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Cognitive Control, Cognitive Flexibility and emotional regulation…
Cognitive Control, Cognitive Flexibility and emotional regulation
Cognitive control: the ability to focus on information that is currently relevant to a particular goal, while inhibiting information that is not relevant. (Gabrys, 2018). It is an aspect f executive functions.
Depends on multiple executive functions, including working memory, inhibition, conflict monitoring, and set-shifting - facilitates flexible behavioral responses
Behavioral tasks used to measure specific components of cognitive control, including n-back task, the Stroop task, the Go/No-Go task, and the WCST, among many others
Cognitive flexibility: ability to modify, or shift between "cognitive sets" or strategies in response to changes in the environment (Gabrys, 2018).
From cognitive (neuro)science it is considered an aspect of cognitive control (i.e. set-shifting) or the manifestation of multiple cognitive control processes which operate sequentially or in parallel
Definitions for cognitive control and cognitive flexibility tend to overlap and the same behavioral tasks can be used to assess both abilities
Paradigms: WCST, the Intra-dimensional (ID/ED) shift task, and the Task Shifting Paradigm (Grant and Berg, 1948; Downes et al., 1989; Monsell, 2003)
These behavioral paradigms assess the efficiency (or inefficiency) in shifting attention between relevant and irrelevant information
My hypothesis: greater cog control + flexibility would be associated with more favorable stressor appraisals - which in turn, will be predictive of lower levels of heavy drinking. Act as moderators (?)
Other views
Connected to fluid intelligence, creativity and divergent thinking - expressions of cognitive control and flexibility. Also effective problem-solving and decision-making highly depend on flexibility
clinical perspective: ability to change one´s maladaptive attitude and belief with more appropriate ones
Disturbances of cognitive control were proposed to underpin the use of ineffective emotional regulation strategies (including excessive rumination)
In the context of emotional situations, the ability to flexibly attend to and disengage from emotional aspects of a situation or a stimulus, termed "affective flexibility" might also reflect cognitive control and flexibility processes
Cognitive control, flexibility and emotions can be manifested through several core processes - span attention, appraisal/reappraisals, and the endorsement of certain coping strategies
Fundamental cognitive control processes (inhibition) play an important role in emotion regulation, where disturbances of cognitive control favor repetitive negative thinking and rumination
In the context of stressful situations, cognitive control and flexibility might be expressed through the ability to effectively regulate, or disengage from, negative thoughts and emotions when they no longer serve and adaptive purpose
diminished cognitive control (and flexibility) might be associated with increased repetitive negative thinking, rigid info processing, and maintenance of negative emotional states
Appraisals and Reappraisals: when a potentially stressful situation is first encountered, appraisals are made concerning the extent to which the stressor poses a threat and whether the ind have the necessary resources to cope with the experience
Negative appraisals (e.g. interpreting a situation as threatening or uncontrollable) might not be counterproductive. However, when negative appraisals are applied across situations without considering different characteristics of the various contexts, sustained negative mood will occur
Cognitive flexibility might involve deliberate appraisal processing, in which multiple alternative appraisals or explanations are determined across stressful situations
Infrequent engagement in reappraisal processes (difficulty to do so) can result in the maintenance of negative affect and has been related to elevated symptoms of depression
Cognitive control has been suggested to play an important role in the reappraisal process, and thus this might be a way through which the ability is expressed in stressful situations.
The reappraisal process involves shifting cognitive sets that are elicited by a stressor, and thus this might be another way through which cognitive flexibility becomes apparent in stressful situations. Cognitive flexibility allows for shifts between implementations and maintenance of new reappraisals while working memory is related to the maintenance and monitoring stage of new reappraisals
Cognitive control and flexibility: individual characteristic that is relatively stale overtime . However, encountering chronic stressors can progressively diminish these abilities - which could compromise effective emotion regulation
Chronic stress exposure can result in continuously engaging limited cognitive resources (e.g. executive functions) required to cope with situational demands - over time, these resources might become exhausted - cognitive form of allostatic overload +> more difficult to engage in flexible behaviors - resulting in automatic or reflexible responses and difficulties in regulating emotions