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Neuroticism as Mental Noise: Evidence from a Continuous Tracking Task

Article  in  Journal of Personality · February 2019

DOI: 10.1111/jopy.12469

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 DR. ROBERT KLEIN (Orcid ID : 0000-0001-6143-787X)

DR. MICHAEL D ROBINSON (Orcid ID : 0000-0003-1429-9069)

Accepted Article
Article type : Original Manuscript

Running Head: Neuroticism as Mental Noise

Neuroticism as Mental Noise:

Evidence from a Continuous Tracking Task

Robert J. Klein and Michael D. Robinson

North Dakota State University

Note: Correspondence can be sent to Robert J. Klein, Psychology, NDSU Dept. 2765, PO

Box 6050, Fargo, ND 58108-6050 USA (email: robert.j.klein@ndsu.edu).

Abstract

Objective: Prominent theories of neuroticism emphasize its potential link to threat- or

punishment-sensitivity processes. Even in the absence of external threats, though,

neuroticism may predispose people to a sort of “mental noise”, or cognitive instability, that

creates problems for ongoing efforts after control. If this is the case, cognitive views of

neuroticism might be needed to complement the primarily emotion-related views that

currently exist.

This article has been accepted for publication and undergone full peer review but has not
been through the copyediting, typesetting, pagination and proofreading process, which may
lead to differences between this version and the Version of Record. Please cite this article as
doi: 10.1111/jopy.12469
This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
 Method: In a four study program of research (total N = 541), momentary forms of

monitoring and control were assessed using variants of a continuous tracking task.
Accepted Article
Results: As hypothesized, the dimension of neuroticism was consistently linked to

performance deficits, regardless of whether aversive sounds were present or not (Studies 1-3),

and the relevant deficits also predicted daily levels of negative affect (Study 4).

Conclusions: The results support the idea that momentary self-regulation is noisier in the

context of higher levels of neuroticism.

Keywords: neuroticism, monitoring, control, self-regulation, mental noise

Neuroticism as Mental Noise:

Evidence from a Continuous Tracking Task

The personality dimension of neuroticism has both a long and short history. Greek

and Roman philosophers recognized anxiety as well as unhappiness and developed systems

(such as Stoicism) to mitigate these conditions. Cicero, in particular, referred to a condition

called “anxietas” and linked it to mental disturbances, fear, and worry (Crocq, 2015). That

anxiety, depression, and unhappiness are linked was recognized subsequently, but

terminology varied and the literature was less consistent (Crocq, 2015). The modern view of

neuroticism began with Freud, continued with ideas about war trauma and the susceptibility

of certain soldiers to it, and reached an early culmination in the work of Hans Eysenck

(1947). Eysenck (1947) named the relevant features (e.g., distress, poor coping) in terms of

“neuroticism” and suggested that they comprise a dimension of personality rather than an

exclusively abnormal condition.

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 Many of Eysenck’s (1947) observations have been confirmed. Neuroticism is one of a

handful of personality dimensions that routinely emerges from factor analyses, whether of
Accepted Article
items or scales and whether the relevant attributes are reported on by selves or others

(Goldberg, 1993). The item content of neuroticism scales suggests moodiness, vulnerability,

and tendencies toward emotional upset, both within and outside of the context of stressors

(Watson, 2000, chap. 6). In turn, neuroticism has been shown to be a robust predictor of well-

being as well as psychopathology and people who are higher in neuroticism are prone to a

variety of serious issues such as self-harm and addictive behavior (Lahey, 2009). In daily

process terms, neuroticism predicts the occurrence of stressful events, negative emotional

reactions to them, and forms of coping that seem more problematic than helpful (Suls &

Martin, 2005).

Although we know a fair amount about the trait of neuroticism and what it predicts,

we know far less about the processes that underlie it or how it operates. This is a problem

because good, process-oriented theories are somewhat necessary when making new

predictions and because the absence of process-oriented theories could result in a somewhat

tautological area of inquiry (Ormel, Rosmalen, & Farmer, 2004). Along these lines, the most

common theoretical perspectives on neuroticism emphasize its links to neurocognitive

systems responsible for identifying threats or punishments and responding to them (Watson,

Wiese, Vaidya, & Tellegen, 1999). Through mechanisms of this type, we could potentially

explain why neuroticism varies positively with emotional experiences like fear and why

reactivity to stressors is often more pronounced at higher levels of neuroticism (Suls &

Martin, 2005). Such theories might have a harder time accounting for other neuroticism-

linked phenomena (e.g., experiences of boredom or low self-esteem or tendencies toward

greater variability across time).

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 An alternative (though perhaps complementary) perspective on neuroticism also

seems to be emerging. This alternative can be expressed in terms of the “mental noise”
Accepted Article
hypothesis (Robinson & Tamir, 2005), which posits that neurotic people have noisier, more

chaotic mental control systems. In part because of a vigilant/avoidant mode of dealing with

the world (Mathews, 1990), individuals with high levels of neuroticism will often find

themselves off-task and disconnected from what they are currently supposed to be doing.

Vigilance with respect to the past can result in ruminative thoughts, which attempt to undo

what cannot be undone (Watkins, 2008). Vigilance with respect to the future can result in

worry, which somewhat similarly attempts to control something that cannot (at least

currently) be controlled (Borkovec, 2002). And even when neurotic individuals intend to

attend to the present, they can often find themselves caught up in intrusive thoughts (e.g., of

possible failure or the inadequacies of the self) that can interfere with focusing on the task at

hand (Sarason, 1984).

The upshot of these considerations is the possibility that the mental control system

may “drift away” from present-moment reality more frequently at higher levels of

neuroticism (Perkins, Arnone, Smallwood, & Mobbs, 2015; Robinson, in press), potentially

affecting performance. There is evidence in favor of these ideas in the form of the

relationship between neuroticism and mindfulness. Mindfulness, which is often defined in

terms of attention and awareness concerning present reality (Brown & Ryan, 2003), seems to

be in shorter supply at higher levels of neuroticism. Indeed, the correlation between trait

measures of neuroticism and mindfulness can be as strong as r = -.5, despite minimal item

overlap (Hanley, 2016). Furthermore, there is evidence that mindfulness mediates some of

the pernicious consequences of neuroticism and does so in sensible ways. For example,

Fetterman, Robinson, Ode, and Gordon (2010) found that dispositional mindfulness mediated

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 the positive relationship between neuroticism and impulsivity as well as the negative

relationship between neuroticism and self-control, at least when these outcomes were self-
Accepted Article
reported.

More pertinent, though, are potential relationships between neuroticism and

performance, as mental noise should tend to undermine it (Sanders, 1998, chap. 9). In fact,

there are fairly complicated relationships in this realm. Meta-analytic findings suggest that

neuroticism tends to be negatively related to job performance, but the magnitude of this

relationship is small (Judge, Klinger, Simon, & Yang, 2008). Moreover, there are cases in

which people with higher levels of neuroticism can outperform those with lower levels, at

least when the job requires a high degree of deliberation or concern (Perkins & Corr, 2005).

Findings of both types can be viewed in terms of attentional control theory (Eysenck,

Derakshan, Santos, & Calvo, 2007), which is an updated version of processing efficiency

theory (Eysenck & Calvo, 1992). According to Michael Eysenck and colleagues, people with

higher levels of trait anxiety (which is closely related to neuroticism) can compensate for

their lower levels of processing efficiency with effort, in effect canceling the limitations of

their noisier mental control systems. Indeed, there is evidence that anxious or neurotic people

typically want to do well and will devote extra effort in support of this possibility (Bresin,

Robinson, Ode, & Leth-Steensen, 2011).

To investigate relations between neuroticism and mental noise, then, it would be

useful to study tasks in which high levels of effort cannot compensate for deficiencies in

mental control. Robinson and Tamir (2005) used choice reaction time tasks in their studies,

with the reasoning that the choice-accuracy component of such tasks does not easily lend

itself to simple cognitive effort (Sanders, 1998, chap. 2). What Robinson and Tamir (2005)

found was that neurotic individuals displayed greater variability in their categorization times

from trial to trial than people low in neuroticism did. The authors interpreted this finding in

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 terms of more frequent lapses of attention at higher levels of neuroticism, though variations

in semantic processing could also be involved (Sanders, 1998, chap. 5). Puzzlingly, though,
Accepted Article
there was no relationship between neuroticism and the speed with which the tasks could be

performed. Thus, these tasks were not able to capture neuroticism-related processes with the

precision necessary to demonstrate performance deficits. Or, put another way, the variability

that occurred at higher levels of neuroticism could have reflected stylistic variables rather

than noisy, error-prone processing.

In the present studies, therefore, we resolved to investigate the neuroticism-

performance relationship in micro-analytic terms. We did so by asking participants to

continuously track moving targets presented on the computer screen. Owing to the

continuous nature of the task, we could sample joystick or mouse position with a very high

degree of temporal precision, one that should be capable of revealing even short-duration

lapses of attention or control (Slifkin & Newell, 1998). To the extent that neurotic individuals

have noisier control systems (Robinson & Tamir, 2005), they should exhibit worse

performance on the task, defined in terms of greater discrepancies between target and cursor

position. Of note, the task is a very simple one in which one merely needs to attend to the

target and move toward it. Because the target is always moving, however, this process must

be repeated throughout the entire trial. Vagaries in attention and control should therefore

show up (Slifkin & Newell, 1998).

While investigating these basic questions about neuroticism and control, we sought to

contrast punishment-sensitivity ideas about neuroticism versus the mental noise hypothesis.

To the extent that punishment-sensitivity processes are involved, they should be more evident

under conditions of stress or threat (Perkins et al., 2015). To examine contingencies of this

type, we provoked participants with white noise blasts on some trials but not others.

Punishment-sensitivity processes would take the form of neuroticism by sound interactions,

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 with stronger relationships under conditions of aversive stimulation (Glass & Singer, 1972).

By contrast, more endemic difficulties in mental control, which are emphasized by the mental
Accepted Article
noise perspective (Robinson & Tamir, 2005), as well as by Perkins et al. (2015), should be

evident in terms of main effects for neuroticism within both aversive and non-aversive

conditions.

We conducted four studies, both for the sake of replication and to explore the

generality of possible personality-performance relationships. Indeed, these efforts were

substantive and programmatic. In Study 1, we instituted relatively long trials, with the

reasoning that long trials might be especially conducive to attentional lapses (Cheyne,

Carriere, & Smilek, 2006). Even so, it is our contention that mental noise should be evident

on shorter trials as well and we therefore switched to shorter trials in Studies 2-4. Doing so

also allowed us to blast individuals with shorter-duration noise blasts, which we reasoned

would be more emotionally provocative (Bushman & Anderson, 1998). In addition, we

explored the consistency of the findings across different effectors (joystick versus mouse) and

as a function of trial sequence (early versus late).

Given the findings from the first three studies, we conducted a fourth in which we

removed external sources of aversive stimulation. Even under these circumstances, we

thought it likely that neuroticism would manifest itself as poorer tracking performance.

Finally, because we think that mental noise follows from vigilance-related systems as well as

intrusive, unpleasant thoughts (Robinson & Tamir, 2011), we explored the possibility that

tracking performance could be considered an implicit measure of personality (Robinson &

Wilkowski, 2015). Specifically, we explored the possibility that individuals displaying poorer

performance in the tracking task would be more prone to emotional distress in daily life.

Altogether, then, we performed multiple analyses and studies to examine the generalizability

of the findings.

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 Study 1

Study 1 constituted an initial test of the idea that neuroticism disrupts the control
Accepted Article
functions necessary for continuous performance. The trials were relatively long (30 seconds),

which can contribute to lapses of attention (Steinborn, Langner, Flehmig, & Huestegge,

2016). In addition, we manipulated stress levels through the provision of loud white noise,

which has been linked to emotional and behavioral reactivity in previous research (Bushman

& Anderson, 1998; Westman & Walters, 1981). We hypothesized that neurotic individuals

would exhibit poorer control than non-neurotic individuals, potentially irrespective of trial

type.

Method

Participants and General Procedures

Power calculation software revealed that sample sizes of 113 would give us ample

(.90) power to detect correlations as well as interactions in the medium effect size (.30) range.

Because we sought this degree of power, we ran all of the studies for lengths of time that had

yielded similar sample sizes in previous research within the lab. All studies were approved by

our institutional IRB.

In Study 1, we recruited 150 undergraduates from a northern Midwestern university,

who received psychology course credit. Demographics were not collected in this study, but

the participant pool tends to be 90% Caucasian, 60% female, and of traditional college age.

Participants arrived to the laboratory in groups of 6 or fewer and completed the remainder of

the study in private computer rooms, on personal computers.

Neuroticism Assessment

Neuroticism was assessed with a broad-bandwidth scale from Goldberg (1999) that

converges highly with BFI and NEO versions of neuroticism (John & Srivastava, 1999) and

maximizes correlations with neuroticism factor markers (Goldberg, 1999). Participants were

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 asked to indicate how well a series of 10 neuroticism-related statements (e.g., “am easily

disturbed”, “get stressed out easily”) describe the self (1 = very inaccurate; 5 = very accurate)
Accepted Article
and an average score was computed (M = 2.80; SD = 0.81; α = .89). For comparison

purposes, we also assessed the emotion-related (Watson, 2000, chap. 6) Big 5 traits of

extraversion (M = 3.38; SD = 0.81; α = .91) and agreeableness (M = 3.98; SD = 0.66; α =

.86).

Continuous Tracking Task

We designed a continuous tracking task to assess micro-momentary lapses of control.

Participants were asked to use a Saitek Aviator model joystick to track a visual target as

carefully and accurately as possible, using their dominant hands. The task was programmed

with E-Prime software, which used a 32-bit version of Windows XP, and the monitor, which

had a screen height of 13.65 inches, was set to a resolution of 1600 by 1200.

In the first study, we programmed 8 long, 30-second trials. Each trial began with a

visible joystick cursor (a white + sign), which was displayed at center screen. 500 ms later, a

target (also a white + sign) appeared, displaced to the left or right by 25%. Participants

moved the joystick cursor to the target (average latency = 2211 ms), which turned yellow

when the cursor was within 5 pixels both horizontally and vertically. At this point, the target

started moving further away from center screen, in a strait horizontal line, at the constant rate

of 300 pixels per second. Participants were instructed to track the target as well as possible

throughout the trial. Targets turned around when they reached the edge of the screen (which

happened 6 times), but these reversals were entirely predictable.

To study performance in a nearly continuous manner, we sampled joystick and target

position every 100 ms. To study the possible impact of emotional stimulation, we presented

80 dB white noise sounds, continuously, during the course of 4 of the trials, selected at

random. These sounds were both unpleasant and arousing (Bushman & Anderson, 1998).

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 Results

For every sample of every trial, the Pythagorean theorem was used to calculate the
Accepted Article
distance between target position and joystick position. Because these distances were

positively skewed, we replaced distances longer than 200 pixels with this value, which

replaced 1.38% of the observations (Robinson, 2007). We then computed 2 means per

participant – one for silent trials and one for trials on which aversive noise had been present.

A repeated-measures ANOVA revealed that performance was somewhat better when noise

was present (M = 41.96 pixels) than not (M = 43.45), F(1, 149) = 6.27, p = .013, ηp2 = .04,

possibly because the constant noise helped participants maintain alertness during the long

trials.

A second, GLM-based analysis added neuroticism as an additional z-scored predictor,

a procedure that should be used when looking at potential interactions between continuous

personality variables and experimental manipulations (Robinson, 2007). The results revealed

main effects for Neuroticism, F(1, 148) = 6.73, p = .010, ηp2 = .04, and Noise Condition, F(1,

148) = 6.23, p = .010, ηp2 = .04, but there was no Neuroticism by Noise Condition interaction,

F < 1. Estimated means for the neuroticism main effect (Aiken & West, 1991) revealed that

performance was markedly worse when neuroticism was high (+1 SD: 45.60) relative to low

(-1 SD: 39.72). Also, additional analyses revealed that there were no comparable effects for

extraversion or agreeableness, all personality-related ps > .20. Thus, neuroticism was unique

from a personality-processing perspective.

To further examine the generality of the neuroticism-related results, we computed

performance means for the first two trials of each type (e.g., noise) versus the second two

trials of each type, and added this trial variable as an additional predictor. If the neuroticism-

related results are due to performance anxiety, they might be more apparent during earlier

trials. If they are due to fatigue, they might be more apparent during later trials. If, by

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 contrast, they reflect stable tendencies toward instability, the trial-related factor should not

matter. There was a main effect for the Trial variable (Ms = 44.58 & 41.57 for earlier & later
Accepted Article
trials), F(1, 148) = 18.53, p < .001, ηp2 = .11, but interactions between neuroticism and this

trial variable were not significant, ps > .20. Accordingly, high-neuroticism individuals were

consistently worse on the task, regardless of trial order or aversive stimulation. The

consistency of these individual differences can be underlined in one final way: Cronbach’s α

across the 8 trials of the task was .96, indicating robust tendencies toward noisy performance

versus not.

Discussion

Study 1 used a task in which we could assess nearly continuous variations in

performance. Through the use of such procedures, we could catch micro-momentary lapses of

control, which would show up in terms of greater distance from a tracked target. At this level

of temporal resolution, we were able to show that neurotic people display difficulties

consistent with the mental noise hypothesis (Robinson & Tamir, 2005). The phenomenon did

not interact with aversive stimulation and it was neither more nor less apparent on earlier

trials, arguing against factors like evaluation apprehension (which would be more prevalent

on early trials) or fatigue (which would be more prevalent on later trials). The results

therefore highlight somewhat chronic difficulties in control that are apparent with a fine

temporal resolution.

Study 2

Despite the success of the first study, there were some ambiguities that led to an

altered Study 2 paradigm. In Study 1, participants used a joystick to track targets, but the

vagaries of this device (e.g., springs that sought to return to center screen), as well as

differing degrees of familiarity with joysticks, could have affected performance. Study 2

therefore switched to a regular computer mouse, which everyone should be familiar with. In

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 addition, the trials of Study 1 were long and the length of the trials could have encouraged a

greater degree of mind-wandering than might otherwise have been the case (Steinborn et al.,
Accepted Article
2016). Such time-on-task factors are not emphasized by the mental noise hypothesis

(Robinson & Tamir, 2005) and we therefore switched to shorter, but more plentiful, trials in

Study 2.

Of further importance, we changed the aversive stimulation procedures such that

aversive events would most likely disrupt rather than facilitate performance. We did this by

issuing white noise blasts for shorter periods of time, in a somewhat unpredictable manner.

This form of stimulation is both stressful and startling (Glass & Singer, 1972) and it should

reasonably destabilize ongoing performance (Westman & Walters, 1981). An important

question was whether this would be particularly true at higher levels of neuroticism, which

would be consistent with a threat-reactivity perspective of this trait.

Method

Participants and General Procedures

The Study 2 sample consisted of 185 (75.14% female 89.75% Caucasian; M age =

18.92) undergraduates seeking course credit for their psychology classes. They completed the

motor tracking task prior to reporting on their neuroticism levels and did so within private

computer rooms in groups of 6 or fewer. Neuroticism was assessed with the same Goldberg

(1999) scale administered in Study 1 (M = 3.02; SD = 0.82; α = .89).

Continuous Tracking Task

We designed a tracking task that would assess motor control performance before,

during, and after aversive noise blasts. The computers and programming platform were

identical to Study 1. However, participants were asked to track moving targets using a

familiar desktop mouse rather than the less familiar joystick used in the first study.

This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

 Participants were told to track moving targets as well as possible, despite occasional sound

blasts over headphones.

Accepted Article
Each trial began with a visual mouse cursor at center screen. 500 ms later, a target

appeared, either 25% leftward or rightward from the cursor. Participants started the trial by

moving the mouse cursor to the target (average duration = 966 ms), which then turned yellow

and started moving toward the center of the screen at the rate of 160 pixels per second.

Participants tracked each target for 8000 ms and then returned to center screen. There was

then a 500 ms blank delay before the next trial began.

The task included 60 trials. On 30 of them, the computer blasted the participant with

irritating 90 dB white noise for 200 ms. The aversive-ness of the event was further increased

by varying its timing such that it could occur at 1 of 10 different time intervals subsequent to

the start of the trial (from 1.5 seconds to 6.5 seconds), determined at random. For comparison

purposes, another 30 trials involved a silent “event” with the same timing parameters. The

two conditions were assigned to trial number in a randomized order.

To determine whether aversive sounds disrupted tracking, we defined performance

with respect to three time intervals. We sampled mouse and target position every 100 ms for

5 samples prior to the trial event (either noise or silence), for 7 samples after event offset, and

for 6 samples thereafter. We will refer to these intervals in terms of baseline, reactivity, and

recovery phases of trial performance.

Results

The Pythagorean theorem was used to calculate sample-specific distances between

mouse and target position. As in Study 1, these distances were positively skewed. We

therefore began by replacing 1.50% of the distances with this outlier value (230). The

distances remained positively skewed and we therefore log-transformed them for analysis

purposes, though pixel-based means were also computed for presentation purposes

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 (Robinson, 2007). We computed 6 sets of means, which corresponded with the 2 (sound) by 3

(trial phase) within-subject design.

Accepted Article
The initial 2 by 3 ANOVA focused on normative trends within the dataset. There was

a main effect for Sound, F(1, 184) = 44.64, p < .001, ηp2 = .19, such that performance was

worse on trials with aversive noise (M = 21.72), relative to silence (M = 20.74). There was

also a main effect for Trial Phase, F(2, 368) = 86.10, p < .001, ηp2 = .32, which displayed the

expected curvilinear pattern (baseline = 20.37; reactivity = 23.74; recovery = 21.29). These

main effects, though, were qualified by a Sound by Trial Phase interaction, F(2, 368) = 94.20,

p < .001, ηp2 = .33. As shown in the top panel of Figure 1, participants exhibited pronounced

reactivity to the aversive noise blasts, but later recovered from them to some extent.

In a second, GLM-based analysis, we added neuroticism as an additional z-scored

predictor, which should be done with designs of the present type (Robinson, 2007). In this

presentation, we will omit normative effects, which were parallel to those discussed above. In

a replication of Study 1, there was a main effect for Neuroticism, F(1, 183) = 6.31, p = .013,

ηp2 = .03. Estimated means revealed that performance was worse when neuroticism was high

(+1 SD: 24.06) relative to low (-1 SD: 19.56). Neuroticism, though, did not interact with

Sound, F(1, 183) = 2.25, p = .135, ηp2 = .01, or Trial Phase, F(2, 366) = 1.96, p = .142, ηp2 =

.01, and there was no 3-way interaction, F < 1. Thus, the destabilizing effects of aversive

noise were comparable across neuroticism levels and the main effect for neuroticism

implicated more general processes.

To gain further insight into the effects of neuroticism, we contrasted performance on

the first 15 trials of each type (noise or silence) versus the second 15 trials. The addition of

this trial variable can reveal whether neuroticism effects were more pronounced earlier on,

perhaps due to performance anxiety, or later, perhaps due to fatigue. In this four-predictor

GLM, there was a main effect for Trial, F(1, 183) = 16.81, p < .001, ηp2 = .08, such that

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 performance got worse as the task progressed (Ms = 19.76 & 22.63 for earlier & later trials).

However, there were no interactions that involved both neuroticism and the trial factor, all ps
Accepted Article
> .20. These results again point to the generality of the neuroticism-related performance

costs. Of further note, individual differences were very reliable across the 60 trials of the task

(α = .97).

Discussion

The Study 2 procedures were different than the Study 1 procedures in several notable

respects. Participants were able to use a mouse rather than a joystick to track moving targets

and performance was better with this tracking device. In addition, the trials were fairly short,

which should minimize losses of attention that occur when sustained attention is required

(Sanders, 1998, chap. 9). Despite these changes, we were able to replicate the main effect for

neuroticism found in Study 1: Neurotic individuals, relative to those who tend to be more

stable and unperturbed (Watson & Clark, 1984), displayed noisier tracking performance even

when trials were short and the task was comparatively easy.

Study 2 also allowed us to contrast the mental noise hypothesis with threat-reactivity

views of neuroticism in a more effective manner. Aversive stimulation that was brief, intense,

and unpredictable (Westman & Walters, 1981) disrupted tracking performance in a relatively

pronounced way. Even so, this threat-reactivity effect was equal in magnitude at higher

versus lower levels of neuroticism, as reflected in the lack of a neuroticism by sound by trial

phase interaction. Or, expressed in other terms, the neuroticism effect was evident on all trials

rather than only some of them and was evident before as well as after the occurrence of

aversive stimulation. These findings are consistent with the mental noise hypothesis.

Study 3

The Study 2 procedures were relatively effective in contrasting mental noise versus

threat-reactivity perspectives of neuroticism. Because this was true, and because direct

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 replication has been increasingly favored by the literature, we sought to more or less directly

replicate the findings of Study 2 in a third study.

Accepted Article
Method

Participants and Procedures

Unless otherwise noted, the procedures for Study 3 were identical to Study 2. In Study

3, we recruited 121 (46.60% female; 88.70% Caucasian; M age = 19.36) undergraduates

seeking (and receiving) course credit. Participants completed a continuous tracking task and

then reported on their neuroticism levels (M = 2.87; SD = 0.86; α = .92).

The tracking task was identical to Study 2 except that there were 40 rather than 60

trials and each lasted 5 seconds. On 20 of the trials, there was an aversive noise blast that

occurred 1, 2, 3, or 4 seconds after the start of the trial. There was no such blast on the

remaining 20 trials, though the computer program did log a silent “event” for comparison

purposes. Each participant received a different randomized order of the two conditions.

To study the influence of the noise blasts, we quantified performance with respect to

three time intervals. The baseline period consisted of 5 samples immediately preceding event

onset (either noise or silence). The reactivity period consisted of 7 samples after event offset.

And the recovery period consisted of the 6 samples following the reactivity period.

Results

Distances were positively skewed. We therefore replaced 0.97% of the high outliers

with this value (100). Because the distance distributions were still skewed, we log-

transformed them (Robinson, 2007). Analyses will be conducted on the log-transformed

values, but means and estimated means will be reported in their original pixel-based units.

An initial 2 (sound) by 3 (trial phase) ANOVA focused on normative patterns. As in

Study 2, there were main effects for Sound (silence M = 14.96; noise M = 17.64), F(1, 120) =

51.86, p < .001, ηp2 = .30, and Trial Phase (baseline M = 15.85; reactivity M = 17.29;

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 recovery M = 16.15), F(2, 240) = 9.43, p < .001, ηp2 = .07, that were qualified by a Sound by

Trial Phase interaction, F(2, 240) = 32.17, p < .001, ηp2 = .21. As shown in the bottom panel
Accepted Article
of Figure 1, aversive noise blasts disrupted performance, which then recovered to a certain

extent.

The next, GLM-based analysis added neuroticism as a z-scored predictor (Robinson,

2007). In a direct replication of Study 2, there was again a main effect for Neuroticism, F(1,

119) = 5.53, p = .023, ηp2 = .04: Continuous tracking performance suffered at higher (+1 SD:

17.73), relative to lower (-1 SD: 14.91), levels of this trait. Such neuroticism-linked

decrements in performance did not interact with Sound, F < 1, or Trial Phase, F(2, 238) =

1.81, p = .165, ηp2 = .02, nor was there a 3-way interaction, F < 1. Accordingly, individuals

high in neuroticism exhibited difficulties with the task that were orthogonal to the effects of

emotional reactivity.

As in Study 2, we then added another factor that distinguished performance on the

first 10 trials of each type (either noise or silence) versus the second 10 trials of each type.

There was no main effect for Trial, F(1, 119) = 2.24, p = .137, ηp2 = .02, and 2- and 3-way

interactions involving neuroticism and trial were also non-significant, Fs < 1. There was,

however, a 4-way interaction, F(2, 238) = 3.08, p = .048, ηp2 = .03. An inspection of the

pattern suggested that high-neuroticism individuals exhibited delayed recovery during the

earlier trials of the task, but not the later trials. Regardless, performance was worse at higher

levels of neuroticism for all 12 of the cells defined by the trial by sound by trial phase within-

subject design (all estimated mean difference scores > 1.5). We therefore conclude that the

neuroticism-related main effect is a robust one. As a final note, the reliability of performance

across the 40 trials of the task was .96. This figure indicates that individual differences in

performance were very consistent.

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 Discussion

The main purpose of Study 3 was to replicate Study 2. Though linked to a modest
Accepted Article
effect size, we again found that higher levels of neuroticism were problematic to performance

within a continuous tracking task. The introduction of sudden and intense sound also

disrupted performance, but this emotional reactivity effect was equivalent at higher versus

lower levels of neuroticism, as defined by the lack of a neuroticism by sound by trial phase

interaction. Accordingly, the link between neuroticism and continuous performance appears

to be a general one rather than one that is dependent on aversive stimulation or particular

phases of a trial.

Study 4

Although neuroticism by sound interactions were not found in Studies 1-3, one could

still argue that the presence of aversive sounds on some of the trials placed neurotic

individuals into a defensive mode of operation that undermined their performance in task-

general terms. To speak to this issue, we simply removed any aversive stimulation from the

tracking task of Study 4. If neuroticism is linked to poorer control somewhat irrespective of

the circumstances, we should be able to replicate a main effect for neuroticism even in such a

context.

In Study 4, we also sought to extend the scope of the analysis. If we are correct,

mental noise can essentially serve as an implicit measure of personality (Robinson &

Wilkowski, 2015). What we mean here is that regardless of whether tracking performance

correlates with explicit variations in neuroticism or not, variations in mental noise – as

assessed by the tracking task – should have some capacity to predict the sorts of states that

one is susceptible to in daily life (Robinson & Wilkowski, 2015). To speak to predictions of

this type, we joined the assessment procedures of the laboratory with a subsequent daily diary

protocol (Bolger, Davis, & Rafaeli, 2003) and hypothesized that poorer performance in the

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 laboratory tracking task would be linked to higher averages (or intercepts) for daily

experiences of negative affect. We also examined whether this relationship would depend on
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the occurrence of daily stressors. Based on the findings of Studies 2 and 3, no such stress-

contingency was hypothesized.

Method

Participants and General Procedures

Calculating power for daily diary designs is not straightforward. Nonetheless, we

sought to meet, and slightly exceed, recommendations that have been made in the multilevel

modeling (MLM) literature (e.g., Scherbaum & Ferreter, 2009). Accordingly, we collected

data from slightly over 100 people in the laboratory and the number of daily observations was

1035, which meets recommended numbers (Scherbaum & Ferreter, 2009).

In more specific terms, potential participants were told that the study consisted of two

parts – an initial laboratory session followed by 2 weeks of daily diary reports. We ran the

laboratory portion of the protocol for long enough to collect tracking data from 103

undergraduates. We also collected personality data from 70 of these participants, and thus

potential links with personality were considered a secondary focus for the study. Of the 103

participants who completed the tracking task, 85 (47.96% female; 85.42% Caucasian; M age

= 19.47) completed at least 9 daily reports, which was an a priori criterion for inclusion (the

excluded participants fell considerably short of this standard). Within the laboratory session,

the tracking task was administered prior to the personality questionnaire.

Continuous Tracking Task

Because neuroticism main effects do not seem to depend on the presence of aversive

stimulation, we omitted such stimulation from the Study 4 paradigm. That is, participants

simply tracked moving targets, continuously, as well as they could. Each of the 24 trials

began with a mouse cursor (a white + sign) at center screen. The assessment portion of the

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 trial started after participants moved the cursor to the target (also a + sign) for the trial

(average latency = 918 ms), which then turned yellow and began moving at the rate of 160
Accepted Article
pixels/second. During the 8-second trial, the target moved across the screen and participants

tracked it. Subsequently, participants were asked to return to center screen; after 500 ms, the

next trial started. Mouse and target position were sampled every 100 ms, which resulted in 80

samples per trial.

Personality Assessment

Seventy participants completed Goldberg’s (1999) Big 5 inventory, which had

separable 10-item scales for neuroticism (M = 2.64; SD = 0.79; α = .87), extraversion (M =

3.45; SD = 0.84; α = .89), agreeableness (M = 4.02; SD = 0.55; α = .86), conscientiousness

(M = 3.54; SD = 0.70; α = .90), and openness to experience (M = 3.63; SD = 0.57; α = .85).

Daily Protocol

Subsequent to the laboratory portion of the study, participants were asked to complete

14 days of a daily diary protocol. On each of these days, we sent participants an email

reminder with their participant numbers and a link to the Qualtrics-programmed

questionnaire. Participants were told to complete each report after 5 p.m. (so that the report

captured their daily experiences) and prior to 9 a.m. the next morning (so that retrospection

would be minimized). Reports not received within this time frame were considered missing.

Eighty-five participants completed at least 9 of the 14 reports (M = 12. 14) and were therefore

included in relevant analyses.

The key question was whether we could predict daily experiences of negative emotion

from tracking performance in the laboratory. To speak to this question, we asked participants

to report on their daily experiences of two negative affect markers (“distressed” & “nervous”)

from the PANAS (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988). Participants indicated how strongly

they experienced each feeling on each day (1 = not at all; 5 = extremely) and we averaged

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 across the two markers (M = 1.90; SD = 0.85; α = .63, with day as the unit of analysis). For

comparison purposes, we also asked participants to report on their daily experience of

Accepted Article
positive affect, again using two markers (“excited” & “enthusiastic”) from the PANAS (M =

3.09; SD = 1.08; α = .70). Finally, to examine whether possible relationships with negative

affect were stress-contingent, we asked about the occurrence (1 = not a single time; 4 = more

than two times) of four common stressors (e.g., “had a lot of responsibilities”, “too many

things to do at once”). The latter scale has demonstrated validity in daily diary studies (e.g.,

Klein, Liu, Diehl, & Robinson, 2017) and we averaged across items (M = 1.77; SD = 0.71; α

= .82).

Results

Distances from target, in the continuous tracking task, were computed using the

Pythagorean theorem. Because these distances were positively skewed, we replaced 1.19% of

the longer distances with this cutoff value (150). The distances still displayed some positive

skew and we therefore log-transformed them (Robinson, 2007). Momentary tracking

performance was based on an average of 1920 samples.

GLM analyses were used to examine possible relationships between the Big 5

personality traits and continuous tracking means. In the most pertinent GLM, there was a

main effect for Neuroticism, F(1, 69) = 6.48, p = .013, ηp2 = .09, such that performance was

worse at high (+1 SD: 19.43) relative to low (-1 SD: 15.47) levels of this personality

continuum. By contrast, there were no personality-related main effects for Extraversion, F <

1, Conscientiousness, F < 1, Openness, F < 1, or Agreeableness, F(1, 69) = 2.52, p = .117,

ηp2 = .04. Indeed, in a multiple regression, neuroticism was a significant predictor of

continuous tracking issues, t = 2.36, p = .022, β = .31, but the remainder of the Big 5 traits did

not share a relationship with the tracking measure, ps > .15. These data highlight the special

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 role that neuroticism-related traits seem to play in disrupting momentary forms of attention

and performance.
Accepted Article
We next turned to the daily diary data, which were analyzed using the multilevel

(MLM) modeling procedures recommended by Singer (1998). In these models, the level 2

predictor (tracking performance) was z-scored, the level 1 predictor (daily stress) was person-

centered, and the daily outcomes (affect) retained their original units. In the model of central

interest, daily NA levels were higher among participants exhibiting poor tracking

performance, b = .127, t = 2.45, p = .017. By contrast, tracking performance did not predict

daily PA levels, b = .003, t = 0.05, p = .963. Thus, there was specificity to these relationships.

A subsequent model sought to determine whether there was any stress-contingency to

the relationship between tracking performance and daily NA levels. In this cross-level model,

the tracking/NA relationship remained significant, b = .127, t = 2.44, p = .017. In addition,

NA levels increased when daily stressors occurred, b = .149, t = 4.85, p < .001. There was no

cross-level interaction, however, b = -.024, t = -0.83, p = .410, meaning that poor trackers

were prone to daily NA regardless of whether particular days were stressful or not. These

findings complement those of Studies 1-3, which similarly showed that neuroticism predicted

tracking performance in both stressful (aversive noise) and non-stressful (silence)

circumstances.

Discussion

Several of the findings from Study 4 can be highlighted. Neuroticism predicted

tracking performance even in the absence of any stressors within the task. Thus, the

relationship between neuroticism and mental noise (as we have assessed it) appears to be a

general one. Moreover, this relationship was unique in that other members of the Big 5 were

not similarly associated with deficits in momentary performance. What we particularly

highlight, though, is that people prone to poor tracking performance were also prone to

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 negative emotional experiences in their daily lives. This relationship was not stress-

contingent and tracking performance did not predict positive affect levels. Lapses of
Accepted Article
momentary control therefore seem to share a special relationship with states of distress, a

central component of negative affectivity (Watson & Clark, 1984).

General Discussion

Neuroticism is associated with a number of variables that would seem to implicate

deficient control. Perhaps not surprisingly, neurotic people report that they have greater

difficulties in controlling their emotions as well as in controlling their behaviors when

experiencing strong emotion (John & Gross, 2007). Such apparent difficulties are not limited

to emotion, however. Neurotic individuals report greater difficulties suppressing unwanted

thoughts (Munoz, Sliwinski, Smyth, Almeida, & King, 2013) and in controlling their

attention in a top-down, intentional manner (Derryberry & Rothbart, 1988). Perhaps as a

consequence of such difficulties, neurotic people complain that they are prone to cognitive

failures (Flehmig, Steinborn, Langner, & Westhoff, 2007) and they report less mindfulness in

their daily activities (Fetterman et al., 2010). Although such correlates are self-reported in

nature, and one has to be dubious concerning self-reports of cognition, all of these findings

seem to converge in suggesting that neuroticism is a dimension of personality that relates to

the effectiveness of mental or behavioral control.

When one examines the personality-performance literature, though, one does not find

consistent effects for neuroticism. For example, neuroticism is not a good predictor of

intellectual test performance (Chamorro-Premuzic, Moutafi, & Furnham, 2005) or of job

performance (Perkins & Corr, 2005) in main effect terms. A possible reason for such null

findings is that people with high levels of neuroticism can compensate for their mental noise

(Robinson & Tamir, 2005) or inefficiency (Eysenck & Calvo, 1992) with higher levels of

effort, in effect eliminating possible performance deficits when the task tolerates brief

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 attentional or control lapses (Eysenck et al., 2007). These speculations are plausible because

the emotional features of anxiety can motivate the person to try harder even while the
Accepted Article
cognitive features of anxiety interfere with on-task monitoring (Bresin et al., 2011; Sarason,

1984).

To test these ideas would seem to require a task in which momentary lapses of

attention or control cannot be rectified through spurts of on-task activity. The continuous

tracking task seemed ideally suited to solve such problems. The target for the task moved

and, therefore, participants had to continuously monitor the target as well as their own

position in order to do well. We sampled position 10 times a second and therefore any brief

attentional lapses, or variations in control, would likely show up as increased momentary

distances. And, because the task is such a simple one, performance in it should not necessary

benefit from extra effort.

In this context, we consistently observed relationships between neuroticism and

performance and these relationships were quite robust. They were equally present on early

trials and late trials, which could shift one’s task state from anxiety to fatigue (Hockey,

1997). They were also equally present on long trials and short trials and within both aversive

and non-aversive sound conditions (Glass & Singer, 1972). Indeed, a close analysis of the

latter time course revealed that neuroticism-linked deficits were apparent before, during, and

after aversive noise bursts, as reflected in a main effect for neuroticism that did not depend on

the sound by trial phase interaction that defined a reactivity effect (see Figure 1). It was also

the case that the neuroticism-performance relationship was observed whether participants

used a joystick controller or a mouse and the relationship was a unique one in that there were

no parallel effects for other Big 5 traits (Studies 1 & 4). Thus, a task with excellent temporal

resolution appears to possess considerable value in documenting the sorts of lapses and slips

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 thought to be somewhat endemic to neurotic forms of self-regulation (Flehmig et al., 2007;

Robinson, in press).
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The results were not limited to such relationships, however. In Study 4, we were also

able to show that variations in mental and behavioral control possess value in predicting the

sorts of emotions or feelings that an individual is likely to experience in the upcoming weeks.

Specifically, poor controllers were vulnerable to states of negative affect in their daily lives,

irrespective of their levels of trait neuroticism. Thus, and even though the continuous tracking

task would seem to be a relatively neutral one, with few direct implications for emotional

experience, individuals whose attention exhibited greater variability during the task were

more vulnerable to distress as they went about their lives. This was true regardless of whether

particular days were stressful or not and the findings therefore offer positive support for the

idea that even brief lapses of attention or control can reflect the sorts of processes that give

rise to longer-term affective consequences (Carriere, Cheyne, & Smilek, 2008).

Questions, Implications, Limitations, and Future Directions

The continuous tracking task was designed to assess brief, micro-momentary

disconnections between the mind and its control of the external environment. These

disconnections will be due to attentional lapses and to variations in attention across time as

attention plays a key, if not the key, role in the regulation of motor behavior (Lohse, Jones,

Healy, & Sherwood, 2014). At the same time, the task should not be viewed as a vigilance

task because these sorts of tasks typically require individuals to maintain alertness across

fairly long periods of time in order to respond to infrequent target events (Sanders, 1998,

chap. 9). By contrast, the continuous tracking task requires constant behavioral adjustments

that operate over much shorter periods of time (e.g., less than 10 seconds in Studies 2 and 3).

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 Although the continuous tracking task requires constant attention and control, it is still

an easy task – one merely needs to follow a clearly visible target as it moves across the
Accepted Article
screen. While doing so, the person is not asked to inhibit dominant responses, to switch task

sets, or to move information in and out of working memory. Accordingly, the task is

structurally distinct from executive function tasks (Miyake & Friedman, 2012), though the

individual will still need to control internal forms of distraction (e.g., mind-wandering or

rumination) in the service of good performance. From this perspective, the continuous

tracking task could be considered a sort of mindfulness task in that doing well on it mostly

requires intention, attention, and awareness concerning a simple activity (Jazaieri & Shapiro,

2017).

Having discussed the nature of the task, we should also briefly discuss the sound-

related results of Studies 2 and 3. Prominent theories of emotion suggest that emotional

reactions can co-opt the systems responsible for behavior (Frijda, 2010). Consistent with this

idea, we found that sudden, intense, and aversive noise blasts disrupted performance on the

continuous tracking task and this disruption effect lasted for about a second, which is

compatible with the time course of fear or startle (Lang, 1995). This reactivity effect was

equivalent across levels of neuroticism, but could vary by other factors that implicate the fear

system in more particular terms. For example, there is some evidence that startle reactions are

less pronounced in psychopathy (Lang, 1995) and probes of the Study 2 sort could be

recruited to examine hypotheses of this type.

The primary purpose of the studies, though, was to support noise- or efficiency-based

views of neuroticism. Such views contend that the neurotic mind is a noisier, more chaotic

one that is prone to slips of attention and control (Flehmig et al., 2007). Neurotic people may

be able to compensate for such issues through extra effort (Eysenck et al., 2007) when they

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 are “present” (Fetterman et al., 2010), but glitches and errors will occur over shorter time

scales. The current findings, we think, offer some of the best available evidence for such
Accepted Article
ideas.

The findings do not rule out punishment-sensitivity views of neuroticism, though.

Although neuroticism did not modulate reactivity to aversive events in Studies 2 and 3, those

aversive events could be viewed as primitive or unconditioned stressors that should be

disruptive to nearly everyone (Westman & Walters, 1981). Had the aversive events

implicated the ego to a greater extent, interactions with neuroticism might have been found.

Consistent with this idea, the mind-wandering linked to neuroticism tends to be self-relevant

in nature (Perkins et al., 2015) and it often takes the form of rumination, worry, or self-

criticism (Suls & Martin, 2005). It is possible to manipulate processes of this type (e.g.,

Watkins & Teasdale, 2001) and such conditions could amplify the neuroticism-related

deficits that we identified in the current studies.

Similarly, it would be useful to measure task-related states during or immediately

after continuous tracking performance. Building on earlier research (e.g., Sarason, 1984),

Matthews et al. (2002) compiled a large set of items to measure the motivational, cognitive,

and emotional states that can occur when individuals are trying to accomplish a task. A factor

analysis of these measures revealed that they can be parsimoniously described in terms of

task engagement, distress, and worry. There are reasons for thinking that worry should be

problematic for performance (Sarason, 1984) and it is reasonable to expect disengagement to

be problematic as well (Matthews et al., 2002). It is further possible that states of this type

might mediate the association between neuroticism and continuous tracking performance,

though our analyses did suggest some degree of state-independence (e.g., similar

relationships for early vs. late trials).

This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

 It would also be worthwhile to examine relationships between continuous tracking

performance and operations of the default mode network (DMN). The DMN, which includes
Accepted Article
brain regions such as the lateral parietal cortex, the medial prefrontal cortex, and the anterior

cingulate cortex, has been implicated in mind-wandering (Schooler et al., 2011) as well as

symptoms of anxiety and depression (Coutinho et al., 2016). Our behavioral task might have

value in tracking DMN activity, though one would have to establish systematic links of this

type prior to conducting further research along these lines.

Conclusions

Robinson and Tamir (2005) proposed that neuroticism varies positively with mental

noise, which should affect performance under some circumstances. Although Robinson and

Tamir (2005) were able to show that neurotic people exhibited greater reaction time

variability, the temporal resolution of the tasks was insufficient for demonstrating

performance deficits. The present studies sought to rectify such problems through the use of a

continuous tracking task – one in which even short-duration lapses in control would be

evident. Across four studies, positive relationships between neuroticism and performance

deficits were observed, and these findings were not dependent on punishment-sensitivity

processes. The findings, more so than previous studies, link neuroticism to basic deficits in

momentary self-regulation.

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 Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,
Accepted Article
authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

No funding to report

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 Figure 1
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Reactivity to Aversive Noise Blasts, Studies 2 (Top Panel) and 3 (Bottom Panel)

30
Distance from Target (Pixels)

25

20
Silence
Noise
15

10
Baseline Reactivity Recovery
Trial Phase

22
Distance from Target (Pixels)

19

16
Silence
Noise
13

10
Baseline Reactivity Recovery
Trial Phase

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