Why do people increase effort near a deadline? An opportunity-cost model of goal gradients.

Abstract

People tend to gradually reduce effort when performing lengthy tasks, experiencing physical or mental fatigue. Yet, they often increase their effort near deadlines. How can both phenomena co-occur? If fatigue causes the level of effort to decline, why does effort rise again near a deadline? The present article proposes a model to explain this pattern of behavior and tests three predictions that follow from it. Four lab experiments (N = 311) show that effort, indexed by the rate of keypresses in a computer game, increases more steeply (a) toward a deadline than toward a performance criterion, (b) when a concurrent task is present (vs. absent), and (c) with more (vs. less) effective actions. We suggest that changes in opportunity-cost, which is the cost of missing out on alternatives when engaging in a focal action, can explain these effects. Specifically, we suggest that as the deadline approaches, (a) the value of performing competing, alternative activities decreases because they can be postponed past the deadline with lower cost, and (b) engaging in competing alternatives becomes increasingly more costly, because compensating for the lost time becomes more difficult. Both processes contribute to diminishing the net value of alternative activities and thus reduce the opportunity cost associated with engaging in the focal activity. We discuss the practical implications of this model for diverse fields such as economic behavior, sports, and education.

Proximity to rewards modulates parameters of effortful control exertion.

“…This would be consistent with past work, in which reward incentive effects can be highly variable and context-dependent (e.g., Otto & Daw, 2019). On the other hand, this finding is also consistent with recent work (Emanuel, 2022), showing that the effects of monetary reward on proximity-induced (motor) effort exertion were heterogeneous and, elsewhere (Emanuel et al, 2022), that changes in motor vigor may be less sensitive to goal proximity when a goal is based on performance-based metrics success.…”

“…To examine performance, we estimated mixed-effects regressions predicting participants (log) RTs on correct trials, and accuracy (using a logistic model) from progress information condition (deviance-coded, −0.5 = no progress, 0.5 = progress), goal proximity (distance to the end a block, mean-centered), and reward magnitude (deviance-coded, −0.5 = low reward, 0.5 = high reward). Importantly, the goal-gradient hypothesis predicts that performance should uptick sharply near a reward (Emanuel et al, 2022;Hull, 1932), and other work has suggested that this uptick near the end of task may be accompanied by a parallel decrease in performance near the start (Bonezzi et al, 2011). To capture this hypothesis in our model, we also included a quadratic term for proximity (hereafter, proximity 2 ), which is computed as the square of the goal proximity term.…”

Cost-inclusive research on health psychology interventions: Why, how, and what next.

“…"Cost" has multiple meanings in different fields and for different interest groups. In this manuscript, "cost" does not mean response cost, cognitive resource depletion (Koopman et al, 2022), psychological cost (Emanuel et al, 2022), or qualitative cost that affects provider and patient decision-making (Ogden, 2019;Otto et al, 2022). Here, "cost" also does not mean "negative outcome."…”

“…“Cost” has multiple meanings in different fields and for different interest groups. In this manuscript, “cost” does not mean response cost, cognitive resource depletion (Koopman et al, 2022), psychological cost (Emanuel et al, 2022), or qualitative cost that affects provider and patient decision-making (Ogden, 2019; Otto et al, 2022). Here, “cost” also does not mean “negative outcome.” Instead, a definition of “cost” for present purposes isthe monetary value of the types and amounts of specific resources used to provide treatment or prevention HPIs, measured from perspectives of multiple interest groups involved in delivery and receipt of HPIs.…”

Examining the Alignment between Subjective Effort and Objective Force Production

“…However, evidence suggests a u-shaped curve when it comes to effort allocation. This pattern is normally shown as a high-effort investment at the beginning of the task and towards the end 62,63 . Contrary to that finding, high effort investment and, therefore, a fast decline in physical performance was only found halfway through the experiment.…”