Datasets:

morteza

/

cogtext

like 0

10.3389/fnhum.2014.00320

Frontiers in human neuroscience

Front Hum Neurosci

From action intentions to action effects: how does the sense of agency come about?

Sense of agency refers to the feeling of controlling an external event through one's own action. On one influential view, agency depends on how predictable the consequences of one's action are, getting stronger as the match between predicted and actual effect of an action gets closer. Thus, sense of agency arises when external events that follow our action are consistent with predictions of action effects made by the motor system while we perform or simply intend to perform an action. According to this view, agency is inferred retrospectively, after an action has been performed and its consequences are known. In contrast, little is known about whether and how internal processes involved in the selection of actions may influence subjective sense of control, in advance of the action itself, and irrespective of effect predictability. In this article, we review several classes of behavioral and neuroimaging data suggesting that earlier processes, linked to fluency of action selection, prospectively contribute to sense of agency. These findings have important implications for better understanding human volition and abnormalities of action experience.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1177/0269215514529803

Clinical rehabilitation

Clin Rehabil

Exploring the association between volition and participation in daily life activities with older adults living in the community.

To explore the association between volition and participation in daily activities with older adults living in the community. Cross-sectional study. Community-dwelling, residing in Victoria (Australia). A total of 244 adults, of 70 years and older, drawn from a convenience sample, living in their own homes. Individuals' participation in daily activities was obtained via phone interviews, from the completion of the Phone-FITT survey. Levels of volition (identified under three items; personal causation, values and interests) were collected using the Volition Scale. Analyses were completed through linear regression. The participants' mean age was 77.5 years (SD 5.7) with 60% being female. Higher levels of participation were associated with higher levels of volition in light housework (n = 225, p = 0.008), shopping (n = 239, p = 0.018), lifting weights to strengthen legs (n = 23, p = 0.031), walking for exercise (n = 163, p < 0.001) and gardening (n = 183, p = 0.001). Increased volition is associated with increased participation in physical activities with community-dwelling older adults.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.jad.2014.03.021

Journal of affective disorders

J Affect Disord

Emotional traits and affective temperaments in alcohol users, abusers and dependents in a national sample.

It is unclear how temperament is related to alcohol-related behavior in large population studies. We have used the Affective and Emotional Composite Temperament Scale (AFECTS) model to evaluate how emotional traits and affective temperaments are associated with alcohol use, abuse, and dependence in the general population. Data from 10,603 subjects (mean age=28.0±7.8 years, 70.3% females) was collected anonymously by the Internet in Brazil using the AFECTS model and the Alcohol, Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test (ASSIST). Alcohol use was stratified into control, low use, abuse, and dependence groups. The analysis of dimensional traits showed that Volition and Coping were lower, and Sensitivity was higher, in the abuse and dependence groups, with no differences between the Control and the Low Use groups. Alcohol consumption was also associated with lower Control, Stability, and Caution, and higher with Anger, Anxiety, and Desire, with significant differences between all groups. Regarding affective temperament types, alcohol abuse and dependence were associated with euphoric and cyclothymic temperaments in both genders, which was mirrored by a lower frequency of both euthymic and hyperthymic types. Only hyperthymics were overrepresented in the Control group for both genders. Data was collected by Internet only. A global dysfunction of emotional traits and a predominance of cyclothymic and euphoric temperaments were associated with alcohol-related behavior. Prevention and treatment strategies may be developed more effectively if these traits are taken into account.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1080/08870446.2014.918978

Psychology & health

Psychol Health

Correlates of reduced exercise behaviour in depression: the role of motivational and volitional deficits.

The study aimed at uncovering the correlates of reduced exercise in depressive patients. On the basis of the Health Action Process Approach (Schwarzer, 2011 ), we hypothesised that reduced exercise in depressive patients can be explained by motivational deficits and volitional deficits. A longitudinal sample of 56 clinically depressive outpatients was compared to a sample of 56 parallelised non-depressive controls. Self-reported intention, exercise, and motivational and volitional HAPA variables were measured with self-report questionnaires at baseline and four-week follow-up. Depressive patients showed a motivational deficit: they had significantly reduced intentions to exercise compared to non-depressive participants, and they suffered from reduced self-efficacy and increased negative outcome expectations. No differences were found with regard to positive outcome expectations. Depressive patients also showed a volitional deficit: depressive high-intenders were less capable of transforming their intention into action than non-depressive high-intenders. They produced less action plans, had less maintenance self-efficacy and were more easily distracted by barriers. The lower level of exercise among depressive patients is partly due to motivational, partly to volitional deficits. Interventions should be stage-matched and should focus on pessimistic beliefs (negative outcome expectations, self-efficacy) and planning deficits in depression.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1111/add.12459

Addiction (Abingdon, England)

Addiction

Reasons behind Greek problem drug users’ decisions to quit using drugs and engage in treatment of their own volition: sense of self and the Greek filotimo.

The aim of this study was to explore Greek problem drug users’ perceptions of the reasons that led them to quit using drugs and engage in treatment of their own volition. Qualitative semi-structured in-depth interviews. Two state drug agencies in Thessaloniki, Greece. A total of 40 adult problem drug-using men and women participated in the study. Participants were asked to reflect on their decisions to wean themselves from drugs and enter treatment. Findings Participants reported that their decisions centred on the re-conceptualization of the drug-using community and their membership in it, the desire to restore aspects of identities thatwere deemed to be spoiled, and finally memories of their drug-free selves. The importance of the distinctively Greek notion of filotimo in this discussion is highlighted. Primarily in relation to filotimo (a concept that represents a complex array of virtues that regulates behaviour towards one’s family), the desire to restore one’s spoiled identity plays a pivotal role in Greek problem drug users’ decisions to cease drug use and engage in treatment.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1177/1090198114529132

Health education & behavior : the official publication of the Society for Public Health Education

Health Educ Behav

Positive Exercise Experience Facilitates Behavior Change via Self-Efficacy.

Motivational processes can be set in motion when positive consequences of physical exercise are experienced. However, relationships between positive exercise experience and determinants of the motivational and the volitional phases of exercise change have attracted only sparse attention in research. This research examines direct and indirect associations between positive experience and motivational as well as volitional self-efficacy, intention, action planning, and exercise in two distinct longitudinal samples. The first one originates from an online observational study in the general population with three measurement points in time (N = 350) and the second one from a clinical intervention study in a rehabilitation context with four measurement points (N = 275). Structural equation modeling revealed the following: Positive experience is directly related with motivational self-efficacy as well as intentions in both samples. In the online sample only, positive experience is associated with volitional self-efficacy. In each sample, experience is indirectly associated with action planning via motivational self-efficacy and intentions. Moreover, action planning, in turn, predicts changes in physical exercise levels. Findings suggest a more prominent role of positive experience in the motivational than in the volitional phase of physical exercise change. Thus, this research contributes to the understanding of how positive experience is involved in the behavior change process.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s11427-014-4627-0

Science China. Life sciences

Sci China Life Sci

Causal interactions between the cerebral cortex and the autonomic nervous system.

Mental states such as stress and anxiety can cause heart disease. On the other hand, meditation can improve cardiac performance. In this study, the heart rate variability, directed transfer function and corrected conditional entropy were used to investigate the effects of mental tasks on cardiac performance, and the functional coupling between the cerebral cortex and the heart. When subjects tried to decrease their heart rate by volition, the sympathetic nervous system was inhibited and the heart rate decreased. When subjects tried to increase their heart rate by volition, the parasympathetic nervous system was inhibited and the sympathetic nervous system was stimulated, and the heart rate increased. When autonomic nervous system activity was regulated by mental tasks, the information flow from the post-central areas to the pre-central areas of the cerebral cortex increased, and there was greater coupling between the brain and the heart. Use of directed transfer function and corrected conditional entropy techniques enabled analysis of electroencephalographic recordings, and of the information flow causing functional coupling between the brain and the heart.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnhum.2014.00027

Frontiers in human neuroscience

Front Hum Neurosci

Neural correlates of intentional and stimulus-driven inhibition: a comparison.

People can inhibit an action because of an instruction by an external stimulus, or because of their own internal decision. The similarities and differences between these two forms of inhibition are not well understood. Therefore, in the present study the neural correlates of intentional and stimulus-driven inhibition were tested in the same subjects. Participants performed two inhibition tasks while lying in the scanner: the marble task in which they had to choose for themselves between intentionally acting on, or inhibiting a prepotent response to measure intentional inhibition, and the classical stop signal task in which an external signal triggered the inhibition process. Results showed that intentional inhibition decision processes rely on a neural network that has been documented extensively for stimulus-driven inhibition, including bilateral parietal and lateral prefrontal cortex and pre-supplementary motor area. We also found activation in dorsal frontomedian cortex and left inferior frontal gyrus during intentional inhibition that depended on the history of previous choices. Together, these results indicate that intentional inhibition and stimulus-driven inhibition engage a common inhibition network, but intentional inhibition is also characterized by additional context-dependent neural activation in medial prefrontal cortex.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.schres.2014.01.027

Schizophrenia research

Schizophr Res

Measuring motivation in schizophrenia: is a general state of motivation necessary for task-specific motivation?

Despite the important role of motivation in rehabilitation and functional outcomes in schizophrenia, to date, there has been little emphasis on how motivation is assessed. This is important, since different measures may tap potentially discrete motivational constructs, which in turn may have very different associations to important outcomes. In the current study, we used baseline data from 71 schizophrenia spectrum outpatients enrolled in a rehabilitation program to examine the relationship between task-specific motivation, as measured by the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI), and a more general state of volition/initiation, as measured by the three item Quality of Life (QLS) motivation index. We also examined the relationship of these motivation measures to demographic, clinical and functional variables relevant to rehabilitation outcomes. The two motivation measures were not correlated, and participants with low general state motivation exhibited a full range of task-specific motivation. Only the QLS motivation index correlated with variables relevant to rehabilitation outcomes. The lack of associations between QLS motivation index and IMI subscales suggests that constructs tapped by these measures may be divergent in schizophrenia, and specifically that task-specific intrinsic motivation is not contingent on a general state of motivation. That is, even in individuals with a general low motivational state (i.e. amotivation), interventions aimed at increasing task-specific motivation may still be effective. Moreover, the pattern of interrelationships between the QLS motivation index and variables relevant to psychosocial rehabilitation supports its use in treatment outcome studies.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1371/journal.pone.0085100

PloS one

PLoS One

Decoding intention at sensorimotor timescales.

The ability to decode an individual's intentions in real time has long been a 'holy grail' of research on human volition. For example, a reliable method could be used to improve scientific study of voluntary action by allowing external probe stimuli to be delivered at different moments during development of intention and action. Several Brain Computer Interface applications have used motor imagery of repetitive actions to achieve this goal. These systems are relatively successful, but only if the intention is sustained over a period of several seconds; much longer than the timescales identified in psychophysiological studies for normal preparation for voluntary action. We have used a combination of sensorimotor rhythms and motor imagery training to decode intentions in a single-trial cued-response paradigm similar to those used in human and non-human primate motor control research. Decoding accuracy of over 0.83 was achieved with twelve participants. With this approach, we could decode intentions to move the left or right hand at sub-second timescales, both for instructed choices instructed by an external stimulus and for free choices generated intentionally by the participant. The implications for volition are considered.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

Versicherungsmedizin

Versicherungsmedizin

[Psychological aspects of "reasonable efforts" for the prediction of mental disorder-related disability].

Current standards by which socio-medical expert opinions are furnished and how they forecast the effects of mental disorder on the individual level of performance are discussed. Expert reports generally focus on assessing how the impact of mental illness can be overcome by reasonable "efforts of volition", using a number of criteria within the scope of psychiatric and psychosomatic models of explanation. The article reasons that prognoses concerning impaired performance due to health problems should to a lesser degree be based on illness-related parameters and analyses which are not subject to will and intention. Instead, it asks for a clear distinction between controlled coping processes on the one hand and psychodynamic defence mechanisms and illness-related processes on the other. Forecasts should take into greater consideration to what extent the effects of mental disorder on individual behaviour can also be attributed to a wide range of deliberate, non-pathological factors. Psychological motivation and action theories should become an integral part of expert reports, as they offer some useful tools for differentiating between those disabilities that are caused by controlled action and others that can be attributed to disorder-related factors.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1002/mpr.1410

International journal of methods in psychiatric research

Int J Methods Psychiatr Res

Dysfunctions of decision-making and cognitive control as transdiagnostic mechanisms of mental disorders: advances, gaps, and needs in current research.

Disadvantageous decision-making and impaired volitional control over actions, thoughts, and emotions are characteristics of a wide range of mental disorders such as addiction, eating disorders, depression, and anxiety disorders and may reflect transdiagnostic core mechanisms and possibly vulnerability factors. Elucidating the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms is a precondition for moving from symptom-based to mechanism-based disorder classifications and ultimately mechanism-targeted interventions. However, despite substantial advances in basic research on decision-making and cognitive control, there are still profound gaps in our current understanding of dysfunctions of these processes in mental disorders. Central unresolved questions are: (i) to which degree such dysfunctions reflect transdiagnostic mechanisms or disorder-specific patterns of impairment; (ii) how phenotypical features of mental disorders relate to dysfunctional control parameter settings and aberrant interactions between large-scale brain systems involved in habit and reward-based learning, performance monitoring, emotion regulation, and cognitive control; (iii) whether cognitive control impairments are consequences or antecedent vulnerability factors of mental disorders; (iv) whether they reflect generalized competence impairments or context-specific performance failures; (v) whether not only impaired but also chronic over-control contributes to mental disorders. In the light of these gaps, needs for future research are: (i) an increased focus on basic cognitive-affective mechanisms underlying decision and control dysfunctions across disorders; (ii) longitudinal-prospective studies systematically incorporating theory-driven behavioural tasks and neuroimaging protocols to assess decision-making and control dysfunctions and aberrant interactions between underlying large-scale brain systems; (iii) use of latent-variable models of cognitive control rather than single tasks; (iv) increased focus on the interplay of implicit and explicit cognitive-affective processes; (v) stronger focus on computational models specifying neurocognitive mechanisms underlying phenotypical expressions of mental disorders.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.pnpbp.2013.12.011

Progress in neuro-psychopharmacology & biological psychiatry

Prog Neuropsychopharmacol Biol Psychiatry

The effect of dopamine on adult hippocampal neurogenesis.

Cumulative studies indicated that adult hippocampal neurogenesis might be involved in the action mechanism of antidepressant drugs and/or the pathophysiology of depression. Dopamine (DA) is involved in the regulation of motivation, volition, interest/pleasure, and attention/concentration, all of which are likely to be impaired in depressed patients. Several previous reports suggest that depression may often be accompanied by a relative hypo-dopaminergic state, and some DA receptor agonists are beneficial effects in the treatment for refractory and bipolar depression. In the present study, to clarify the direct effect of DA on neural progenitor cells, we examined the effect of DA on the proliferation of adult rat dentate gyrus-derived neural precursor cells (ADPs). In addition, we examined the effect of DA receptor agonists on adult rat hippocampal neurogenesis in vivo. Results showed that DA promoted the increase of ADPs via D1-like receptor and D1-like receptor agonist promoted the survival of newborn cells in the adult hippocampus. On the contrary, D2-like receptor agonist did not affect both proliferation and survival. These results suggested that DA might play, at least in part, a role in adult hippocampal neurogenesis via D1-like receptor and the activation of D1-like receptor has a therapeutic potential for depression.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00920

Frontiers in psychology

Front Psychol

Re-conceptualizing free will for the 21st century: acting independently with a limited role for consciousness.

This paper examines the concept of free will, or independent action, in light of recent research in psychology and neuroscience. Reviewing findings in memory, prospection, and mental simulation, as well as the neurological mechanisms underlying behavioral control, planning, and integration, it is suggested in accord with previous arguments (e.g., Wegner, 2003; Harris, 2012) that a folk conception of free will as entirely conscious control over behavior should be rejected. However, it is argued that, when taken together, these findings can also support an alternative conception of free will. The constructive nature of memory and an integrative "default network" provide the means for novel and creative combinations of information, such as the imagining of counterfactual scenarios and alternative courses of action. Considering recent findings of extensive functional connections between these systems and those that subsume motor control and goal maintenance, it is argued that individuals have the capability of producing novel ideas and translating them into actionable goals. Although most of these processes take place beneath conscious awareness, it is argued that they are unique to the individual and thus, can be considered a form of independent control over behavior, or free will.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.cognition.2013.11.005

Cognition

Cognition

Subliminal priming of intentional inhibition.

Intentional choice is an important process underlying human behaviour. Intentional inhibition refers to the capacity to endogenously cancel an about-to-be-executed action at the last moment. Previous research suggested that such intentional inhibitory control requires conscious effort and awareness. Here we show that intentional decisions to inhibit are nevertheless influenced by unconscious processing. In a novel version of the Go/No-Go task, participants made speeded keypress actions to a Go target, or withheld responses to a No-Go target, or made free, spontaneous choices whether to execute or inhibit a keypress when presented with a free-choice target. Prior to each target, subliminal masked prime arrows were presented. Primes could be congruent with the Go or No-Go arrows, or neutral. Response times and proportion of action choices were measured. Primes were presented at latencies that would give either positive or negative compatibility effects (PCE, Experiment 1, and NCE, Experiment 2, respectively), based on previous literature. Go-primes at positive-compatibility latencies facilitated speeded response times as expected, but did not influence number of choices to act on free-choice trials. However, when Go primes were presented at negative-compatibility latencies, "free" decisions to inhibit were significantly increased. Decisions to act or not can be unconsciously manipulated, at least by inhibitory mechanisms. The cognitive mechanisms for intentionally withholding an action can be influenced by unconscious processing. We discuss possible moral and legal implications of these findings.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1093/brain/awt302

Brain : a journal of neurology

Brain

The medial frontal-prefrontal network for altered awareness and control of action in corticobasal syndrome.

The volitional impairments of alien limb and apraxia are a defining feature of the corticobasal syndrome, but a limited understanding of their neurocognitive aetiology has hampered progress towards effective treatments. Here we combined several key methods to investigate the mechanism of impairments in voluntary action in corticobasal syndrome. We used a quantitative measure of awareness of action that is based on well-defined processes of motor control; structural and functional anatomical information; and evaluation against the clinical volitional disorders of corticobasal syndrome. In patients and healthy adults we measured 'intentional binding', the perceived temporal attraction between voluntary actions and their sensory effects. Patients showed increased binding of the perceived time of actions towards their effects. This increase correlated with the severity of alien limb and apraxia, which we suggest share a core deficit in motor control processes, through reduced precision in voluntary action signals. Structural neuroimaging analyses showed the behavioural variability in patients was related to changes in grey matter volume in pre-supplementary motor area, and changes in its underlying white matter tracts to prefrontal cortex. Moreover, changes in functional connectivity at rest between the pre-supplementary motor area and prefrontal cortex were proportional to changes in binding. These behavioural, structural and functional results converge to reveal the frontal network for altered awareness and control of voluntary action in corticobasal syndrome, and provide candidate markers to evaluate new therapies.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1111/tops.12068

Topics in cognitive science

Top Cogn Sci

Quantum walks in brain microtubules--a biomolecular basis for quantum cognition?

Cognitive decisions are best described by quantum mathematics. Do quantum information devices operate in the brain? What would they look like? Fuss and Navarro () describe quantum lattice registers in which quantum superpositioned pathways interact (compute/integrate) as 'quantum walks' akin to Feynman's path integral in a lattice (e.g. the 'Feynman quantum chessboard'). Simultaneous alternate pathways eventually reduce (collapse), selecting one particular pathway in a cognitive decision, or choice. This paper describes how quantum walks in a Feynman chessboard are conceptually identical to 'topological qubits' in brain neuronal microtubules, as described in the Penrose-Hameroff 'Orch OR' theory of consciousness.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1177/1550059413491560

Clinical EEG and neuroscience

Clin EEG Neurosci

Volitional control of heartbeat and its dependence on pallium.

It is believed that we cannot change our heart rhythm by will because the heartbeat is mainly controlled by the autonomic nervous system (ANS), which cannot be affected directly by subjective will. An experiment was designed to determine whether the heartbeat and ANS could be controlled by volition, and, if it is true, how they were controlled. It was demonstrated that the ANS could be partly controlled by volition. The volition, which tended to slow down the heartbeat, initiated synchronized activity in the medial prefrontal cortex, inhibited the sympathetic system, and then decreased the heartbeat. On the other hand, another kind of volition, which sped up the heartbeat, initiated desynchronized activity at the precentral, central, parietal, and occipital regions, inhibited the parasympathetic system and excited the sympathetic system, and then increased the heartbeat. Moreover, information flow from posterior cortex to anterior cortex was observed during the experiment. The parietal area played an important role in triggering the sensorimotor cortex and integrating the information, and the information flow from the central and precentral cortex to heart was dominant. All that demonstrated that volition can partly control the heartbeat, but the behavior was different from the motor nervous system.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.cortex.2013.09.001

Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior

Cortex

Distinct electrophysiological potentials for intention in action and prior intention for action.

The role of conscious intention in relation to motoric movements has become a major topic of investigation in neuroscience. Traditionally, reports of conscious intention have been compared to various features of the readiness-potential (RP)--an electrophysiological signal that appears before voluntary movements. Experiments, however, tend to study intentions in immediate relation to movements (proximal intentions), thus ignoring other aspects of intentions such as planning or deciding in advance of movement (distal intentions). The current study examines the difference in electrophysiological activity between proximal intention and distal intention, using electroencephalography (EEG). Participants had to form an intention to move and then wait 2.5 sec before performing the actual movement. In this way, the electrophysiological activity related to forming a conscious intention was separated from any confounding activity related to automated motor activity. This was compared to conditions in which participants had to act as soon as they had the intention and a condition where participants acted upon an external cue 2.5 sec prior to movement. We examined the RP for the three conditions. No difference was found in early RP, but late RP differed significantly depending on the type of intention. In addition, we analysed signals during a longer time-interval starting before the time of distal intention formation until after the actual movement concluded. Results showed a slow negative electrophysiological "intention potential" above the mid-frontal areas at the time participants formed a distal intention. This potential was only found when the distal intention was self-paced and not when the intention was formed in response to an external cue.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00614

Frontiers in psychology

Front Psychol

The influence of high-level beliefs on self-regulatory engagement: evidence from thermal pain stimulation.

Determinist beliefs have been shown to impact basic motor preparation, prosocial behavior, performance monitoring, and voluntary inhibition, presumably by diminishing the recruitment of cognitive resources for self-regulation. We sought to support and extend previous findings by applying a belief manipulation to a novel inhibition paradigm that requires participants to either execute or suppress a prepotent withdrawal reaction from a strong aversive stimulus (thermal pain). Action and inhibition responses could be determined by either external signals or voluntary choices. Our results suggest that the reduction of free will beliefs corresponds with a reduction in effort investment that influences voluntary action selection and inhibition, most directly indicated by increased time required to initiate a withdrawal response internally (but not externally). It is likely that disbelief in free will encourages participants to be more passive, to exhibit a reduction in intentional engagement, and to be disinclined to adapt their behavior to contextual needs.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.cognition.2013.08.020

Cognition

Cognition

Power to the will: how exerting physical effort boosts the sense of agency.

The sense of agency refers to the experience of being in control of one's actions and their consequences. The 19th century French philosopher Maine de Biran proposed that the sensation of effort might provide an internal cue for distinguishing self-caused from other changes in the environment. The present study is the first to empirically test the philosophical idea that effort promotes self-agency. We used intentional binding, which refers to the subjective temporal attraction between an action and its sensory consequences, as an implicit measure of the sense of agency. Effort was manipulated independent of the primary task by requiring participants to pull stretch bands of varying resistance levels. We found that intentional binding was enhanced under conditions of increased effort. This suggests not only that the experience of effort directly contributes to the sense of agency, but also that the integration of effort as an agency cue is non-specific to the effort requirement of the action itself.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.concog.2013.08.003

Consciousness and cognition

Conscious Cogn

Increased response time of primed associates following an "episodic" hypnotic amnesia suggestion: a case of unconscious volition.

Following a hypnotic amnesia suggestion, highly hypnotically suggestible subjects may experience amnesia for events. Is there a failure to retrieve the material concerned from autobiographical (episodic) memory, or is it retrieved but blocked from consciousness? Highly hypnotically suggestible subjects produced free-associates to a list of concrete nouns. They were then given an amnesia suggestion for that episode followed by another free association list, which included 15 critical words that had been previously presented. If episodic retrieval for the first trial had been blocked, the responses on the second trial should still have been at least as fast as for the first trial. With semantic priming, they should be faster. In fact, they were on average half a second slower. This suggests that the material had been retrieved but blocked from consciousness. A goal-oriented information processing framework is outlined to interpret these and related data.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.concog.2013.08.011

Consciousness and cognition

Conscious Cogn

Brain correlates of subjective freedom of choice.

The subjective feeling of free choice is an important feature of human experience. Experimental tasks have typically studied free choice by contrasting free and instructed selection of response alternatives. These tasks have been criticised, and it remains unclear how they relate to the subjective feeling of freely choosing. We replicated previous findings of the fMRI correlates of free choice, defined objectively. We introduced a novel task in which participants could experience and report a graded sense of free choice. BOLD responses for conditions subjectively experienced as free identified a postcentral area distinct from the areas typically considered to be involved in free action. Thus, the brain correlates of subjective feeling of free action were not directly related to any established brain correlates of objectively-defined free action. Our results call into question traditional assumptions about the relation between subjective experience of choosing and activity in the brain's so-called voluntary motor areas.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.concog.2013.08.009

Consciousness and cognition

Conscious Cogn

Hedonic value of intentional action provides reinforcement for voluntary generation but not voluntary inhibition of action.

Intentional inhibition refers to stopping oneself from performing an action at the last moment, a vital component of self-control. It has been suggested that intentional inhibition is associated with negative hedonic value, perhaps due to the frustration of cancelling an intended action. Here we investigate hedonic implications of the free choice to act or inhibit. Participants gave aesthetic ratings of arbitrary visual stimuli that immediately followed voluntary decisions to act or to inhibit action. We found that participants for whom decisions to act produced a strong positive hedonic value for the immediately following visual stimulus made more choices to act than those with weaker hedonic value for action. This finding is consistent with reinforcement learning of action decisions. However, participants who experienced inhibition as generating more positive hedonic value did not choose to inhibit more than other participants. Thus, voluntary inhibition of action did not act as reinforcement for future inhibitory behaviour. Our finding that inhibition of action lacks motivational capacity may explain why self-control is both difficult and limited.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.neuroimage.2013.08.047

NeuroImage

Neuroimage

The neural mechanisms underlying internally and externally guided task selection.

While some prior work suggests that medial prefrontal cortex (MFC) regions mediate freely chosen actions, other work suggests that the lateral frontal pole (LFP) is responsible for control of abstract, internal goals. The present study uses fMRI to determine whether the voluntary selection of a task in pursuit of an overall goal relies on MFC regions or the LFP. To do so, we used a modified voluntary task switching (VTS) paradigm, in which participants choose an individual task to perform on each trial (i.e., a subgoal), under instructions to perform the tasks equally often and in a random order (i.e. the overall goal). In conjunction, we examined patterns of activation in the face of irrelevant, but task-related external stimuli that might nonetheless influence task selection. While there was some evidence that the MFC was involved in voluntary task selection, we found that the LFP and anterior insula (AI) were crucial to task selection in the pursuit of an overall goal. In addition, activation of the LFP and AI increased in the face of environmental stimuli that might serve as an interfering or conflicting external bias on voluntary task choice. These findings suggest that the LFP supports task selection according to abstract, internal goals, and leaves open the possibility that MFC may guide action selection in situations lacking in such top-down biases. As such, the current study represents a critical step towards understanding the neural underpinnings of how tasks are selected voluntarily to enable an overarching goal.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnhum.2013.00385

Frontiers in human neuroscience

Front Hum Neurosci

Timing and awareness of movement decisions: does consciousness really come too late?

Since Libet's seminal observation that a brain potential related to movement preparation occurs before participants report to be aware of their movement intention, it has been debated whether consciousness has causal influence on movement decisions. Here we review recent advances that provide new insights into the dynamics of human decision-making and question the validity of different markers used for determining the onset of neural and conscious events. Motor decisions involve multiple stages of goal evaluation, intention formation, and action execution. While the validity of the Bereitschaftspotential (BP) as index of neural movement preparation is controversial, improved neural markers are able to predict decision outcome even at early stages. Participants report being conscious of their decisions only at the time of final intention formation, just before the primary motor cortex starts executing the chosen action. However, accumulating evidence suggests that this is an artifact of Libet's clock method used for assessing consciousness. More refined methods suggest that intention consciousness does not appear instantaneously but builds up progressively. In this view, early neural markers of decision outcome are not unconscious but simply reflect conscious goal evaluation stages which are not final yet and therefore not reported with the clock method. Alternatives to the Libet clock are discussed that might allow for assessment of consciousness during decision making with improved sensitivity to early decision stages and with less influence from meta-conscious and perceptual inferences.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1002/hipo.22177

Hippocampus

Hippocampus

How does a specific learning and memory system in the mammalian brain gain control of behavior?

This review addresses a fundamental, yet poorly understood set of issues in systems neuroscience. The issues revolve around conceptualizations of the organization of learning and memory in the mammalian brain. One intriguing, and somewhat popular, conceptualization is the idea that there are multiple learning and memory systems in the mammalian brain and they interact in different ways to influence and/or control behavior. This approach has generated interesting empirical and theoretical work supporting this view. One issue that needs to be addressed is how these systems influence or gain control of voluntary behavior. To address this issue, we clearly specify what we mean by a learning and memory system. We then review two types of processes that might influence which memory system gains control of behavior. One set of processes are external factors that can affect which system controls behavior in a given situation including task parameters like the kind of information available to the subject, types of training experience, and amount of training. The second set of processes are brain mechanisms that might influence what memory system controls behavior in a given situation including executive functions mediated by the prefrontal cortex; switching mechanisms mediated by ascending neurotransmitter systems, the unique role of the hippocampus during learning. The issue of trait differences in control of different learning and memory systems will also be considered in which trait differences in learning and memory function are thought to potentially emerge from differences in level of prefrontal influence, differences in plasticity processes, differences in ascending neurotransmitter control, differential access to effector systems like motivational and motor systems. Finally, we present scenarios in which different mechanisms might interact. This review was conceived to become a jumping off point for new work directed at understanding these issues. The outcome of this work, in combination with other approaches, might improve understanding of the mechanisms of volition in human and non-human animals.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2013.07.022

Neuropsychologia

Neuropsychologia

Experience of action depends on intention, not body movement: an experiment on memory for mens rea.

How do we know whether our own actions were voluntary or involuntary? Intentional theories of sense of agency suggest that we consciously perceive the intentions that accompany our actions, but reconstructive theories suggest that we perceive our actions only through the body movements and other effects that they produce. Intentions would then be mere confabulations, and not bona fide experiences. Previous work on voluntary action has focused on immediate experiences of authorship, and few studies have considered memory for voluntary actions. We devised an experiment in which both voluntary action and involuntary movement always occurred at the same time, but could either involve the same hand (congruent condition), or different hands (incongruent condition). When signals from the voluntary and involuntary movements involved different hands, they could therefore potentially interfere in memory. We found that recall of a voluntary action was unaffected by an incongruent involuntary movement. In contrast, recall of an involuntary movement was strongly influenced by an incongruent voluntary action. Our results demonstrate an "intentional capture" of body movement by voluntary actions, in support of intentional theories of agency, but contrary to reconstructive theories. When asked to recall both actions and movements, people's responses are shaped by memory of what they intended to do, rather than by how their body moved.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.schres.2013.07.007

Schizophrenia research

Schizophr Res

A new Integrated Negative Symptom structure of the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) in schizophrenia using item response analysis.

Debate persists with regard to how best to categorize the syndromal dimension of negative symptoms in schizophrenia. The aim was to first review published Principle Components Analysis (PCA) of the PANSS, and extract items most frequently included in the negative domain, and secondly, to examine the quality of items using Item Response Theory (IRT) to select items that best represent a measurable dimension (or dimensions) of negative symptoms. First, 22 factor analyses and PCA met were included. Second, using a large dataset (n=7187) of participants in clinical trials with chronic schizophrenia, we extracted items loading on one or more PCA. Third, items not loading with a value of ≥ 0.5, or loading on more than one component with values of ≥ 0.5 were discarded. Fourth, resulting items were included in a non-parametric IRT and retained based on Option Characteristic Curves (OCCs) and Item Characteristic Curves (ICCs). 15 items loaded on a negative domain in at least one study, with Emotional Withdrawal loading on all studies. Non-parametric IRT retained nine items as an Integrated Negative Factor: Emotional Withdrawal, Blunted Affect, Passive/Apathetic Social Withdrawal, Poor Rapport, Lack of Spontaneity/Conversation Flow, Active Social Avoidance, Disturbance of Volition, Stereotyped Thinking and Difficulty in Abstract Thinking. This is the first study to use a psychometric IRT process to arrive at a set of negative symptom items. Future steps will include further examination of these nine items in terms of their stability, sensitivity to change, and correlations with functional and cognitive outcomes.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.bandc.2013.06.005

Brain and cognition

Brain Cogn

Differential roles of the frontal and parietal cortices in the control of saccades.

Although externally as well as internally-guided eye movements allow us to flexibly explore the visual environment, their differential neural mechanisms remain elusive. A better understanding of these neural mechanisms will help us to understand the control of action and to elucidate the nature of cognitive deficits in certain psychiatric populations (e.g., schizophrenia) that show increased latencies in volitional but not visually-guided saccades. Both the superior precentral sulcus (sPCS) and the intraparietal sulcus (IPS) are implicated in the control of eye movements. However, it remains unknown what differential contributions the two areas make to the programming of visually-guided and internally-guided saccades. In this study we tested the hypotheses that sPCS and IPS distinctly encode internally-guided saccades and visually-guided saccades. We scanned subjects with fMRI while they generated visually-guided and internally-guided delayed saccades. We used multi-voxel pattern analysis to test whether patterns of cue related, preparatory and saccade related activation could be used to predict the direction of the planned eye movement. Results indicate that patterns in the human sPCS predicted internally-guided saccades but not visually-guided saccades in all trial periods and patterns in the IPS predicted internally-guided saccades and visually-guided saccades equally well. The results support the hypothesis that the human sPCS and IPS make distinct contributions to the control of volitional eye movements.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1038/nrn3538

Nature reviews. Neuroscience

Nat Rev Neurosci

Hypnotic suggestion: opportunities for cognitive neuroscience.

Hypnosis uses the powerful effects of attention and suggestion to produce, modify and enhance a broad range of subjectively compelling experiences and behaviours. For more than a century, hypnotic suggestion has been used successfully as an adjunctive procedure to treat a wide range of clinical conditions. More recently, hypnosis has attracted a growing interest from a cognitive neuroscience perspective. Recent studies using hypnotic suggestion show how manipulating subjective awareness in the laboratory can provide insights into brain mechanisms involved in attention, motor control, pain perception, beliefs and volition. Moreover, they indicate that hypnotic suggestion can create informative analogues of clinical conditions that may be useful for understanding these conditions and their treatments.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.neuroimage.2013.06.077

NeuroImage

Neuroimage

Classification aided analysis of oscillatory signatures in controlled retrieval.

Control processes are critical for both facilitating and suppressing memory retrieval, but these processes are not well understood. The current work, inspired by a similar fMRI design (Detre et al., in press), used a modified Think/No-Think(TNT) paradigm to investigate the neural signatures of volition over enhancing and suppressing memory retrieval. Previous studies have shown memory enhancement when well-learned stimulus pairs are restudied in cued recall ("Recall or think of studied pair item"), and degradation when restudied with cued suppression ("Avoid thinking of studied pair item"). We used category-based (faces vs. scenes) multivariate classification of electroencephalography signals to determine if individual target items were successfully retrieved or suppressed. A logistic regression based on classifier output determined that retrieval activation during the cued recall/suppression period was a predictor for subsequent memory. Labeling trials with this internal measure, as opposed to their nominal Think vs. No-Think condition, revealed the classic TNT pattern of enhanced memory for successful cued-retrieval and degraded memory for cued-suppression. This classification process enabled a more selective investigation into the time-frequency signatures of control over retrieval. Comparing controlled retrieval vs. controlled suppression, results showed more prominent Theta oscillations (3 to 8 Hz) in controlled retrieval. Beta oscillations (12 to 30 Hz) were involved in high levels of both controlled retrieval and suppression, suggesting it may have a more general control-related role. These results suggest unique roles for these frequency bands in retrieval processes.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2013.06.021

International journal of psychophysiology : official journal of the International Organization of Psychophysiology

Int J Psychophysiol

Volitional control of the heart rate.

The heart rate is largely under control of the autonomic nervous system. The aim of the present study is to investigate the interactions between the brain and heart underlying volitional control of the heart and to explore the effectiveness of volition as a strategy to control the heart rate without biofeedback. Twenty seven healthy male subjects voluntarily participated in the study and were instructed to decrease and increase their heart beats according to rhythmic, computer generated sound either 10% faster or slower than the subjects' measured heart rate. Sympathetic and parasympathetic activities were estimated with the heart rate variability (HRV) obtained by power spectral analysis of RR intervals. Functional coupling patterns of cerebral cortex with the heart were determined by Partial directed coherence (PDC). In HR(slow) task; HR and sympathetic activity significantly decreased. However parasympathetic activity and power spectral density of EEG in low Alpha (8-10.5 Hz) band significantly increased. Moreover information flow from parietal area (P3 and P4) to RR interval significantly increased. During HR(quick) task; HR, sympathetic activity and power spectral density of EEG in low Beta (14-24 Hz) band significantly increased. Parasympathetic activity significantly decreased. Information flow from FT8, CZ and T8 electrodes to RR interval significantly increased. Our findings suggested that the heart beat can be controlled by volition and is related to some special areas in the cortex.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1111/psyp.12060

Psychophysiology

Psychophysiology

Neural correlates of impaired volitional action control in schizophrenia patients.

Slowed initiation of volitional but not visually guided saccades indicates impaired volitional action control in schizophrenia patients (SZ). The present study aimed at identifying neural correlates of this specific deficit. Fourteen SZ and 13 healthy control participants (HC) underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while performing volitional and visually guided saccades. SZ showed increased latencies in volitional but not in visually guided saccades. Brain activation during volitional saccades compared to visually guided saccades was increased in SZ compared to HC in several areas: the supplementary eye fields, suggesting inefficient production of volitional saccades; the prefrontal cortex, pointing to altered top down control on complex eye movements; and the left middle temporal area, suggesting changes in early sensory and attention processing during the volitional control of saccades in SZ.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00324

Frontiers in psychology

Front Psychol

How and to what end may consciousness contribute to action? Attributing properties of consciousness to an embodied, minimally cognitive artificial neural network.

An artificial neural network called reaCog is described which is based on a decentralized, reactive and embodied architecture developed to control non-trivial hexapod walking in an unpredictable environment (Walknet) while using insect-like navigation (Navinet). In reaCog, these basic networks are extended in such a way that the complete system, reaCog, adopts the capability of inventing new behaviors and - via internal simulation - of planning ahead. This cognitive expansion enables the reactive system to be enriched with additional procedures. Here, we focus on the question to what extent properties of phenomena to be characterized on a different level of description as for example consciousness can be found in this minimally cognitive system. Adopting a monist view, we argue that the phenomenal aspect of mental phenomena can be neglected when discussing the function of such a system. Under this condition, reaCog is discussed to be equipped with properties as are bottom-up and top-down attention, intentions, volition, and some aspects of Access Consciousness. These properties have not been explicitly implemented but emerge from the cooperation between the elements of the network. The aspects of Access Consciousness found in reaCog concern the above mentioned ability to plan ahead and to invent and guide (new) actions. Furthermore, global accessibility of memory elements, another aspect characterizing Access Consciousness is realized by this network. reaCog allows for both reactive/automatic control and (access-) conscious control of behavior. We discuss examples for interactions between both the reactive domain and the conscious domain. Metacognition or Reflexive Consciousness is not a property of reaCog. Possible expansions are discussed to allow for further properties of Access Consciousness, verbal report on internal states, and for Metacognition. In summary, we argue that already simple networks allow for properties of consciousness if leaving the phenomenal aspect aside.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.psychres.2013.05.021

Psychiatry research

Psychiatry Res

Stability in MMPI among adoptees with high and low genetic risk for schizophrenia and with low Communication Deviance of their adoptive parents.

Stability has been considered an important aspect of vulnerability to schizophrenia. The temporal stability of the scales in the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) was examined, using adoptees from the Finnish Adoptive Family Study of Schizophrenia. Adoptees who were high-risk (HR) offspring of biological mothers having a schizophrenia spectrum disorder (n=28) and low-risk (LR) controls (n=46) were evaluated using 15 MMPI scales at the initial assessment (HR, mean age 24 years; LR, mean age 23 years) and at the follow-up assessment after a mean interval of 11 years. Stability of the MMPI scales was also assessed in the groups of adoptees, assigned according to the adoptive parents'(n=44) communication style using Communication Deviance (CD) scale as an environmental factor. Initial Lie, Frequency, Correction, Psychopathic Deviate, Schizophrenia, Manifest Hostility, Hypomania, Phobias, Psychoticism, Religious Fundamentalism, Social Maladjustment, Paranoid Schizophrenia, Golden-Meehl Indicators, Schizophrenia Proneness and 8-6 scale scores significantly predicted the MMPI scores at the follow-up assessment indicating stability in the characteristics of thinking, affective expression, social relatedness and volition. Low CD in the family had an effect on the stabilization of personality traits such as social withdrawal and restricted affectivity assessed by Correction and Hostility.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s00221-013-3582-5

Experimental brain research

Exp Brain Res

What is volition?

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3390/ijms14059037

International journal of molecular sciences

Int J Mol Sci

Role of melatonin in schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia is a chronic mental disease that disturbs several cognitive functions, such as memory, thought, perception and volition. Schizophrenia's biological etiology is multifactorial and is still under investigation. Melatonin has been involved in schizophrenia since the first decades of the twentieth century. Research into melatonin regarding schizophrenia has followed two different approaches. The first approach is related to the use of melatonin as a biological marker. The second approach deals with the clinical applications of melatonin as a drug treatment. In this paper, both aspects of melatonin application are reviewed. Its clinical use in schizophrenia is emphasized.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1111/papr.12076

Pain practice : the official journal of World Institute of Pain

Pain Pract

Linguistic analysis of face-to-face interviews with patients with an explicit request for euthanasia, their closest relatives, and their attending physicians: the use of modal verbs in Dutch.

The literature, field research, and daily practice stress the need for adequate communication in palliative care. Although language is of the utmost importance in communication, linguistic analysis of end-of-life discussions is scarce. Our aim is 2-fold: We want to determine what the use of 4 significant Dutch modal verbs expressing volition, obligation, possibility, and permission reveals about the concept of unbearable suffering and about physicians' communicative style. We quantitatively (TextStat) and qualitatively (bottom-up approach) analyzed the use of the modal verbs in 15 interviews, with patients requesting euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide, their physicians, and their closest relatives. An essential element of unbearable suffering is the patient's incapacity to perform certain tasks. Further, the physician's preference for particular modal verbs reveals whether his attitude toward patients is more or less patronizing and more or less appreciative. Linguistic analysis can help medical professionals to better understand their communicative skills, styles, and approach to patients in end-of-life situations. We have shown how linguistic analysis can contribute to a better understanding of physician-patient interaction. Moreover, we have illustrated the usefulness of interdisciplinary research in the medical domain.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00202

Frontiers in psychology

Front Psychol

Persistence of internal representations of alternative voluntary actions.

We have investigated a situation in which externally available response alternatives and their internal representations could be dissociated, by suddenly removing some action alternatives from the response space during the interval between the free selection and the execution of a voluntary action. Choice reaction times in this situation were related to the number of initially available response alternatives, rather than to the number of alternatives available effectively available after the change in the external environment. The internal representations of response alternatives appeared to persist after external changes actually made the corresponding action unavailable. This suggests a surprising dynamics of voluntary action representations: counterfactual response alternatives persist, and may even be actively maintained, even when they are not available in reality. Our results highlight a representational basis for the counterfactual course of action. Such representations may play a key role in feelings of regret, disappointment, or frustration. These feelings all involve persistent representation of counterfactual response alternatives that may not actually be available in the environment.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s00221-013-3471-y

Experimental brain research

Exp Brain Res

Break in volition: a virtual reality study in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Research in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) produced inconsistent results in demonstrating an association between patients' symptom severity and their cognitive impairments. The process involved in volition aspects of behavioral syndromes can be extensively analyzed using specific tests developed in virtual environments, more suitable to manipulate rules and possible breaks of the normal task execution with different, confusing or stopping instructions. The study involved thirty participants (15 OCD patients and 15 controls) during task execution and the relative interferences. At this purpose, the virtual version of Multiple Errands Test was used. Virtual reality setting, with a higher ecological validity respect to a classic neuropsychological battery, allowed us to take into account deficits of volition and the relative dysexecutive functions associated with OCD patients. The proposed paradigm also allows the development of innovative prototypes of coevolving technologies based on new theories and models and deeper understanding of human behavior.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s00221-013-3472-x

Experimental brain research

Exp Brain Res

Imaging volition: what the brain can tell us about the will.

The question of how we can voluntarily control our behaviour dates back to the beginnings of scientific psychology. Currently, there are two empirical research disciplines tackling human volition: cognitive neuroscience and social psychology. To date, there is little interaction between the two disciplines in terms of the investigation of human volition. The aim of the current article is to highlight recent brain imaging work on human volition and to relate social psychological concepts of volition to the functional neuroanatomy of intentional action. A host of studies indicate that the medial prefrontal cortex plays a crucial role in voluntary action. Accordingly, we postulate that social psychological concepts of volition can be investigated using neuroimaging techniques, and propose that by developing a social cognitive neuroscience of human volition, we may gain a deeper understanding of this fascinating and complex aspect of the human mind.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1037/a0031934

Journal of counseling psychology

J Couns Psychol

Disentangling the link between perceiving a calling and living a calling.

Research has suggested there is an important distinction between perceiving a calling and living a calling. With a sample of 542 working adults, the current study examined (a) the degree to which perceiving a calling and living a calling differed according to yearly income and level of educational attainment and (b) potential mediators that may explain the link between perceiving a calling and living a calling. Adults with higher yearly incomes and more education were significantly more likely to endorse living a calling, but no significant group differences were found for perceiving a calling. Additionally, using structural equation modeling, work volition was found to be a significant mediator in the link between perceiving a calling and living a calling, and organizational support was found to be a significant mediator in the link between work volition and living a calling. The strength and significance of these indirect effects were supported by bootstrapping techniques. We suggest that part of the reason people with a calling feel more able to live out that calling is because of increased feelings of control in their career decision making. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1123/jsep.35.1.30

Journal of sport & exercise psychology

J Sport Exerc Psychol

A conditional process model of children's behavioral engagement and behavioral disaffection in sport based on self-determination theory.

The potential benefits of children's engagement in sport for their psychological, social, and physical health are well established. Yet children may also experience psychological and social impairments due, in part, to a variety of detrimental coach behaviors. In the current study, we proposed and tested a conditional process model of children's self-reported behavioral engagement and behavioral disaffection in sport based on self-determination theory. Results from a sample of 245 youth soccer players suggested that structure from coaches related positively to behavioral engagement and negatively to behavioral disaffection, and that these relations were mediated by athletes' basic psychological need satisfaction. Importantly, and in line with our hypotheses, these indirect effects were moderated by autonomy support from coaches, such that the mediation was evident only among those who reported higher levels of autonomy support. These findings underscore the importance of coaches' providing guidance, expectations, and feedback (i.e., structure) in a way that respects athletes' volition (i.e., autonomy support).

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.biopsych.2012.12.022

Biological psychiatry

Biol Psychiatry

Negative symptoms of schizophrenia are associated with abnormal effort-cost computations.

Decision-making studies show that response selection is influenced by the "effort cost" associated with response alternatives. These effort-cost calculations seem to be mediated by a distributed neural circuit including the anterior cingulate cortex and subcortical targets of dopamine neurons. On the basis of evidence of dysfunction in these systems in schizophrenia (SZ), we examined whether effort-cost computations were impaired in SZ patients and whether these deficits were associated with negative symptoms. Effort-cost decision-making performance was evaluated in 44 patients with SZ and 36 demographically matched control subjects. Subjects performed a computerized task where they were presented with a series of 30 trials in which they could choose between making 20 button presses for $1 or 100 button presses for higher amounts (varying from $3 to $7 across trials). Probability of reward receipt was also manipulated to determine whether certain (100%) or uncertain (50%) reward affected effort-based decision-making. Patients were less likely than control subjects to select the high-effort response alternative during the 100% probability condition, particularly when the value payoff was highest (i.e., $6 and $7). Patients were also less likely to select the high-effort option on trials after reward in the 50% probability condition. Furthermore, these impairments in effort-cost computations were greatest among patients with elevated negative symptoms. There was no association with haloperidol equivalent dosage. The motivational impairments of SZ might be associated with abnormalities in estimating the "cost" of effortful behavior. This increased effort cost might undermine volition.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1162/jocn_a_00360

Journal of cognitive neuroscience

J Cogn Neurosci

What we think before a voluntary movement.

A central feature of voluntary movement is the sense of volition, but when this sense arises in the course of movement formulation and execution is not clear. Many studies have explored how the brain might be actively preparing movement before the sense of volition; however, because the timing of the sense of volition has depended on subjective and retrospective judgments, these findings are still regarded with a degree of scepticism. EEG events such as beta event-related desynchronization and movement-related cortical potentials are associated with the brain's programming of movement. Using an optimized EEG signal derived from multiple variables, we were able to make real-time predictions of movements in advance of their occurrence with a low false-positive rate. We asked participants what they were thinking at the time of prediction: Sometimes they were thinking about movement, and other times they were not. Our results indicate that the brain can be preparing to make voluntary movements while participants are thinking about something else.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s00221-013-3407-6

Experimental brain research

Exp Brain Res

The psychology of volition.

Volition can be studied from two perspectives. From the third-person view, volitional behaviour is internally generated, rather than being determined by the immediate environmental context, and is therefore, to some extent, unpredictable. Such behaviour is not unique to humans, since it is seen in many other species including invertebrates. From the first-person view, our experience of volitional behaviour includes a vivid sense of agency. We feel that, through our intentions, we can cause things to happen and we can choose between different actions. Our experience of agency is not direct. It depends on sub-personal inferences derived from prior expectations and sensations associated with movement. As a result, our experiences and intuitions about volition can be unreliable and uncertain. Nevertheless, our experience of agency is not a mere epiphenomenon. Anticipation of the regret we might feel after making the wrong choice can alter behaviour. Furthermore, the strong sense of responsibility, associated with agency, has a critical role in creating social cohesion and group benefits. We can only study the experience of agency in humans who can describe their experiences. The discussion of the experience of volition, that introspection and communication make possible, can change our experience of volitional actions. As a result, agency, regret and responsibility are cultural phenomena that are unique to humans.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s10597-012-9576-0

Community mental health journal

Community Ment Health J

Readiness for employment: perceptions of mental health service users.

Work is good for both physical and mental health, and access to work is a basic human right. People with mental health conditions want to work and with the right support can work but are often excluded from the workplace. We explored factors influencing individual's perceptions of their readiness for employment. Participants' narratives focused particularly on personal causation and it's inter-reactions with other aspects of volition, habituation and the environment and highlight a number of key areas, which are discussed in relation to service provision. Sheltered workshops offer support and some structure and routine but may limit an individual's readiness for employment. Services should be evidence based and focused on real work opportunities which fit with individual's interests and values. Occupational therapy theory offers a unique and valuable perspective in understanding perceptions of readiness for employment and occupational therapists offer valid and useful assessments and interventions for vocational rehabilitation.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s00221-013-3399-2

Experimental brain research

Exp Brain Res

Neurology of volition.

Neurological disorders of volition may be characterized by deficits in willing and/or agency. When we move our bodies through space, it is the sense that we intended to move (willing) and that our actions were a consequence of this intention (self-agency) that gives us the sense of voluntariness and a general feeling of being "in control." While it is possible to have movements that share executive machinery ordinarily used for voluntary movement but lack a sense of voluntariness, such as psychogenic movement disorders, it is also possible to claim volition for presumed involuntary movements (early chorea) or even when no movement is produced (anosognosia). The study of such patients should enlighten traditional models of how the percepts of volition are generated in the brain with regard to movement. We discuss volition and its components as multi-leveled processes with feedforward and feedback information flow, and dependence on prior expectations as well as external and internal cues.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

Giornale italiano di medicina del lavoro ed ergonomia

G Ital Med Lav Ergon

[Job satisfaction, volition and reasons for choice of temporary work].

In this paper, we reviewed the literature on volition and the principal studies on the reasons for choosing temporary work, which explain in more details how voluntary/involuntary status is interpreted. The description of a research, based on a sample of 1979 workers, is presented with two aims: 1. confirm a structural model that examines the effects on satisfaction of some variables, such as motivation and trust; 2. evaluate the influence of volition and reasons for choosing a temporary employment on job satisfaction. The results confirm the plausibility of the proposed structural model and show interesting results regarding the reasons for choosing temporary work.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.addbeh.2012.11.009

Addictive behaviors

Addict Behav

How emotional traits and affective temperaments relate to cocaine experimentation, abuse and dependence in a large sample.

The contribution of specific traits in cocaine experimentation, abuse and addiction is not yet clear. Our aim was to evaluate how temperament was associated with cocaine experimentation, abuse and dependence using a recently developed scale for the assessment of emotional traits (e.g. anger, volition) and affective temperaments (e.g. cyclothymic). An anonymous web-survey provides the optimal means to evaluate sensitive issues such as drug related behavior in the general population. The data was collected by the Brazilian Internet Study on Temperament and Psychopathology (BRAINSTEP), which included the Affective and Emotional Composite Temperament Scale (AFECTS) and the Alcohol, Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test (ASSIST). The final sample consisted of 28,587 subjects (26.6% males, mean age=30.8±9.8yrs). Trait analysis was controlled for age, gender, ethanol and marijuana use. For emotional traits, Caution, Coping and Control were significantly lower in the cocaine-using groups when compared to controls, particularly in those with cocaine dependence. Anger and Desire increased in relation to the degree of cocaine involvement. The associations with Emotional Sensitivity and Volition were less robust. For affective temperaments, greater cocaine use was related to a lower proportion of stable types (obsessive, euthymic and hyperthymic) and the anxious type, and to a higher proportion of cyclothymic and euphoric temperaments in both sexes. Specific externalized and unstable traits were associated with cocaine related behavior. Addressing these traits may be important for recovery and prevention strategies.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.jad.2012.11.046

Journal of affective disorders

J Affect Disord

Bullying victimization is associated with dysfunctional emotional traits and affective temperaments.

Being bullied has been increasingly recognized as a risk factor for the development of psychiatric disorders, but there is very limited evidence on the association of bullying with temperament. The data was collected in a large web-survey on psychological and psychiatric measures (BRAINSTEP). Bullying was assessed with a question on time exposed to bullying (none, <1 year, 1-3 years and >3 years) during childhood and adolescence. Emotional traits and affective temperaments were evaluated with the Affective and Emotional Composite Temperament Scale (AFECTS). The final sample consisted of 50,882 subjects (mean age 30.8 ± 10.4 years, 73.4% females) with valid answers. About half of the sample reported exposure to bullying and ∼10% reported being victimized by peers for longer than 3 years. Longer exposure to bullying was associated with lower Volition, Coping and Control scores, and more Emotional Sensitivity, Anger and Fear, with statistical significance between all groups. To a lower degree, exposure to bullying was associated with lower Caution and higher Desire scores. Bullying victimization was also associated with a much lower proportion of euthymic and hyperthymic types in both genders, which was compensated by an increase mainly in the proportion of depressive, cyclothymic and volatile types. Retrospective assessment of bullying with a single question on time exposed to bullying and use of self-report instruments only. Being bullied was associated with a broad and profound impact on emotional and cognitive domains in all dimensions of emotional traits, and with internalized and unstable affective temperaments.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1037/a0030771

Journal of counseling psychology

J Couns Psychol

Examining a model of life satisfaction among unemployed adults.

The present study examined a model of life satisfaction among a diverse sample of 184 adults who had been unemployed for an average of 10.60 months. Using the Lent (2004) model of life satisfaction as a framework, a model was tested with 5 hypothesized predictor variables: optimism, job search self-efficacy, job search support, job search behaviors, and work volition. After adding a path in the model from optimism to work volition, the hypothesized model was found to be a good fit for the data and a better fit than a more parsimonious, alternative model. In the hypothesized model, optimism, work volition, job search self-efficacy, and job search support were each found to significantly relate to life satisfaction, accounting for 35% of the variance. Additionally, using 50,000 bootstrapped samples, optimism was found to have a significant indirect effect on life satisfaction as mediated by job search self-efficacy, job search support, and work volition. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s10964-012-9847-7

Journal of youth and adolescence

J Youth Adolesc

The jingle-jangle fallacy in adolescent autonomy in the family: in search of an underlying structure.

The construct of autonomy has a rich, though quite controversial, history in adolescent psychology. The present investigation aimed to clarify the meaning and measurement of adolescent autonomy in the family. Based on theory and previous research, we examined whether two dimensions would underlie a wide range of autonomy-related measures, using data from two adolescent samples (N = 707, 51 % girls, and N = 783, 59 % girls, age range = 14-21 years). Clear evidence was found for a two-dimensional structure, with the first dimension reflecting "volition versus pressure", that is, the degree to which adolescents experience a sense of volition and choice as opposed to feelings of pressure and coercion in the parent-adolescent relationship. The second dimension reflected "distance versus proximity", which involves the degree of interpersonal distance in the parent-adolescent relationship. Whereas volition related to higher well-being, less problem behavior and a secure attachment style, distance was associated mainly with more problem behavior and an avoidant attachment style. These associations were not moderated by age. The discussion focuses on the meaning of adolescent autonomy and on the broader implications of the current findings.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnint.2012.00098

Frontiers in integrative neuroscience

Front Integr Neurosci

The biophysical bases of will-less behaviors.

Are there distinctions at the neurophysiological level that correlate with voluntary and involuntary actions? Whereas the wide variety of involuntary behaviors (and here mostly the deviant or pathological ones will be considered) will necessarily be represented at some biophysical level in nervous system activity-for after all those cellular activity patterns manifest themselves as behaviors and thus there will be a multiplicity of them-there could be some general tendencies to be discerned amongst that assortment. Collecting observations derived from neurophysiological activity associated with several pathological conditions characterized by presenting will-less actions such as Parkinson's disease, seizures, alien hand syndrome and tics, it is proposed that a general neurophysiologic tendency of brain activity that correlates with involuntary actions is higher than normal synchrony in specific brain cell networks, depending upon the behavior in question. Wilful, considered normal behavior, depends on precise coordination of the collective activity in cell ensembles that may be lost, or diminished, when there are tendencies toward more than normal or aberrant synchronization of cellular activity. Hence, rapid fluctuations in synchrony is associated with normal actions and cognition while less variability in brain recordings particularly with regards to synchronization could be a signature of unconscious and deviant behaviors in general.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnint.2012.00093

Frontiers in integrative neuroscience

Front Integr Neurosci

How quantum brain biology can rescue conscious free will.

Conscious "free will" is problematic because (1) brain mechanisms causing consciousness are unknown, (2) measurable brain activity correlating with conscious perception apparently occurs too late for real-time conscious response, consciousness thus being considered "epiphenomenal illusion," and (3) determinism, i.e., our actions and the world around us seem algorithmic and inevitable. The Penrose-Hameroff theory of "orchestrated objective reduction (Orch OR)" identifies discrete conscious moments with quantum computations in microtubules inside brain neurons, e.g., 40/s in concert with gamma synchrony EEG. Microtubules organize neuronal interiors and regulate synapses. In Orch OR, microtubule quantum computations occur in integration phases in dendrites and cell bodies of integrate-and-fire brain neurons connected and synchronized by gap junctions, allowing entanglement of microtubules among many neurons. Quantum computations in entangled microtubules terminate by Penrose "objective reduction (OR)," a proposal for quantum state reduction and conscious moments linked to fundamental spacetime geometry. Each OR reduction selects microtubule states which can trigger axonal firings, and control behavior. The quantum computations are "orchestrated" by synaptic inputs and memory (thus "Orch OR"). If correct, Orch OR can account for conscious causal agency, resolving problem 1. Regarding problem 2, Orch OR can cause temporal non-locality, sending quantum information backward in classical time, enabling conscious control of behavior. Three lines of evidence for brain backward time effects are presented. Regarding problem 3, Penrose OR (and Orch OR) invokes non-computable influences from information embedded in spacetime geometry, potentially avoiding algorithmic determinism. In summary, Orch OR can account for real-time conscious causal agency, avoiding the need for consciousness to be seen as epiphenomenal illusion. Orch OR can rescue conscious free will.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1037/a0030182

Health psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association

Health Psychol

Testing two principles of the Health Action Process Approach in individuals with type 2 diabetes.

The Health Action Process Approach (HAPA) proposes principles that can be translated into testable hypotheses. This is one of the first studies to have explicitly tested HAPA's first 2 principles, which are (1) health behavior change process can be subdivided into motivation and volition, and (2) volition can be grouped into intentional and action stages. The 3 stage groups are labeled preintenders, intenders, and actors. The hypotheses of the HAPA model were investigated in a sample of 1,193 individuals with Type 2 diabetes. Study participants completed a questionnaire assessing the HAPA variables. The hypotheses were evaluated by examining mean differences of test variables and by the use of multigroup structural equation modeling (MSEM). Findings support the HAPA's 2 principles and 3 distinct stages. The 3 HAPA stages were significantly different in several stage-specific variables, and discontinuity patterns were found in terms of nonlinear trends across means. In terms of predicting goals, action planning, and behavior, differences transpired between the 2 motivational stages (preintenders and intenders), and between the 2 volitional stages (intenders and actors). Results indicate implications for supporting behavior change processes, depending on in which stage a person is at: All individuals should be helped to increase self-efficacy. Preintenders and intenders require interventions targeting outcome expectancies. Actors benefit from an improvement in action planning to maintain and increase their previous behavior. Overall, the first 2 principles of the HAPA were supported and some evidence for the other principles was found. Future research should experimentally test these conclusions.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnhum.2012.00265

Frontiers in human neuroscience

Front Hum Neurosci

Brain mechanisms underlying automatic and unconscious control of motor action.

Are we in command of our motor acts?The popular belief holds that our conscious decisions are the direct causes of our actions. However, overwhelming evidence from neurosciences demonstrates that our actions are instead largely driven by brain processes that unfold outside of our consciousness. To study these brain processes, scientists have used a range of different functional brain imaging techniques and experimental protocols, such as subliminal priming. Here, we review recent advances in the field and propose a theoretical model of motor control that may contribute to a better understanding of the pathophysiology of movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s11948-012-9388-1

Science and engineering ethics

Sci Eng Ethics

The ethics of neuroscience and the neuroscience of ethics: a phenomenological-existential approach.

Advances in the neurosciences have many implications for a collective understanding of what it means to be human, in particular, notions of the self, the concept of volition or agency, questions of individual responsibility, and the phenomenology of consciousness. As the ability to peer directly into the brain is scientifically honed, and conscious states can be correlated with patterns of neural processing, an easy--but premature--leap is to postulate a one-way, brain-based determinism. That leap is problematic, however, and emerging findings in neuroscience can even be seen as compatible with some of the basic tenets of existentialism. Given the compelling authority of modern "science," it is especially important to question how the findings of neuroscience are framed, and how the articulation of research results challenge or change individuals' perceptions of themselves. Context plays an essential role in the emergence of human identity and in the sculpting of the human brain; for example, even a lack of stimuli ("nothing") can lead to substantial consequences for brain, behavior, and experience. Conversely, advances in understanding the brain might contribute to more precise definitions of what it means to be human, including definitions of appropriate social and moral behavior. Put another way, the issue is not simply the ethics involved in framing neurotechnology, but also the incorporation of neuroscientific findings into a richer understanding of human ethical (and existential) functioning.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.2340/16501977-1052

Journal of rehabilitation medicine

J Rehabil Med

Reliability and validity of the Paediatric Volitional Questionnaire - Chinese version.

The purpose of this study is to examine the psychometric properties of the Chinese version of the Paediatric Volitional Questionnaire (PVQ-C) for use amongst preschoolers in Taiwan. Forty preschoolers with developmental delays were randomly selected from northern Taiwan, along with another 40 typically developing preschoolers. The data was analysed using Rasch measurement model for construct validity and classical test theory for item reliability, intra- and inter-rater reliability, and convergent validity. The results indicated the PVQ items of PVQ-C fit into a unidimensional continuum of volition (logit -6.63~3.05) with 2 items representing differential item functioning for diagnostic group. The person-fit statistics showed that 83% participants' response could be appropriately estimated and stratified (separation index = 1.86). Using a modified 3-point rating scale resulted in acceptable item reliability (0.97), intra-rater reliability (0.412-1.0), 86% PVQ items in test-retest reliability > 0.4, and convergent validity (r = 0.562-0.656). The PVQ-C is regarded as a reliable and valid instrument for assessing the volitional status of children, as a reference for subsequent clinical judgement, and for client-centred intervention programmes and treatment effects.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1891/1061-3749.20.2.90

Journal of nursing measurement

J Nurs Meas

Measuring motivation and volition of nursing students in nontraditional learning environments.

The purpose of this study was to identify the best fitting model to represent interrelationships between motivation, volition, and academic success for adult nursing students learning in nontraditional environments. Participants (N=297) completed a survey that incorporated two measures: the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) and the academic volitional strategies inventory (AVSI) as well as demographic information. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and structural equation modeling (SEM) were used for data analysis. In phase 1, EFA resulted in factors that generally aligned with previous theoretical factors as defined by the psychometrics used. In Phase 2 of the analysis, CFA validated the use of predefined factor structures. In Phase 3, SEM analysis revealed that motivation has a larger effect on grade point average (GPA; beta = .28, p < .01) than volition (beta = .15, p < .05). The covariance between motivation and volition (r = .42, p < .01) was also found to be significant. These results suggest that there is a significant relationship among motivation, volition, and academic success for adult learners studying in nontraditional learning environments. These findings are consistent with and elaborate the relationship between motivation and volition with a population and setting underrepresented in the research.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1111/j.1465-3362.2012.00501.x

Drug and alcohol review

Drug Alcohol Rev

The place of volition in addiction: differing approaches and their implications for policy and service provision.

'Addiction' is an ambiguous concept. Its meaning, and how it is used in drug policy and treatment, depends on how it is conceptualised. While the 'disease' model of addiction is prevalent in Australia, differing, sometimes contradictory, interpretations of this model are mobilised. Drawing on 20 semi-structured interviews conducted with professionals working in the area of drug use in Victoria, Australia, this paper develops a typology delineating different approaches to addiction. Five domains of meaning related to addiction were identified in the data. These were: (i) the sign of craving; (ii) susceptibility; (iii) social and psychological issues producing addiction; (iv) self-concept; and (v) social functions of addiction. These domains are further divided into two subtypes based on how the participants understood the role of a key notion in addiction: volition, that is, whether or not an 'addict' has control over drug use and other aspects of life. By systematically mapping different conceptualisations of addiction, this typology identifies the ambiguities and contradictions in the models currently in use, especially with respect to the notion of volition. While a homogeneous approach to these issues is neither practical nor desirable, there is a need to consider the implications of this lack of coherence. Service providers, medical practitioners and policy makers need to reflect on their assumptions, and consider the implications of their different approaches for clients, some of whom encounter more than one approach when undergoing treatment for drug use.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1186/1743-0003-9-41

Journal of neuroengineering and rehabilitation

J Neuroeng Rehabil

Can motor volition be extracted from the spinal cord?

Spinal cord injury (SCI) results in the partial or complete loss of movement and sensation below the level of injury. In individuals with cervical level SCI, there is a great need for voluntary command generation for environmental control, self-mobility, or computer access to improve their independence and quality of life. Brain-computer interfacing is one way of generating these voluntary command signals. As an alternative, this study investigates the feasibility of utilizing descending signals in the dorsolateral spinal cord tracts above the point of injury as a means of generating volitional motor control signals. In this work, adult male rats were implanted with a 15-channel microelectrode array (MEA) in the dorsolateral funiculus of the cervical spinal cord to record multi-unit activity from the descending pathways while the animals performed a reach-to-grasp task. Mean signal amplitudes and signal-to-noise ratios during the behavior was monitored and quantified for recording periods up to 3 months post-implant. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Tukey's post-hoc analysis was used to investigate signal amplitude stability during the study period. Multiple linear regression was employed to reconstruct the forelimb kinematics, i.e. the hand position, elbow angle, and hand velocity from the spinal cord signals. The percentage of electrodes with stable signal amplitudes (p-value < 0.05) were 50% in R1, 100% in R2, 72% in R3, and 85% in R4. Forelimb kinematics was reconstructed with correlations of R² > 0.7 using tap-delayed principal components of the spinal cord signals. This study demonstrated that chronic recordings up to 3-months can be made from the descending tracts of the rat spinal cord with relatively small changes in signal characteristics over time and that the forelimb kinematics can be reconstructed with the recorded signals. Multi-unit recording technique may prove to be a viable alternative to single neuron recording methods for reading the information encoded by neuronal populations in the spinal cord.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnhum.2012.00082

Frontiers in human neuroscience

Front Hum Neurosci

Automatic motor activation in the executive control of action.

Although executive control and automatic behavior have often been considered separate and distinct processes, there is strong emerging and convergent evidence that they may in fact be intricately interlinked. In this review, we draw together evidence showing that visual stimuli cause automatic and unconscious motor activation, and how this in turn has implications for executive control. We discuss object affordances, alien limb syndrome, the visual grasp reflex, subliminal priming, and subliminal triggering of attentional orienting. Consideration of these findings suggests automatic motor activation might form an intrinsic part of all behavior, rather than being categorically different from voluntary actions.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1093/cercor/bhs059

Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991)

Cereb Cortex

An online neural substrate for sense of agency.

"Sense of agency" refers to the feeling of controlling an external event through one's own action. On one influential view, sense of agency is inferred after an action, by "retrospectively" comparing actual effects of actions against their intended effects. In contrast, a "prospective" component of agency, generated during action selection, and in advance of knowing the actual effect, has received less attention. Here, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate prospective contributions of action selection processes to sense of agency. To do so, we dissociated action selection processes from action-outcome matching, by subliminally priming responses to a target. We found that participants experienced greater control over action effects when the action was compatibly versus incompatibly primed. Thus, compatible primes facilitated action selection processing, in turn boosting sense of agency over a subsequent effect. This prospective contribution of action selection processes to sense of agency was accounted for by exchange of signals across a prefrontal-parietal network. Specifically, we found that the angular gyrus (AG) monitors signals relating to action selection in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, to prospectively inform subjective judgments of control over action outcomes. Online monitoring of these signals by AG might provide the subject with a subjective marker of volition, prior to action itself.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fnhum.2012.00040

Frontiers in human neuroscience

Front Hum Neurosci

Moving a Rubber Hand that Feels Like Your Own: A Dissociation of Ownership and Agency.

During voluntary hand movement, we sense that we generate the movement and that the hand is a part of our body. These feelings of control over bodily actions, or the sense of agency, and the ownership of body parts are two fundamental aspects of the way we consciously experience our bodies. However, little is known about how these processes are functionally linked. Here, we introduce a version of the rubber hand illusion in which participants control the movements of the index finger of a model hand, which is in full view, by moving their own right index finger. We demonstrated that voluntary finger movements elicit a robust illusion of owning the rubber hand and that the senses of ownership and agency over the model hand can be dissociated. We systematically varied the relative timing of the finger movements (synchronous versus asynchronous), the mode of movement (active versus passive), and the position of the model hand (anatomically congruent versus incongruent positions). Importantly, asynchrony eliminated both ownership and agency, passive movements abolished the sense of agency but left ownership intact, and incongruent positioning of the model hand diminished ownership but did not eliminate agency. These findings provide evidence for a double dissociation of ownership and agency, suggesting that they represent distinct cognitive processes. Interestingly, we also noted that the sense of agency was stronger when the hand was perceived to be a part of the body, and only in this condition did we observe a significant correlation between the subjects' ratings of agency and ownership. We discuss this in the context of possible differences between agency over owned body parts and agency over actions that involve interactions with external objects. In summary, the results obtained in this study using a simple moving rubber hand illusion paradigm extend previous findings on the experience of ownership and agency and shed new light on their relationship.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.cogpsych.2012.02.001

Cognitive psychology

Cogn Psychol

Neural dynamics of object-based multifocal visual spatial attention and priming: object cueing, useful-field-of-view, and crowding.

How are spatial and object attention coordinated to achieve rapid object learning and recognition during eye movement search? How do prefrontal priming and parietal spatial mechanisms interact to determine the reaction time costs of intra-object attention shifts, inter-object attention shifts, and shifts between visible objects and covertly cued locations? What factors underlie individual differences in the timing and frequency of such attentional shifts? How do transient and sustained spatial attentional mechanisms work and interact? How can volition, mediated via the basal ganglia, influence the span of spatial attention? A neural model is developed of how spatial attention in the where cortical stream coordinates view-invariant object category learning in the what cortical stream under free viewing conditions. The model simulates psychological data about the dynamics of covert attention priming and switching requiring multifocal attention without eye movements. The model predicts how "attentional shrouds" are formed when surface representations in cortical area V4 resonate with spatial attention in posterior parietal cortex (PPC) and prefrontal cortex (PFC), while shrouds compete among themselves for dominance. Winning shrouds support invariant object category learning, and active surface-shroud resonances support conscious surface perception and recognition. Attentive competition between multiple objects and cues simulates reaction-time data from the two-object cueing paradigm. The relative strength of sustained surface-driven and fast-transient motion-driven spatial attention controls individual differences in reaction time for invalid cues. Competition between surface-driven attentional shrouds controls individual differences in detection rate of peripheral targets in useful-field-of-view tasks. The model proposes how the strength of competition can be mediated, though learning or momentary changes in volition, by the basal ganglia. A new explanation of crowding shows how the cortical magnification factor, among other variables, can cause multiple object surfaces to share a single surface-shroud resonance, thereby preventing recognition of the individual objects.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1186/1479-5868-9-24

The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity

Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act

Self-determination theory in health care and its relations to motivational interviewing: a few comments.

The papers of this special issue have the dual focus of reviewing research, especially clinical trials, testing self-determination theory (SDT) and of discussing the relations between SDT and motivational interviewing (MI). Notably, trials are reviewed that examined interventions either for behaviors such as physical activity and smoking cessation, or for outcomes such as weight loss. Although interventions were based on and intended to test the SDT health-behavior-change model, authors also pointed out that they drew techniques from MI in developing the interventions. The current paper refers to these studies and also clarifies the meaning of autonomy, which is central to SDT and has been shown to be important for effective change. We clarify that the dimension of autonomy versus control is conceptually orthogonal to the dimension of independence versus dependence, and we emphasize that autonomy or volition, not independence, is the important antecedent of effective change. Finally, we point out that SDT and MI have had much in common for each has emphasized autonomy. However, a recent MI article seems to have changed MI's emphasis from autonomy to change talk as the key ingredient for change. We suggest that change talk is likely to be an element of effective change only to the degree that the change talk is autonomously enacted and that practitioners facilitate change talk in an autonomy supportive way.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1186/1479-5868-9-23

The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity

Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act

Toward systematic integration between self-determination theory and motivational interviewing as examples of top-down and bottom-up intervention development: autonomy or volition as a fundamental theoretical principle.

Clinical interventions can be developed through two distinct pathways. In the first, which we call top-down, a well-articulated theory drives the development of the intervention, whereas in the case of a bottom-up approach, clinical experience, more so than a dedicated theoretical perspective, drives the intervention. Using this dialectic, this paper discusses Self-Determination Theory (SDT) 12 and Motivational Interviewing (MI) 3 as prototypical examples of a top-down and bottom-up approaches, respectively. We sketch the different starting points, foci and developmental processes of SDT and MI, but equally note the complementary character and the potential for systematic integration between both approaches. Nevertheless, for a deeper integration to take place, we contend that MI researchers might want to embrace autonomy as a fundamental basic process underlying therapeutic change and we discuss the advantages of doing so.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00013

Frontiers in psychology

Front Psychol

Rethinking the role of top-down attention in vision: effects attributable to a lossy representation in peripheral vision.

According to common wisdom in the field of visual perception, top-down selective attention is required in order to bind features into objects. In this view, even simple tasks, such as distinguishing a rotated T from a rotated L, require selective attention since they require feature binding. Selective attention, in turn, is commonly conceived as involving volition, intention, and at least implicitly, awareness. There is something non-intuitive about the notion that we might need so expensive (and possibly human) a resource as conscious awareness in order to perform so basic a function as perception. In fact, we can carry out complex sensorimotor tasks, seemingly in the near absence of awareness or volitional shifts of attention ("zombie behaviors"). More generally, the tight association between attention and awareness, and the presumed role of attention on perception, is problematic. We propose that under normal viewing conditions, the main processes of feature binding and perception proceed largely independently of top-down selective attention. Recent work suggests that there is a significant loss of information in early stages of visual processing, especially in the periphery. In particular, our texture tiling model (TTM) represents images in terms of a fixed set of "texture" statistics computed over local pooling regions that tile the visual input. We argue that this lossy representation produces the perceptual ambiguities that have previously been as ascribed to a lack of feature binding in the absence of selective attention. At the same time, the TTM representation is sufficiently rich to explain performance in such complex tasks as scene gist recognition, pop-out target search, and navigation. A number of phenomena that have previously been explained in terms of voluntary attention can be explained more parsimoniously with the TTM. In this model, peripheral vision introduces a specific kind of information loss, and the information available to an observer varies greatly depending upon shifts of the point of gaze (which usually occur without awareness). The available information, in turn, provides a key determinant of the visual system's capabilities and deficiencies. This scheme dissociates basic perceptual operations, such as feature binding, from both top-down attention and conscious awareness.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.nicl.2012.11.008

NeuroImage. Clinical

Neuroimage Clin

Assessing residual reasoning ability in overtly non-communicative patients using fMRI.

It is now well established that some patients who are diagnosed as being in a vegetative state or a minimally conscious state show reliable signs of volition that may only be detected by measuring neural responses. A pertinent question is whether these patients are also capable of logical thought. Here, we validate an fMRI paradigm that can detect the neural fingerprint of reasoning processes and moreover, can confirm whether a participant derives logical answers. We demonstrate the efficacy of this approach in a physically non-communicative patient who had been shown to engage in mental imagery in response to simple auditory instructions. Our results demonstrate that this individual retains a remarkable capacity for higher cognition, engaging in the reasoning task and deducing logical answers. We suggest that this approach is suitable for detecting residual reasoning ability using neural responses and could readily be adapted to assess other aspects of cognition.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/S1353-8020(11)70032-3

Parkinsonism & related disorders

Parkinsonism Relat Disord

Cortical control of voluntary saccades in Parkinson's disease and pre-emptive perception.

Gamma range EEG has been associated with cognition. Bodis-Wollner et al. [Ann NY Acad Sci 2002;956:464-7] and Forgacs et al. [Perception 2008;37:419-32] described posterior perisaccadic gamma (35-45 Hz) modulation associated with voluntary saccades. Voluntary impairment is a hallmark of Parkinson's disease (PD). We have done correlational analysis of frontally and posteriorly (posterior-parietal) recorded intrasaccadic gamma (ISG) powers, to understand cortical control of voluntary saccades in PD and healthy controls. Fifteen PD patients (55-71 years, 4 females) and 17 healthy controls (54-72 years, 9 females) participated in the study. The EEG was recorded over frontal and posterior-parietal scalp sites. Saccades were recorded with electro-oculogram and infra-red ISCAN camera. Subjects executed horizontal voluntary saccades to a mark; 15 degree distance rightwards or leftwards (centrifugal CF) from the central fixation, then back to the center (centripetal CP) and so on, for 2 minutes. Perisaccadic EEG segments were wavelet transformed followed by Hilbert transform to obtain ISG (35-45 Hz) powers. ISG power was trial-averaged, separately for the 4 possible saccade types; CP and CF, rightwards and leftwards. The perisaccadic EEG revealed disorganization in the intrasaccadic period. The correlations between frontal and posterior ISG power are high in PD (correlation coefficient >0.6) while low in controls (correlation coefficient <0.02). We interpret these results as lack of modulatory coupling between frontal and posterior intrasaccadic mechanisms in PD. Impaired volition in PD may be due to impaired circuitry of preemptive perception (PEP). Interareal phase coupling analysis will help in investigating the cortical voluntary saccade control with greater temporal precision.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.concog.2011.10.014

Consciousness and cognition

Conscious Cogn

When moving without volition: implied self-causation enhances binding strength between involuntary actions and effects.

The conscious awareness of voluntary action is associated with systematic changes in time perception: The interval between actions and outcomes is experienced as compressed in time. Although this temporal binding is thought to result from voluntary movement and provides a window to the sense of agency, recent studies challenge this idea by demonstrating binding in involuntary movement. We offer a potential account for these findings by proposing that binding between involuntary actions and effects can occur when self-causation is implied. Participants made temporal judgements concerning a key press and a tone, while they learned to consider themselves as the cause of the effect or not. Results showed that implied self-causation (vs. no implied self-causation) increased temporal binding. Since intrinsic motor cues of movement were absent, these results suggest that sensory evidence about the key press caused binding in retrospect and in line with the participant's sense of being an agent.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.4276/030802210X12892992239233

The British journal of occupational therapy

Br J Occup Ther

The occupational and quality of life consequences of chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgic encephalomyelitis in young people.

INTRODUCTION: Chronic fatigue syndrome, termed myalgic encephalomyelitis in the United Kingdom (CFS/ME), is a debilitating condition involving severe exhaustion, cognitive difficulties, educational and vocational losses, and disruption of social activities and relationships. CFS/ME may affect volition (that is, value, interest and sense of competence). PURPOSE: To test Model of Human Occupation (MOHO) concepts by comparing young people with and without CFS/ME in terms of occupational participation, volition and health-related quality of life during infection and over time. METHOD: Three hundred and one people (12-18 years old) diagnosed with glandular fever were evaluated at the time of acute infection (baseline). Six months following diagnosis, 39 of them met the criteria for CFS/ME. A further 39 who recovered were randomly selected and matched to CFS/ME participants. Both groups were re-evaluated at 12 months and 24 months. The Occupational Self Assessment and the Child General Health Questionnaire were used to compare occupational participation. RESULTS: Those with CFS/ME reported lower levels of perceived competency, more difficulties with physical functioning and poorer general health status than those who recovered. CONCLUSION: Those with CFS/ME report lower perceived competency, and compromises in physical functioning, school performance, social activities, emotional functioning and general health. This supports the MOHO assertion that impairments affect volition and quality of life.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.diabres.2011.10.006

Diabetes research and clinical practice

Diabetes Res Clin Pract

Using a combined motivational and volitional intervention to promote exercise and healthy dietary behaviour among undergraduates.

This study tested the impact of combining a motivational intervention based on protection motivation theory (PMT, Rogers, 1983 [18]) plus a volitional intervention based on action planning and coping planning, as a way to promote the prevention of type 2 diabetes among UK undergraduates. Eighty-four participants were randomly assigned to either a control group or one of three experimental conditions: motivational intervention (PMT), volitional intervention (APCP), or combined motivational and volitional intervention (PMT&APCP). PMT variables, dietary and exercise behaviours were measured at three time-points over a four-week period. The motivational intervention significantly changed PMT variables. The combined motivational and volitional intervention significantly decreased fat intake and increased the frequency of exercise relative to all other groups, and significantly increased the amount of fruit and vegetables consumed relative to control and volitional intervention groups. These results suggest that motivational intervention is effective at changing cognitions but changing behaviour requires an intervention based on both motivation and volition.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3389/fphys.2011.00068

Frontiers in physiology

Front Physiol

William james, gustav fechner, and early psychophysics.

American psychologist and philosopher William James devoted the entirety of his career to exploring the nature of volition, as expressed by such phenomena as will, attention, and belief. As part of that endeavor, James's unorthodox scientific pursuits, from his experiments with nitrous oxide and hallucinogenic drugs to his investigation of spiritualist mediums, represent his attempt to address the "hard problems" of consciousness for which his training in brain physiology and experimental psychology could not entirely account. As a student, James's reading in chemistry and physics had sparked his interest in the concepts of energy and force, terms that he later deployed in his writing about consciousness and in his arguments against philosophical monism and scientific materialism, as he developed his "radically empiricist" ideas privileging discontinuity and plurality. Despite James's long campaign against scientific materialism, he was, however, convinced of the existence of a naturalistic explanation for the more "wayward and fitful" aspects of mind, including transcendent experiences associated with hysteria, genius, and religious ecstasy. In this paper, I examine aspects of James's thought that are still important for contemporary debates in psychology and neuroscience: his "transmission theory" of consciousness, his ideas on the "knowing of things together," and, finally, the related concept of "the compounding of consciousness," which postulates the theoretical possibility for individual entities within a conscious system of thought to "know" the thoughts of others within the system. Taken together, these ideas suggest that James, in spite of, or perhaps because of, his forays into metaphysics, was working toward a naturalistic understanding of consciousness, what I will term a "distributive model," based on his understanding of consciousness as an "awareness" that interacts dynamically within, and in relation to, its environment.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1358/dot.2011.47.7.1603503

Drugs of today (Barcelona, Spain : 1998)

Drugs Today (Barc)

Available therapies and current management of fibromyalgia: focusing on pharmacological agents.

Fibromyalgia (FM) is a chronic medical condition characterized by physical, psychiatric and psychological symptoms. Widespread pain, fatigue, sleep disturbances, heightened sensitivity, morning stiffness, decreased volition, depressed mood and a history of early abuse are frequently reported by patients with FM. Treatment of fibromyalgia is multidisciplinary, with an emphasis on active patient participation, medications, cognitive-behavioral therapy and physical modalities. No single medication has yet been found to sufficiently control all the symptoms of FM; currently available medication classes include antidepressants, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, opioids, sedatives, muscle relaxants, analgesics, hypnotic agents and anticonvulsants. Hence, treatment for patients with FM, including pharmacological and non-pharmacological approaches, should be individualized based on each patient's clinical history, target symptoms and functional impairments. Although nonpharmacological modalities are also frequently used, recent research has focused on identifying more effective pharmacological treatments, particularly antidepressants and anticonvulsants. Furthermore, several new pharmacological agents have been now officially approved for the treatment of patients with FM. Thus, the purpose of this review is to help healthcare professionals make informed decisions about the appropriate use of a number of pharmacological treatments for patients with FM.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.jad.2011.08.036

Journal of affective disorders

J Affect Disord

The Affective and Emotional Composite Temperament (AFECT) model and scale: a system-based integrative approach.

Based on many temperament frameworks, here we propose an integration of emotional and affective temperaments (the AFECT model), forming a common substrate for mood, behavior, personality and part of cognition. Temperament is conceived as a self-regulated system with six emotional dimensions: volition, anger, inhibition, sensitivity, coping and control. The different combinations of these emotional dimensions result in 12 affective temperament types, namely depressive, anxious, apathetic, obsessive, cyclothymic, dysphoric, irritable, volatile, disinhibited, hyperthymic and euphoric. We also developed and validated a self-report scale to evaluate this construct, the Affective and Emotional Composite Temperament Scale (AFECTS). Exploratory and confirmatory psychometric analyses were performed with the internet version of the AFECTS in 2947 subjects (72% females, 35±11years old). The factors interpreted as volition, anger, inhibition, sensitivity, coping and control showed very good Cronbach's alphas for 5 dimensions (0.87-0.90) and acceptable alpha for inhibition (0.75). Confirmatory factor analysis corroborated this 6-factor structure when considering inhibition as a second-order factor with fear and caution as first-order factors (SRMR=0.061; RMSEA=0.053). In the Affective section, all 12 categorical affective temperaments were selected in the categorical choice, with 99% of volunteers identifying at least one adequate description of their affective temperament. Only the internet version was used in a general population sample. The AFECT model provides an integrated framework of temperament as a self-regulated system, with implications for mental health, psychiatric disorders and their treatment. The AFECTS showed good psychometric properties to further study this model.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1146/annurev-psych-120709-145401

Annual review of psychology

Annu Rev Psychol

Human intracranial recordings and cognitive neuroscience.

The ultimate goal of neuroscience research is to understand the operating mechanism of the human brain and to exploit this understanding to devise methods for repair when it malfunctions. A key feature of this operating mechanism is electrical activity of single brain cells and cell assemblies. For obvious ethical reasons, scientists rely mostly on animal research in the study of such signals. Research in humans is often limited to electrical signals that can be recorded at the scalp or to surrogates of electrical activity, namely magnetic source imaging and measures of regional blood flow and metabolism. Invasive brain recordings performed in patients during various clinical procedures provide a unique opportunity to record high-resolution signals in vivo from the human brain-data that are otherwise unavailable. Of special value are the rare opportunities to record in awake humans the activity of single brain cells and small cellular assemblies. These recordings provide a unique view on aspects of human cognition that are impossible to study in animals, including language, imagery, episodic memory, volition, and even consciousness. In the current review we discuss the unique contribution of invasive recordings from patients to the field of cognitive neuroscience.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1037/a0024808

Developmental psychology

Dev Psychol

Infants' joint attention skills predict toddlers' emerging mental state language.

To assess predictive relations between joint attention skills, intention understanding, and mental state vocabulary, 88 children were tested with measures of comprehension of gaze and referential pointing, as well as the production of declarative gestures and the comprehension and production of imperative gestures, at the ages of 7-18 months. Infants' intention-based imitation skills were assessed at 12, 15, and 18 months. At the ages of 24 and 36 months, toddlers' internal state lexicon was evaluated by parents with a German adaptation of the Mental State Language Questionnaire (Olineck & Poulin-Dubois, 2005). Regression analyses revealed that 9-months-olds' comprehension of referential pointing contributed significantly to the prediction of intention-based imitation skills at 15 months, as well as to children's volition and cognition vocabularies at 24 and 36 months, respectively. Moreover, 12-month-olds' comprehension of an imperative motive was shown to selectively predict toddlers' use of volition terms at 24 months. Overall, these results provide empirical evidence for both general and specific developmental relations between preverbal communication skills and mental state language, thus implying developmental continuity within the social domain in the first 3 years of life.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1177/1049732311420737

Qualitative health research

Qual Health Res

Unsolicited written narratives as a methodological genre in terminal illness: challenges and limitations.

Stories about illness have proven invaluable in helping health professionals understand illness experiences. Such narratives have traditionally been solicited by researchers through interviews and the collection of personal writings, including diaries. These approaches are, however, researcher driven; the impetus for the creation of the story comes from the researcher and not the narrator. In recent years there has been exponential growth in illness narratives created by individuals, of their own volition, and made available for others to read in print or as Internet accounts. We sought to determine whether it was possible to identify such material for use as research data to explore the subject of living with the terminal illness amyotrophic lateral sclerosis/motor neuron disease--the contention being that these accounts are narrator driven and therefore focus on issues of greatest importance to the affected person. We encountered and sought to overcome a number of methodological and ethical challenges, which is our focus here.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1080/13548506.2011.592843

Psychology, health & medicine

Psychol Health Med

An intervention to increase walking requires both motivational and volitional components: a replication and extension.

An intervention to increase walking has previously been developed, consisting of three motivational techniques, designed to increase self-efficacy, and three volitional techniques, designed to help translate intentions into action. Previous research found large effects (d = 0.90) on the objectively measured walking behaviour of 130 English adult volunteers, mediated by self-efficacy. The present study aimed to replicate this intervention, and decompose the intervention to assess whether both motivational and volitional intervention components are necessary. A three-group experimental design was employed, with n = 35 adult volunteers randomly allocated to receive one of three interventions: (a) a "combined" intervention, containing motivational and volitional components in session at T1 and a filler task at T2, (b) a "motivation first" intervention, where the motivational components were received at T1 and the volitional components at T2, or (c) a "volition first" intervention, where the volitional components were received at T1 followed by motivational components at T2. At T2, there was a significant main effect of time, such that there was an increase in walking, but this did not differ between groups. At T3, the "combined" intervention group showed a large (d = 1.06) and significant (p = 0.036) increase in walking behaviour, in contrast to both other interventions (time × groups interaction, p = 0.003). The "combined" intervention also produced a significant increase in self-efficacy, relative to the two other interventions. This study demonstrates generalisability of previous large intervention effects and suggests that use of both motivational and volitional components is optimal in producing change in walking behaviour. Future research should explore the mechanisms by which techniques to increase self-efficacy and planning interact.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1097/WCO.0b013e3283489754

Current opinion in neurology

Curr Opin Neurol

Forensic neurosciences: from basic research to applications and pitfalls.

In recent years, there has been growing interest in the application of genetic and neuroscientific methods to the investigation of the criminal mind. Here we summarize the results of recent studies and discuss their potential implications for the criminal system. The results of studies published so far have implications for theoretical aspects of the law. For example, a series of studies have indicated that conscious sense of volition may not be a driving force in the initiation of willed behavior but rather may arise as a consequence of such behavior. According to some, this challenges the very notion of conscious will on which the criminal system is based. The results also have implications for practical aspects of the law. For instance, genetic and neuroscientific methods may provide objective, biological data which can be used to reduce controversy in forensic psychiatric evaluations of mental insanity and minimize errors in detecting malingering. Another potential practical application is lie and memory detection, which at present appears to be susceptible to countermeasures. Genetic and neuroimaging techniques may provide information which, when considered in combination with other sources of evidence, might prove useful in advancing knowledge about mens rea.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2011.05.021

Neuropsychologia

Neuropsychologia

Abnormal sense of intention preceding voluntary movement in patients with psychogenic tremor.

Psychogenic tremor is the commonest psychogenic movement disorder, yet little is known of its pathophysiology. Given the presence of movements that appear from their physiological properties to be voluntarily produced, and yet are not experienced as such by the patients, we hypothesised that patients might have an abnormal conscious experience of volition with regard to self-generated movement. Nine patients with psychogenic tremor were asked to judge the timing of a self-paced button press relative to a clock displayed on a computer screen. In separate trials they were asked to judge the timing of their internal feeling of intention to move. These results were compared to those of healthy control participants. Patients with psychogenic tremor judged their feeling of intention to move significantly later compared to control participants. As a result, the interval between the perceived time of intention and the perceived time of action, which was highly significant in the control participants, was numerically smaller and non-significant in the patients. This study provides novel data that the sense of volition prior to movement is impaired in patients with psychogenic tremor. This fits with a pathophysiological explanation for this disorder based on an impairment of neural mechanisms that generate the conscious experience of action: actions that are voluntary in terms of their physiological origin might be experienced as involuntary.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1037/a0023904

Journal of personality and social psychology

J Pers Soc Psychol

The cognitive consequences of envy: attention, memory, and self-regulatory depletion.

In a series of 4 experiments, we provide evidence that--in addition to having an affective component--envy may also have important consequences for cognitive processing. Our first experiment (N = 69) demonstrated that individuals primed with envy better attended to and more accurately recalled information about fictitious peers than did a control group. Studies 2 (N = 187) and 3 (N = 65) conceptually replicated these results, demonstrating that envy elicited by targets predicts attention and later memory for information about them. We demonstrate that these effects cannot be accounted for by admiration or changes in negative affect or arousal elicited by the targets. Study 4 (N = 152) provides evidence that greater memory for envied--but not neutral--targets leads to diminished perseverance on a difficult anagram task. Findings demonstrate that envy may play an important role in attention and memory systems and deplete limited self-regulatory resources available for acts of volition.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1007/s13164-011-0056-1

Review of philosophy and psychology

Rev Philos Psychol

Early Developments in Joint Action.

Joint action, critical to human social interaction and communication, has garnered increasing scholarly attention in many areas of inquiry, yet its development remains little explored. This paper reviews research on the growth of joint action over the first 2 years of life to show how children become progressively more able to engage deliberately, autonomously, and flexibly in joint action with adults and peers. It is suggested that a key mechanism underlying the dramatic changes in joint action over the second year of life is the ability to reflect consciously on oneself and one's behavior and volition and correspondingly, on the behavior, goals, and intentions of others.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1186/1471-2474-12-111

BMC musculoskeletal disorders

BMC Musculoskelet Disord

Development and validation of a questionnaire assessing volitional competencies to enhance the performance of physical activities in chronic low back pain patients.

Motivation has long been emphasized as the most important determinant of action. However, there is a substantial gap between people's goals and their attainment. Patients may be motivated and yet unable to take action if their volitional competencies are insufficient. One of the important tasks of volition is goal-maintenance. Research has stressed the importance of a volitional tool, the implementation intentions. Implementation intentions indicate where, when, and how the action leading to the goal will be performed. Forming implementation intentions favours the execution of goal-directed efforts, and reinforces the relationship between intentions and behaviours. Results from various studies clearly suggest that volitional competencies and implementation intentions could play a role in low back pain (LBP) patients. However, there is at present no questionnaire allowing assessing the capacity of implementation intentions of physical activities in LBP patients. This study will develop such a questionnaire, using a 3-step approach. A first qualitative step to build categories and generate items; 30 patients suffering chronic LBP will be invited to participate in semi-structured interviews; verbatim and derived items will then be submitted to a panel of experts, using a Delphi method; a second quantitative step to examine the properties of items, and determine the factorial structure of the questionnaire; 100 patients suffering chronic LBP will be recruited to respond to this phase; and third, preliminary psychometric analyses (item-scale correlations, construct validity, reliability); 180 chronic LBP patients will be recruited for this phase of the study. The relationships between implementation intentions and variables affecting physical activity on chronic LBP patients, i.e. pain, physical capacities, fear-avoidance beliefs, kinesiophobia, work status, and level of physical activity will be considered. Developing a questionnaire to assess implementation intentions would allow investigating the role of these intentions in the transition from acute to chronic LBP. The results of this study should contribute to the understanding of the psychological processes at stake in the development of chronic LBP, and in particular to the identification of factors eventually favouring patients' participation in and adherence to active physical treatments.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

Journal of medicine and life

J Med Life

Questionnaire about psychology/disease correlation-I.

The existing personality inventories are exploring too general psychological features so that the possible psychology/disease associations might be leveled out. We attempt to build a tool to explore the possible correlation between certain psychological features and the most common internal disorders. We have used two questionnaires containing many pairs of synonymous items (necessary for assessing the consistency of the answers). The items are divided into four main domains: preoccupation for the basal conditions of existence (health/ disease/ death, fear, money, lodging); interaction with other people; action, will/ volition, self-assertion; and preoccupation with the exterior. In this first article we are presenting the correlations between items of the first domain, based on the answers from our first 3138 respondents. The concern about health is best reflected by general formulations. The desire for security is best expressed by items combining the worry about money and dwelling, and worst by items reflecting the eagerness to gain, keep or judiciously spend money. Among the various fears, those of future, darkness, and loneliness are better indicators of security concern. In assessing the anxiety about safety/ security, specific worries are more revelatory than the general ones. Precaution and inclination for order are the best indicators for the aspiration to stability. Poorer ones are the desire for cleanliness and the tendency to attachment. Health and security concerns seem to be consistently linked. The consistency evaluating system will be based upon pairs of synonymous items correlated with a10(-200) or less error probability.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.addbeh.2011.03.003

Addictive behaviors

Addict Behav

Risk perception and motivation to quit smoking: a partial test of the Health Action Process Approach.

The Health Action Process Approach (HAPA) posits a distinction between pre-intentional motivation processes and a post-intentional volition process that leads to the actual behavior change. For smoking cessation, the HAPA predicts that increased risk perceptions would foster a decision to quit smoking. From a cross-sectional perspective, the HAPA predicts that those who do not intend to quit (non-intenders) should have lower risk perceptions than those who do intend to quit (intenders). Adult smokers participated in a cross-sectional survey. Multiple measures of motivation to quit smoking and risk perceptions for smoking were assessed. ANOVA and contrast analysis were employed for data analysis. The results were generally supportive of the HAPA. Non-intenders had systematically lower risk perceptions compared to intenders. Most of these findings were statistically significant. The results demonstrated that risk perceptions distinguish non-intenders from intenders. These results suggest that smokers low in motivation to quit could benefit from information and reminders about the serious health problems caused by smoking.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3233/BEN-2011-0314

Behavioural neurology

Behav Neurol

Ictal and peri-ictal psychopathology.

Patients with epilepsy may experience psychiatric symptoms preceding the seizure (pre-ictal), following the seizure (post-ictal), independently of seizure occurrence (interictal), or as an expression of the seizure (ictal). Compared to interictal, peri-ictal psychiatric symptoms are less investigated and recognized. However, they contribute substantially to disability and distress among people with epilepsy. The relationship between interictal and peri-ictal symptoms is still largely unknown but it seems that they are intimately related in epilepsy. Greater appreciation and understanding of the peri-ictal period is clinically important, providing a model for understanding basic mechanisms underlying mood and thought disorders and the substrates of cognition, volition, emotion, and consciousness. The present paper is aimed at reviewing major psychiatric symptoms that may occur around the ictus with special attention to clinical descriptions and relationships with interictal psychopathology.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.neuron.2010.11.045

Neuron

Neuron

Internally generated preactivation of single neurons in human medial frontal cortex predicts volition.

Understanding how self-initiated behavior is encoded by neuronal circuits in the human brain remains elusive. We recorded the activity of 1019 neurons while twelve subjects performed self-initiated finger movement. We report progressive neuronal recruitment over ∼1500 ms before subjects report making the decision to move. We observed progressive increase or decrease in neuronal firing rate, particularly in the supplementary motor area (SMA), as the reported time of decision was approached. A population of 256 SMA neurons is sufficient to predict in single trials the impending decision to move with accuracy greater than 80% already 700 ms prior to subjects' awareness. Furthermore, we predict, with a precision of a few hundred ms, the actual time point of this voluntary decision to move. We implement a computational model whereby volition emerges once a change in internally generated firing rate of neuronal assemblies crosses a threshold.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.neuron.2011.01.028

Neuron

Neuron

Decision time for free will.

In this issue of Neuron, Fried et al. report electrical recordings from single neurons in several areas of the human medial frontal lobe prior to voluntary movement. These data shed important new light on the neuronal mechanisms of human volition and on the hotly debated relation between consciousness and will.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1080/13546805.2010.546074

Cognitive neuropsychiatry

Cogn Neuropsychiatry

Ketamine administration in healthy volunteers reproduces aberrant agency experiences associated with schizophrenia.

Aberrant experience of agency is characteristic of schizophrenia. An understanding of the neurobiological basis of such experience is therefore of considerable importance for developing successful models of the disease. We aimed to characterise the effects of ketamine, a drug model for psychosis, on sense of agency (SoA). SoA is associated with a subjective compression of the temporal interval between an action and its effects: This is known as "intentional binding". This action-effect binding provides an indirect measure of SoA. Previous research has found that the magnitude of binding is exaggerated in patients with schizophrenia. We therefore investigated whether ketamine administration to otherwise healthy adults induced a similar pattern of binding. 14 right-handed healthy participants (8 female; mean age 22.4 years) were given low-dose ketamine (100 ng/mL plasma) and completed the binding task. They also underwent structured clinical interviews. Ketamine mimicked the performance of schizophrenia patients on the intentional binding task, significantly increasing binding relative to placebo. The size of this effect also correlated with aberrant bodily experiences engendered by the drug. These data suggest that ketamine may be able to mimic certain aberrant agency experiences that characterise schizophrenia. The link to individual changes in bodily experience suggests that the fundamental change produced by the drug has wider consequences in terms of individuals' experiences of their bodies and movements.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.3758/s13421-010-0040-5

Memory & cognition

Mem Cognit

Automatic processing influences free recall: converging evidence from the process dissociation procedure and remember-know judgments.

Dual-process theories of retrieval suggest that controlled and automatic processing contribute to memory performance. Free recall tests are often considered pure measures of recollection, assessing only the controlled process. We report two experiments demonstrating that automatic processes also influence free recall. Experiment 1 used inclusion and exclusion tasks to estimate recollection and automaticity in free recall, adopting a new variant of the process dissociation procedure. Dividing attention during study selectively reduced the recollection estimate but did not affect the automatic component. In Experiment 2, we replicated the results of Experiment 1, and subjects additionally reported remember-know-guess judgments during recall in the inclusion condition. In the latter task, dividing attention during study reduced remember judgments for studied items, but know responses were unaffected. Results from both methods indicated that free recall is partly driven by automatic processes. Thus, we conclude that retrieval in free recall tests is not driven solely by conscious recollection (or remembering) but also by automatic influences of the same sort believed to drive priming on implicit memory tests. Sometimes items come to mind without volition in free recall.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania)

Medicina (Kaunas)

Voluntary performance.

Will, purpose, and volition have long been viewed as either causes of behavior or of no direct consequence to behavior. In this essay, volition affects a flexible direct coupling of participant to task, modulating the degrees of freedom for kinematics in action, a point of view first introduced in theories of motor coordination. The consequence is an explanation consistent with present knowledge about involuntary and voluntary sources of control in human performance, and also the changes of the body expressed in aging and dynamical disease. Specifically, this view explains how tradeoffs between sources of overly regular versus overly random dynamics change the structure of variability in repeated measurements of voluntary performance.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1136/jnnp.2010.221143

Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry

J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry

Delayed experience of volition in Gilles de la Tourette syndrome.

Gilles de la Tourette's syndrome (TS) is a neuropsychiatric movement disorder characterised by the presence of multiple tics. Tics have an unusual, intermediate status between voluntary and involuntary movements. This ambiguity might involve not just a disorder of movement generation but also an abnormality of voluntary experience. Here the experience of voluntary movements in adult patients with TS is investigated and compared with healthy controls. A group of adult TS patients and age matched control participants estimated the time of conscious intention to perform a simple keypress movement and movement onset. Patients with TS showed a delayed experience of intention relative to controls whereas estimates of the actual movement onset were similar for patients and controls. These data suggest an abnormal experience of volition in patients with TS. Delayed volition could either be an additional intrinsic feature of the syndrome or it could reflect a cognitive strategy to limit motor excitability, and thus tic generation, during voluntary action.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1111/j.1600-0447.2010.01651.x

Acta psychiatrica Scandinavica

Acta Psychiatr Scand

'Social dysmetria' in first-episode psychosis patients.

The 'embodied cognition' hypothesis suggests a close relationship between internal self-representations and the outward expression of social behaviours and emotions. Given self-awareness disturbances in patients with first-rank symptoms (FRS), we hypothesized that these patients would show abnormal social behaviours. In this study, we examined the social interactive skills of patients with first-episode psychosis during an interview, together with changes in performance over time. We analysed previously unreported data from 227 patients with first-episode psychosis (90 with, and 137 without, FRS) who took part in the WHO multicentre study on the Determinants of Outcome of Severe Mental Disorders. They were assessed on the Psychological Impairment Rating Schedule (PIRS) and examined again after 2 years. A principal component analysis on the Psychosocial Impairment Rating Schedule produced two factors (interactive skills; withdrawal from interactions). Patients with FRS showed greater impairments in the domain linked to 'interactive skills', which remained 2 years after the first experience of a psychotic illness. These findings were not explained by clinical characteristics, or presence of non-FRS delusions. Self-awareness deficits, as indexed by the FRS symptom cluster, are linked to deficits in social interactive behaviours. These abnormalities are indicative of 'social dysmetria' in this group, which involves difficulties conveying motor aspects of behaviours, volition and affect to facilitate mutual communication. These findings point to the utility of behavioural assessment scales in clinical and research settings.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1016/j.jbspin.2010.10.009

Joint bone spine

Joint Bone Spine

Is volition the missing link in the management of low back pain?

Patients with nonspecific chronic low back pain are typically prescribed a regimen of regular physical exercises to improve pain and function, increase workability, and prevent pain recurrence. However, adherence to home exercise programs is often partial at best. Patients often fail to translate their intention to exercise (motivation) into action (implementation). Volition is the mental activity by which intentions are implemented. In this review, we argue that volition may be crucial to the successful rehabilitation of patients with low back pain. Obstacles to the implementation of intentions are described, as well as factors that promote implementation, most notably the conscious formation of implementation intentions.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.2466/01.03.07.14.PR0.107.5.447-462

Psychological reports

Psychol Rep

Self-leadership and volition: distinct and potentially supplemental constructs?

Self-leadership and volition are conceptually similar concepts. Both propose self-influence strategies that aim to improve the motivation and self-direction necessary to perform well. The present study assesses whether self-leadership strategies maintain construct-specific variance when compared with the similar strategies of volition. Results from a questionnaire study (N=320) indicate that self-leadership and volitional strategies are distinguishable and only moderately (r = .33) correlated. Self-leadership, therefore, supplements volition during goal attainment. Findings are discussed in light of the Rubicon model of action phases.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition

10.1080/13803395.2010.518597

Journal of clinical and experimental neuropsychology

J Clin Exp Neuropsychol

Academic procrastination in college students: the role of self-reported executive function.

Procrastination, or the intentional delay of due tasks, is a widespread phenomenon in college settings. Because procrastination can negatively impact learning, achievement, academic self-efficacy, and quality of life, research has sought to understand the factors that produce and maintain this troublesome behavior. Procrastination is increasingly viewed as involving failures in self-regulation and volition, processes commonly regarded as executive functions. The present study was the first to investigate subcomponents of self-reported executive functioning associated with academic procrastination in a demographically diverse sample of college students aged 30 years and below (n = 212). We included each of nine aspects of executive functioning in multiple regression models that also included various demographic and medical/psychiatric characteristics, estimated IQ, depression, anxiety, neuroticism, and conscientiousness. The executive function domains of initiation, plan/organize, inhibit, self-monitor, working memory, task monitor, and organization of materials were significant predictors of academic procrastination in addition to increased age and lower conscientiousness. Results enhance understanding of the neuropsychological correlates of procrastination and may lead to practical suggestions or interventions to reduce its harmful effects on students' academic performance and well-being.

CognitiveConstruct

Volition