated distractors appeared relatively early during task performance. While the results were thus somewhat mixed, they generally support the idea that reward associations can augment the negative effect of distractors on performance.
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spelling pubmed-61719092018-10-19 Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance Rusz, Dorottya Bijleveld, Erik Kompier, Michiel A. J. PLoS One Research Article When people carry out cognitive tasks, they sometimes suffer from distractions, that is, drops in performance that occur close in time to task-irrelevant stimuli. In this research, we examine how the pursuit of rewards contributes to distractions. In two experiments, participants performed a math task (in which they could earn monetary rewards vs. not) while they were exposed to task-irrelevant stimuli (that were previously associated with monetary rewards vs. not). In Experiment 1, irrelevant cues that were previously associated with rewards (vs. not) impaired performance. In Experiment 2, this effect was only replicated when these reward-associated distractors appeared relatively early during task performance. While the results were thus somewhat mixed, they generally support the idea that reward associations can augment the negative effect of distractors on performance. Public Library of Science 2018-10-04 /pmc/articles/PMC6171909/ /pubmed/30286146 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0205091 Text en © 2018 Rusz et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Rusz, Dorottya
Bijleveld, Erik
Kompier, Michiel A. J.
Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
title Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
title_full Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
title_fullStr Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
title_full_unstemmed Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
title_short Reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
title_sort reward-associated distractors can harm cognitive performance
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6171909/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30286146
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0205091
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