ABSTRACT

Cognitive flexibility is a widely studied construct and is considered an important treatment target for several psychological disorders. The convergence of several independent fields of research has led to assumptions about the assessment of cognitive flexibility – assumptions that are not empirically supported and often conflate different notions of flexibility. This critical review discusses how the conflation of self-report and neurocognitive assessments has seemingly arisen from literature on eating disorders. We describe how seminal early observations of “inflexible” personality characteristics, communication competence research, and investigations of frontal lobe function after injury led to two methods of assessing “cognitive flexibility”. We discuss the impact that conflation of self-report and neurocognitive assessments has had on the field, and we provide recommendations for assessing cognitive flexibility in both research and clinical settings.

摘要

认知灵活性是一种广泛研究的结构，被认为是多种心理障碍的重要治疗目标。几个独立研究领域的融合导致了关于认知灵活性评估的假设——这些假设没有经验支持，并且经常混淆不同的灵活性概念。这篇批判性评论讨论了自我报告和神经认知评估的合并似乎是如何从饮食失调的文献中产生的。我们描述了对“僵化”人格特征的开创性早期观察、沟通能力研究和受伤后额叶功能的调查如何导致两种评估“认知灵活性”的方法。