Chapter 23: Personality and Performance: Cognitive Models

Researchers transitioned from traditional, often inadequate, arousal theory to information-processing models, heavily influenced by the cognitive revolution that emphasized cognitive distortions associated with emotional states like trait anxiety. A key approach involves resource theories, such as the Humphreys and Revelle model, which posits that motivation and arousal influence performance by altering the availability of resources for sustained information transfer and short-term memory, with anxiety typically leading to cognitive interference as attentional capacity is diverted to personal worries. More recent advancements, like Attentional Control Theory, specify that anxiety impairs specific executive functions, notably weaker inhibitory control and difficulties in shifting attention between tasks. Empirical evidence demonstrates that personality traits are expressed through complex cognitive patternings, which are multiple, distinct biases in information-processing rather than a single general mechanism. For instance, anxiety is reliably linked to a bias in selective attention, specifically showing slower disengagement from threatening stimuli, observable through techniques like the emotional Stroop and dot-probe tasks. Conversely, Extraversion frequently correlates with faster performance in specific domains, such as enhanced fluency in speech production and quicker motor response execution, and sometimes superior functioning in demanding dual-task situations. To fully explain this multiplicity of effects, the chapter proposes a cognitive science framework utilizing three explanatory levels: the biological level (neural processes and psychophysiology), the symbol-processing level (parameters of the virtual cognitive architecture), and the knowledge level (higher-level self-regulation, strategy choice, and personal goals). This multilevel understanding supports the Cognitive-Adaptive Theory, which suggests that traits possess functional coherence by acting as adaptive specializations—such as Neuroticism/Anxiety facilitating avoidance adaptation to threat, or Extraversion facilitating adaptation to social challenges—with all associated processing biases serving these ultimate adaptive goals.