William Revelle

Personality, motivation, and performance: A theory of the relationship between individual differences and information processing

We introduce a model to relate the personality dimensions of introversion- extraversion, achievement motivation, and anxiety to efficient cognitive performance. We show how these personality dimensions in combination with situational moderators (e.g., success, failure, time pressure, incentives, time of day, and stimulant drugs) affect the motivational constructs of arousal and effort. We propose a general information-processing model that accounts for the systematic effects of these motivational states on certain task components (sustained information transfer and some aspect of short-term memory). We combine empirical generalizations about task components in a structural model and derive testable predictions that differentiate alternative motivational hypotheses.

The Interactive Effect of Personality, Time of Day, and Caffeine: A Test of the Arousal Model

The personality dimension of introversion/extraversion is one of the few personality dimensions that can be reliably identified from study to study and investigator to investigator. The importance of this demension within personality theory is due both to the stability of the trait and the influential theory of H. J. Eysenck. The basic assumption in Eysencks theory of introversion/extraversion is that the personality differences between introverts and extraverts reflect some basic difference in the resting level of cortical arousal or activation. Assuming that there is a curvilinear relationship (an inverted U) between levels of stress and performance leads to a test of this arousal theory. That is, moderate increases in stress should hinder the performance of introverts who are presumably already highly aroused. However, the same moderate increase in stress might help the performance of the presumably underaroused extraverts. Revelle, Amaral, and Turriff reported that the administration of moderate doses of caffeine hindered the performance of introverts and helped the performance of extraverts on a cognitive task similar to the verbal test of the Graduate Record Examination. Assuming that caffeine increases arousal, this interaction between introversion/extraversion and drug condition supports Eysencks theory. This interaction was explored in a series of experiments designed to replicate, extend, and test the generality of the original finding. The interaction between personality and drug condition was replicated and extended to additional cognitive performance tasks. However, these interactions were affected by time of day and stage of practice, and the subscales of introversion/extraversion, impulsivity, and sociability, were differentially affected. In the morning of the first day, low impulsives were hindered and high impulsives helped by caffeine. This pattern reversed in the evening of the first day, and it reversed again in the evening of Day 2. We concluded that the results from the first day of testing require a revision of Eysencks theory. Instead of a stable difference in arousal between low and high impulsives, it appeared that these groups differed in the phase of their diurnal arousal rhythms. The result is that low impulsives are more aroused in the morning and less aroused in the evening than are the high impulsives. A variety of peripheral or strategic explanations (differences in caffeine consumption, guessing strategies, distraction, etc.) for the observed performance increments and decrements were proposed and tentatively rejected. It seems probable that some fundamental change in the efficiency with which information is processes is responsible for these performance changes.

Very Simple Structure: An Alternative Procedure For Estimating The Optimal Number Of Interpretable Factors

A new procedure for determining the optimal number of interpretable factors to extract from a correlation matrix is introduced and compared to more conventional procedures. The new method evaluates the magnitude of the Very Simple Structure index of goodness of fit for factor solutions of increasing rank. The number of factors which maximizes the VSS criterion is taken as being the optimal number of factors to extract. Thirty-two artificial and two real data sets are used in order to compare this procedure with such methods as maximum likelihood, the eigenvalue greater than 1.0 rule, and comparison of the observed eigenvalues with those expected from random data.

Hierarchical Cluster Analysis And The Internal Structure Of Tests

Hierachical cluster analysis is shown to be an effective method for forming scales from sets of items. The number of scales to form from a particular item pool is found by testing the psychometric adequacy of each potential scale. Higher-order scales are formed when they are more adequate than their component sub-scales. It is suggested that a scales adequacy should be assessed by a new measure of internal consistency reliability, coefficient beta, which is defined as the worst split-half reliability of the test. Comparisons with other procedures show that hierarchical clustering algorithms using this psychometrically based decisions rule can be more useful for scale construction using large item pools than are conventional factor analytic techniques.

Estimating Generalizability to a Latent Variable Common to All of a Scale's Indicators: A Comparison of Estimators for ω h

The extent to which a scale score generalizes to a latent variable common to all of the scales indicators is indexed by the scales general factor saturation. Seven techniques for estimating this parameter—omegahierarchical (ωh)—are compared in a series of simulated data sets. Primary comparisons were based on 160 artificial data sets simulating perfectly simple and symmetric structures that contained four group factors, and an additional 200 artificial data sets confirmed large standard deviations for two methods in these simulations when a general factor was absent. Major findings were replicated in a series of 40 additional artificial data sets based on the structure of a real scale widely believed to contain three group factors of unequal size and less than perfectly simple structure. The results suggest that alpha and methods based on either the first unrotated principal factor or component should be rejected as estimates of ωh.

Effects of Anxiety on Analogical Reasoning. A Test of Three Theoretical Models

Three mediational theories of anxiety and performance, namely, cue utilization theory (Easterbrook, 1959), attentional theory (Mandler & Sarason, 1952; Wine, 1971), and working memory capacity theory (M. W. Eysenck, 1979), were compared for their efficacy in explaining anxiety-induced performance decrements on a task of analogical reasoning. One hundred two subjects who varied in their trait and state anxiety levels completed 100 geometric analogies under either relaxed (reassurance, non-time-limited) or stressed (ego-threat, time-limited) conditions. Response time and error rate data for nine levels of task complexity (1-, 2-, and 3-element analogies with zero, one, or two transformations per element) were analyzed by means of multivariate analysis of variance. Results in the relaxed condition supported attentional theory in that the more anxious subjects were both slower and less accurate than were the less anxious subjects. In the stressed condition, none of the three anxiety-performance theories was supported. More anxious subjects were faster but made more errors than did less anxious subjects. Thus in the stressed condition, performance differences suggested differences in speed-accuracy trade-off strategies rather than differences in processing abilities. The limitations of attentional theory and the need to study the effects of anxiety and time stress on information processing are discussed.

Impulsivity, caffeine, and proofreading: A test of the Easterbrook hypothesis

Easterbrooks (1959) suggestion that arousal is inversely related to the range of cue utilization has been frequently cited as an explanation for the curvilinear relationship between arousal and performance. There is very little empirical support for this position, however. As a test of the Easterbrook hypothesis, 60 undergraduates who varied in their impulsivity level were given caffeine or placebo and then asked to proofread several passages. Estimates of sensitivity were calculated using signal detection techniques. It was predicted that high arousal would reduce sensitivity to interword errors, which require a broad range of cue utilization, but that the observed levels of arousal would not affect sensitivity to intraword errors, which require a minimal range of cue utilization. A significant crossover interaction between impulsivity and drug for interword errors indicated that caffeine increased the error detection rate of the (less aroused) more impulsive subjects but lowered the error detection rate of the (more aroused) less impulsive subjects. The results of this study support the suggestion that arousal has direct effects on the capacity for simultaneous information processing, independent of its effects on performance speed.

The theory of achievement motivation revisited: The implications of inertial tendencies

The basic: theory of achievement motivation as developed by Atkinson is reviewed, and lhe implications of the incrliaUcndcncy postulate are examined. The classic theory of achievement motivation is found to be a special case of a more general theory relating lask difficulty and number of trials to performance. II is shown that the inertial-temlcncy postulate implies an asymmetric, curvilinear relationship between lask difficulty and effort, and that the degree of asymmetry is a function of the number of experimental trials and the consummatory value of failure. Experimental evidence previously viewed as contradicting the classic theory of achievement motivation is shown to be compatible with the general theory and to allow for estimation of the consummatory value of failure. Several predictions that allow for a direct test of the iiierlial-tcndency postulate are derived. The general theory of achievement motivation is suggested to be relevant to other theories concerned with the effects of success and failure on performance.

The meaning and measurement of self-complexity

Abstract The self-complexity (SC) theory is a structural model of self-knowledge that suggests individual differences in the complexity of knowledge about the self are predictive of emotional stability and reactivity to stress. Various studies have identified problems concerning the consistency, reliability and validity of the often used measure of SC, the dimensionality statistic (H; Scott, 1969 ). Addressing these issues, the present study proposes 2 alternative measures of the components of SC and examines psychometric properties of these measures. Results of this study indicate a lack of a general factor underlying the dimensionality statistic. In addition, they offer support for the benefit of distinguishing between 2 components of self-complexity: quantity of self-aspects and overlap among them.

Personality and motivation: Sources of inefficiency in cognitive performance☆

Abstract Impulsivity and anxiety are two dimensions of personality which have strong effects upon the efficiency of cognitive performance. The effects of these two variables depend upon characteristics of the task as well as upon four types of tradeoffs between psychological resources. Tasks may be characterized in terms of their relative requirements for sustained information transfer (SIT), short-term memory (STM), and long-term memory (LTM). Resource tradeoffs may be automatic, strategic, directional, or stylistic. Impulsivity effects on performance involve an automatic arousal-induced tradeoff between SIT and STM, strategic tradeoffs of speed for accuracy, and stylistic differences in persistence. Anxiety effects involve strategic, directional, and stylistic tradeoffs.