This study aims to investigate the influence of self-awareness on students’ ethical compliance, examine the impact of self-integrity on students’ ethical compliance, explore the effect of self-regulation on students’ ethical compliance, and analyze the influence of ethics education on students’ ethical compliance. Additionally, the research investigates whether ethics education taught in schools or universities has a greater impact compared to an individual’s personality on students’ ethical compliance. The population in this study comprises students in Indonesia. Data collection involves distributing questionnaires (...) through Google Forms, allowing one month for questionnaire completion. The study employs a significance level of 5% to examine the influence of independent variables on the dependent variable. The research findings demonstrate that self-awareness, self-integrity, self-regulation, and ethics education have significant influences on students’ ethical compliance. Furthermore, the study reveals that ethics education does not have a higher impact on students’ ethical compliance compared to the individual’s personality. Therefore, it is crucial to ensure that students possess good self-awareness, high levels of self-integrity, and self-regulation, and understand the ethics education they receive, as this will help enhance students’ ethics compliance. (shrink)

This paper examines what it takes for a state of knowledge-how to be extended (i.e. partly constituted by entities external to the organism) within an anti-intellectualist approach to knowledge- how. I begin by examining an account of extended knowledge- how developed by Carter, J. Adam, and Boleslaw Czarnecki. 2016 [“Extended Knowledge-How.” Erkenntnis 81 (2): 259–273], and argue that it fails to properly distinguish between cognitive outsourcing and extended knowing-how. I then introduce a solution to this problem which rests on the (...) distribution of tasks between agent and non-biological entity. On closer inspection, I show that this solution is ultimately unsatisfactory, though its failure is instructive as it illuminates the important role played by an agent’s skilled interaction with an external entity. Drawing on key anti-intellectualist ideas, as well as on insight from cognitive psychology, I propose an account according to which what ultimately matters for extending knowledge-how is whether a hybrid ability is self-regulated. In closing, I illuminate the practical value of extended knowledge-how vis-à-vis cognitive outsourcing. (shrink)

Individuals come across extreme Uncertainty situations, feeling rounded–up 360 degrees, as if trapped inside Chakra Vyuha (wheel form strategy). For uncertainty is often related to future, the concept of Future Time perspective (FTP) is relied upon for attaining positive states. But FTP is a critical factor which works both positively and negatively depending on other factors intervening. For politicians and businessmen such states of being trapped in Chakra Vyuha, can mean end of their political life or business life. In the (...) current paper, the author describes the introspection of a Subject while he attempted to alter his Future Time perspective. This introspective report further gave clue for Merged Time Perspective or Seamless Time Horizon instead of FTP and also that Regulatory Focus and Resistance To Change need to be combined, coalesced and treated on a single continuum. Current author also has proposed a therapy outline to help businessmen and politicians to come out of devastating situations in which they feel rounded – up by opponents 360 degrees. (shrink)

Philosophers, psychologists, and economists have reached the consensus that one can use two different kinds of regulation to achieve self-control. Synchronic regulation uses willpower to resist current temptation. Diachronic regulation implements a plan to avoid future temptation. Yet this consensus may rest on contaminated intuitions. Specifically, agents typically use willpower (synchronic regulation) to achieve their plans to avoid temptation (diachronic regulation). So even if cases of diachronic regulation seem to involve self-control, this may be because they are contaminated by synchronic (...) regulation. We therefore developed a novel multifactorial method to disentangle synchronic and diachronic regulation. Using this method, we find that ordinary usage assumes that only synchronic––not diachronic––regulation counts as self-control. We find this pattern across four experiments involving different kinds of temptation, as well as a paradigmatic case of diachronic regulation based on the classic story of Odysseus and the Sirens. Our final experiment finds that self-control in a diachronic case depends on whether the agent uses synchronic regulation at two moments: when she (1) initiates and (2) follows-through on a plan to resist temptation. Taken together, our results strongly suggest that synchronic regulation is the sole difference maker in the folk concept of self-control. (shrink)

Self-regulation in early childhood is an important predictor of success across a variety of indicators in life, including health, well-being, and earnings. Although conceptually self-regulation has been defined as multifaceted, previous research has not investigated whether there is conceptual and empirical overlap between the factors that comprise self-regulation or if they are distinct. In this study, using a bifactor model, we tested the shared and unique variance among self-regulation constructs and prediction to pre-academic and social-emotional skills. The sample included 932 (...) preschool children, their parents, and their teachers in the United States. Children’s self-regulation was assessed using measures of executive function, behavioral self-regulation, and emotion regulation. The bifactor model demonstrated a common overarching self-regulation factor, as well as distinct executive function and emotion regulation factors. The common overarching self-regulation factor and executive function predicted children’s pre-academic and social-emotional skills. The emotion regulation factor predicted children’s social-emotional skills. Identifying the shared and unique aspects of self-regulation may have important implications for supporting children’s regulatory skills as well as their success in school. (shrink)

The broad spectrum revolution brought greater dependence on skill and knowledge, and more demanding, often social, choices. We adopt Sterelny's account of how cooperative foraging paid the costs associated with longer dependency, and transformed the problem of skill learning. Scaffolded learning can facilitate cognitive control including suppression, whereas scaffolded exchange and trade, including inter-temporal exchange, can help develop resolve.

According to a standard picture of agency, a person’s actions always reflect what they most desire, and many theorists extend this model to mental illness. In this chapter, I pin down exactly where this “volitional” view goes wrong. The key is to recognize that human motivational architecture involves a regulatory control structure: we have both spontaneous states (e.g., automatically-elicited thoughts and action tendencies, etc.) as well as regulatory mechanisms that allow us to suppress or modulate these spontaneous states. Our regulatory (...) abilities, however, are bounded. Mental illnesses, I argue, arise precisely where these bounds are reached, thus allowing inappropriate spontaneous states to regularly manifest in thought and action. I conclude that the volitional view of mental illness is wrong: when a person with mental illness reaches the limits of control, what they do often does not reflect what they most prefer. (shrink)

This paper draws on work in the sciences of the mind to cast doubt on some assumptions that have often been made in the study of self-control. Contra a long, Aristotelian tradition, recent evidence suggests that highly self-controlled individuals do not have a trait very similar to continence: they experience relatively few desires that conflict with their evaluative judgments and are not especially good at directly and effortfully inhibiting such desires. Similarly, several recent studies have failed to support the view (...) that self-control capacities are constituted, at least in part, by excellent inhibitory executive function ability. I propose an alternative “indirect harmony” hypothesis about trait self-control. According to this hypothesis, if there is a character trait of being highly self-controlled, it consists in motivational harmony within the mind that is brought about through the effective use of indirect resistance strategies that prevent occurrent motivational conflict from emerging in the first place. If this hypothesis is correct, high trait self-control in actual humans does not fit neatly into the traditional categories of either continence or temperance. I conclude by drawing out several implications this hypothesis has for future research on trait self-control and its relation to executive functions. (shrink)

Previous research indicates that the depletion of self-regulatory resources can promote unethical behavior that benefits the self. Extending this literature, we focus on norm-transgressing behavior that is intended to primarily benefit others. In particular, we predicted a differing effect of self-regulatory resource depletion on dishonesty that benefits one’s group, depending on the degree of identification with the group. Following a dual process approach, we argue that if identification with the group is strong, then people may have an automatic inclination to (...) benefit their group even perhaps by lying. In contrast, if identification with the group is weak, then the default, uncontrolled impulse may be to tell the truth. Accordingly, identification with the social group should interact with self-regulatory resource depletion in predicting group-benefiting dishonesty. Focusing on pro-organizational dishonesty, we tested our hypotheses in one field study with 1269 employees and in one experimental study with 71 university students. As predicted, the results revealed a highly significant interaction of organizational identification and self-control strength: Depletion of self-regulatory resources increased the level of pro-organizational dishonesty among those who identify highly with the organization, but decreased the level of such behavior among those who identify less. (shrink)

Although several studies provide evidence that trait self-control contributes to subjective well-being, the self-control strategies that promotes happiness and life satisfaction remains unknown. The present study aims to shed light on this relation by investigating the mediating role of four self-control strategies: situation selection, attentional deployment, reappraisal, and inhibition. To test the hypothesis that self-control strategies mediate trait self-control’s effect on well-being, an online questionnaire on trait self-control, self-control strategies, and cognitive and affective well-being was administered to 4,036 participants from (...) four countries (ages 18–65 and 56.4% female), whose responses were analyzed using structural equation modeling. Our analysis replicates previous studies that trait self-control positively relates to subjective well-being. Moreover, our analysis provides evidence that this relation is indeed mediated by the tendency to employ particular self-control strategies. Attentional deployment and reappraisal positively relate to subjective well-being, whereas inhibition exhibits a negative relation. Situation selection was unrelated to subjective well-being. The incorporation of self-control strategies represents the first attempt to empirically disentangle the positive relation between trait self-control and subjective well-being. The heterogeneous effects of self-control strategies suggest the importance of obtaining a better understanding of which aspects of trait self-control positively contributes to subjective well-being. (shrink)

Emerging research shows a strong connection between brain areas governing cognition and motor behavior. Yet, research investigating the negative aftereffects of cognitive control exertion on task performance has not considered the potential role of areas governing motor behavior. The present study investigated the effects of high cognitive control exertion on task self-efficacy and exercise performance in children. A secondary purpose was to investigate whether motor coordination influences the change in exercise performance differently following low versus high cognitive control exertion. Participants (...) (N = 70) performed two isometric handgrip endurance trials separated by a Stroop task, which was either congruent (low cognitive control) or incongruent (high cognitive control). Motor coordination was assessed prior to the first endurance trial. Task self-efficacy for performing the second endurance trial was assessed following the Stroop task. Participants in the high cognitive control condition reported lower task self-efficacy and showed a reduction in endurance exercise performance. Task self-efficacy mediated the cognitive control – performance relationship. Participants scoring lower on motor coordination showed the greatest declines in exercise performance following high cognitive control, whereas motor coordination did not affect performance following low cognitive control. The results of this study provide evidence that task self-efficacy and exercise performance are also negatively affected in children following high cognitive control, and interestingly, these effects are exacerbated among those scoring lower in motor coordination. We recommend future research investigate motor coordination as a potential mechanism for the reductions in both cognitive and physical task performance following the prolonged exertion of high cognitive control. (shrink)

Inducing the rubber hand illusion (RHI) requires that participants look at an imitation hand while it is stroked in synchrony with their occluded biological hand. Previous explanations of the RHI have emphasized multisensory integration, and excluded higher cognitive functions. We investigated the relationship between the RHI and higher cognitive functions by experimentally testing task switch (as measured by switch cost) and mind wandering (as measured by SART score); we also included a questionnaire for attentional control that comprises two subscales, attention-shift (...) and attention-focus. To assess experience of RHI, the Botvinick and Cohen (1998) questionnaire was used and illusion onset time was recorded. Our results indicate that rapidity of onset reliably indicates illusion strength. Regression analysis revealed that participants evincing less switch cost and higher attention-shift scores had faster RHI onset times, and that those with higher attention-shift scores experienced the RHI more vividly. These results suggest that the multi-sensory hypothesis is not sufficient to explain the illusion: higher cognitive functions should be taken into account when explaining variation in the experience of ownership for the rubber hand. (shrink)

Situation selection involves choosing situations based on their likely emotional impact and may be less cognitively taxing or challenging to implement compared to other strategies for regulating emotion, which require people to regulate their emotions “in the moment”; we thus predicted that individuals who chronically experience intense emotions or who are not particularly competent at employing other emotion regulation strategies would be especially likely to benefit from situation selection. Consistent with this idea, we found that the use of situation selection (...) interacted with individual differences in emotional reactivity and competence at emotion regulation to predict emotional outcomes in both a correlational and an experimental field study. Taken together, the findings suggest that situation selection is an effective strategy for regulating emotions, especially for individuals who otherwise struggle to do so. (shrink)

This paper examines what it takes for a state of knowledge-how to be extended (i.e. partly constituted by entities external to the organism) within an anti-intellectualist approach to knowledge-how. I begin by examining an account of extended knowledge-how developed by Carter, J. Adam, and Boleslaw Czarnecki. 2016 [“Extended Knowledge-How.” Erkenntnis 81 (2): 259–273], and argue that it fails to properly distinguish between cognitive outsourcing and extended knowing-how. I then introduce a solution to this problem which rests on the distribution of (...) tasks between agent and non-biological entity. On closer inspection, I show that this solution is ultimately unsatisfactory, though its failure is instructive as it illuminates the important role played by an agent’s skilled interaction with an external entity. Drawing on key anti-intellectualist ideas, as well as on insight from cognitive psychology, I propose an account according to which what ultimately matters for extending knowledge-how is whether a hybrid ability is self-regulated. In closing, I illuminate the practical value of extended knowledge-how vis-à-vis cognitive outsourcing. (shrink)

Any analysis of self-regulation that focuses solely on willpower in conflict-laden situations is insufficient. Research makes clear that the best way to reach one's goal is not to resist temptations but to avoid temptations before they arrive; it further suggests that willpower is fragile and not to be relied on; and that the best self-regulators engage in willpower remarkably seldom.

Is the way that kindergarteners view their willpower – as a limited or as a non-limited resource – related to their motivation and behavioral self-regulation? This study is the first to examine the structure of beliefs about willpower in relation to behavioral self-regulation by interviewing 147 kindergarteners aged 5 to 7 years. A new instrument was developed to assess implicit theories about willpower for this specific age group. Results indicated that kindergarteners who think of their willpower as a non-limited resource (...) showed better behavioral self-regulation than children who adopted a more limited theory, even when controlling for age and gender. This relation was especially pronounced in low achieving children. Mediation and moderation analyses showed that this relation was partly mediated through the children’s willingness to invest effort to reach a learning goal. Findings suggest that fostering metacognitive beliefs in children, such as the belief that willpower is a non-limited resource, may increase behavioral self-regulation for successful adjustment to the demands of kindergarten and school. (shrink)

Philosophers routinely invoke self‐control in their theorizing, but major questions remain about what exactly self‐control is. I propose a componential account in which an exercise of self‐control is built out of something more fundamental: basic intrapsychic actions called cognitive control actions. Cognitive control regulates simple, brief states called response pulses that operate across diverse psychological systems (think of one's attention being grabbed by a salient object or one's mind being pulled to think about a certain topic). Self‐control ostensibly seems quite (...) different because it regulates complex, temporally extended states such as emotions and cravings. But critically, these complex states also exhibit important componential structure: They rely on response pulses as a key means by which they bring about action. The overall picture is that self‐control consists of skilled sequences of cognitive control directed against extended streams of response pulses that arise from states such as emotions and cravings, thus preventing these states from being effective in action. The account clarifies the “atoms” of self‐control—the elemental units that get combined in complex ways to produce different kinds of self‐control actions. Surprisingly, the account, which is derived from research in cognitive science, aligns nicely with the commonsense conception of self‐control. (shrink)

Background The increasing incidence of people affected by overweight or obesity is a significant health problem. The knowledge of the factors which influences the inappropriate eating behaviours causing excessive body fat is an essential goal for the research. In fact, overweight and obesity are significant risk factors for many health diseases, such as cardiovascular problems, diabetes, etc. Recently, many studies have focused on the relationship between body weight and cognitive processes. Objectives This systematic review is aimed to investigate the existence (...) and the nature of the relationship between excessive body weight (overweight/obesity) and executive functions, analysing cross-sectional and longitudinal studies in order to verify the evidence of a possible causality between these variables. Methods The review was carried out according to the PRISMA-Statement, through systematic searches in the scientific databases PubMed, Medline, PsychInfo, and PsycArticles. The studies selected examined performance on executive tasks by participants with overweight or obesity, aged between 5 and 70 years. Studies examining eating disorders or obesity resulting from other medical problems were excluded. Furthermore, the results of studies using a cross-sectional design and those using a longitudinal one were separately investigated. Results Sixty-three cross-sectional studies and twenty-eight longitudinal studies that met our inclusion and exclusion criteria were analysed. The results confirmed the presence of a relation between executive functions and overweight/obesity, although the directionality of this relation was not clear; nor did any single executive function emerge as being more involved than others in this relation. Despite this, there was evidence of a reciprocal influence between executive functions and overweight/obesity. Conclusions This systematic review underlines the presence of a relationship between executive functions and overweight/obesity. Moreover, it seems to suggest a bidirectional trend in this relationship that could be the cause of the failure of interventions for weight reduction. The results of this review highlight the importance of a theoretical model able to consider all the main variables of interest, with the aim to structuring integrated approaches to solve the overweight/obesity problems. (shrink)

This is a work concerned with justification and freedom and the relationship between these. Its summational aim is to defend a transcendental argument for free will – that we could not be epistemically justified in undermining a strong notion of free will, as a strong notion of free will would be required for any such process of undermining to be itself epistemically justified. The book advances two transcendental arguments – for a deontically internalist conception of epistemic justification and the aforementioned (...) argument for a libertarian conception of free will. In defending each of these arguments, the book both defends and relies upon the principle that ‘ought’ implies ‘can’. In articulating the latter transcendental argument – for freedom – heavy reliance is made on the earlier, epistemic, work: especially on the deontological conception of rational justification (on epistemic internalism). (shrink)

In this paper we propose a pragmatic approach to the evolution of language based on analysis of a particular element of human communication: discourse coherence. We show that coherence is essential for effective communication. Through analysis of a collection of neuropsychological and neurolinguistic studies, we maintain that the proper functioning of executive processes responsible for planning and executing actions plays a key role in the construction of coherent discourses. Studies that tested the discursive and conversational abilities of bonobos have showed (...) that apes are unable to construct a flow of discourse governed by coherence, and therefore, apes’ conversational interactions are quite different from those of humans. We then propose that the emergence of coherence in communication occurred after the split between great apes’ and humans’ lines of descendants and that this emergence might have been the result of a specific gradual development in the course of hominin evolution of the executive functions. (shrink)

Why does performing certain tasks cause the aversive experience of mental effort and concomitant deterioration in task performance? One explanation posits a physical resource that is depleted over time. We propose an alternative explanation that centers on mental representations of the costs and benefits associated with task performance. Specifically, certain computational mechanisms, especially those associated with executive function, can be deployed for only a limited number of simultaneous tasks at any given moment. Consequently, the deployment of these computational mechanisms carries (...) an opportunity cost – that is, the next-best use to which these systems might be put. We argue that the phenomenology of effort can be understood as the felt output of these cost/benefit computations. In turn, the subjective experience of effort motivates reduced deployment of these computational mechanisms in the service of the present task. These opportunity cost representations, then, together with other cost/benefit calculations, determine effort expended and, everything else equal, result in performance reductions. In making our case for this position, we review alternative explanations for both the phenomenology of effort associated with these tasks and for performance reductions over time. Likewise, we review the broad range of relevant empirical results from across sub-disciplines, especially psychology and neuroscience. We hope that our proposal will help to build links among the diverse fields that have been addressing similar questions from different perspectives, and we emphasize ways in which alternative models might be empirically distinguished. (shrink)

ABSTRACTRecent research suggests that impaired emotion regulation may play an important role in the development of youth psychopathology. However, little research has explored the effects of ER strategies on affect in early adolescents. In Study 1, we examined if early adolescents are able to use distraction and whether the effects of this strategy are similar to talking to one’s mother. In Study 2, we compared the effects of distraction, cognitive reappraisal, acceptance, and rumination. In both studies, participants received instructions on (...) how to regulate their emotions after a standardised negative mood induction. In general, the results indicated that distraction, but also cognitive reappraisal and acceptance, had promising short-term effects on positive and negative affect in early adolescents. These findings suggest that targeting adaptive ER skills, such as distraction, acceptance, and cognitive reappraisal, may be an important strategy to prevent or treat psychological pro... (shrink)

Background: The Self-Regulation of Eating Behavior Questionnaire is an economical way of assessing an individual's self-regulatory abilities regarding eating behavior. Such scales are needed in the German population; therefore, the purpose of the present study was the translation and validation of a German version of the SREBQ.Method: First, we conducted a pilot study after the translation procedure. Second, we assessed the final scale in a representative sample of the German population and its underlying factor structure. Further, we tested for measurement (...) invariance and evaluated the SREBQ's associations with related scales to explore convergent and discriminant validity. Finally, we considered differences in SREBQ based on sociodemographic variables and provided derived reference scores.Results: Factor analysis revealed deficiencies in the original model. Thus, we shortened the scale based on statistical considerations and the adapted version showed improved fit in Confirmatory Factor Analysis and reliability. We also found evidence for partial strict invariance, which means the measure is equivalent for the tested groups of age and gender. Item and scale psychometric properties of the shortened version were satisfactory. In terms of diagnostic validity, it was shown that individuals with higher body mass index have worse self-regulation of eating behavior than those with lower.Conclusion: In sum, the SREBQ evidenced good validity and reliability and is suitable for application in medical, psychological, and nutritional research. (shrink)

To process information selectively and to continuously fine-tune selectivity of information processing are important abilities for successful goal-directed behavior. One phenomenon thought to represent this fine-tuning are conflict adaptation effects in interference tasks, i.e. reduction of interference after an incompatible trial and when incompatible trials are frequent. The neurocognitive mechanisms of these effects are currently only partly understood and results from brainimaging studies so far are mixed. In our study we validate and extend recent findings by examining adaption to recent (...) conflict in the classical Stroop task using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Consistent with previous research we found increased activity in a fronto-parietal network comprising the medial prefrontal cortex, ventro-lateral prefrontal cortex, and posterior parietal cortex when contrasting incompatible with compatible trials. These areas have been associated with attentional processes and might reflect increased cognitive conflict and resolution thereof during incompatible trials. While carefully controlling for non-attentional sequential effects we found smaller Stroop interference after an incompatible trial (conflict adaptation effect). These behavioral conflict adaptation effects were accompanied by changes in activity in visual color-selective areas (V4, V4α), while there was no modulation by previous trial compatibility in a visual word-selective area (VWFA). Our results provide further evidence for the notion, that adaptation to recent conflict seems to be based mainly on enhancement of processing of the task-relevant information. (shrink)

In this review, I discuss recent advances in philosophical and psychological approaches to self-control. The review is divided in 4 parts, in which I discuss: a) different conceptions of self-control; b) standard methods for studying it; c) some models of how self-control is exercised; and d) the connections between self-control and other relevant psychological constructs. The review was originally commissioned by the John Templeton Foundation to provide an informative overview that would knit together different strands of current debates in the (...) field. It is meant to be useful to well-informed audiences, as well as new-comers to the discussion. (shrink)

Adaptive behavior critically depends on performance monitoring, the ability to monitor action outcomes and the need to adapt behavior. PM-related brain activity has been linked to guiding decisions about whether action adaptation is warranted. The present study examined whether PM-related brain activity in a flanker task, as measured by electroencephalography, was associated with adaptive behavior in daily life. Specifically, we were interested in the employment of self-control, operationalized as self-control failures, and measured using ecological momentary assessment. Analyses were conducted using (...) an adaptive elastic net regression to predict SCFs from EEG in a sample of 131 participants. The model was fit using within-subject averaged response-locked EEG activity at each electrode and time point within an epoch surrounding the response. We found that higher amplitudes of the error-related negativity were related to fewer SCFs. This suggests that lower error-related activity may relate to lower recruitment of interventive self-control in daily life. Altered cognitive control processes, like PM, have been proposed as underlying mechanisms for various mental disorders. Understanding how alterations in PM relate to regulatory control might therefore aid in delineating how these alterations contribute to different psychopathologies. (shrink)