Psychological characteristics of individuals who put forth inadequate cognitive effort in a secondary gain context

Abstract

The current study sought to characterize the psychological architecture of individuals who put forth inadequate effort. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, 2nd Edition-Restructured Form was used to identify dimensions of psychological functioning in a mixed outpatient sample of U.S. Veterans referred for neuropsychological evaluation as part of their clinical care. After accounting for external financial incentive and symptom overreporting, results showed that the inadequate effort group (n = 23, mean age = 42.48) scored higher than the adequate effort group (n = 29, mean age = 44.31) on neurologic complaints (NUC) and lower on behavioral/externalizing dysfunction (BXD), antisocial behaviors (RC4), and disconstraint (DISC-r). Lower scores on BXD, RC4, and DISC-r could indicate higher behavioral constraint-a psychological characteristic that has been linked to the pursuit of high-value future rewards. Alternatively, lower scores on these scales could have reflected a self-presentation strategy aimed at minimizing externalizing and RC4 in order to appear more psychological healthy. Implications of each of these interpretations are discussed.