How does mood affect task-switching in 7- to 8-year-olds?

Conference item

Research is increasingly supporting the intuition that emotional states have important effects on cognitive processes. Fluctuations in incidental mood states are known to affect cognitive performance across a variety of tasks in adulthood and childhood. Cognitive flexibility, the capacity to switch adaptively between cognitive tasks or mindsets, appears to be enhanced by positive mood states and unaffected by negative mood states when measured by verbal fluency or categorisation tasks. However, limited research has examined the effects of mood on cognitive flexibility with more controlled experimental designs and tasks, or in childhood. We examined the effects of incidental mood on cognitive flexibility in middle childhood using a computerised set-switching task. Children completed the Switching Inhibition and Flexibility Test (SwIFT) both before and after watching animated videos selected to induce either positive, neutral or negative mood states. Self-report scales suggested that the mood manipulations were partially effective. No differences were found in set-switching performance between neutral and either negative or positive mood groups. However, children with extremely positive baseline mood performed more poorly in terms of overall efficiency and mixing, but not switch, costs.

Authors: Turnbull, S; Hoicka, E; Carroll, D

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Cognitive Development Center
• Host title: Budapest CEU Conference on Cognitive Development
• Journal: Budapest CEU Conference on Cognitive Development
• Publication date: 2016-01-08
• Acceptance date: 2015-10-30
• Keywords: SBTMR