EYSENCKIAN PEN STRUCTURE OF PERSONALITY AND COGNITIVE CONTROL IN TASK-SWITCHING PARADIGM

The present study was aimed at exploring the relationship between individual differences and performance level in high cognitive load condition, demanding strengthened cognitive control. The research problem was focused on the influence of eysenckian personality traits on attention switching efficacy, studied in task-switching paradigm. Modified Stroop task was used, requiring constant shifts between color-naming and word-reading tasks. It was assumed that the size of the switch costs would be greater when the task was performed by participants with high scores on introversion, neuroticism and psychoticism, separately. The obtained results confirmed the hypothesis concerning psychoticism dimension only. Other traits were found to have an interactive effect on the performance level, which was hindered when the intensity of all three personality traits was high. The gathered data suggests that task-switching paradigm may be a useful tool when studying the influence of individual differences in psychoticism on cognition.