Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Individuals experiencing symptoms of anxiety and depression have been shown to exhibit persistent underconfidence. The origin of such metacognitive biases presents a puzzle, given that individuals should be able to learn appropriate levels of confidence from observing their own performance. In two large general population samples (N = 230 and N = 278), we measure both 'local' confidence in individual task instances and 'global' confidence as longer-run self-performance estimates while manipulating external feedback. Global confidence is sensitive to both local confidence and feedback valence-more frequent positive (negative) feedback increases (respectively decreases) global confidence, with asymmetries in feedback also leading to shifts in affective self-beliefs. Notably, however, global confidence exhibits reduced sensitivity to instances of higher local confidence in individuals with greater subclinical anxious-depression symptomatology, despite sensitivity to feedback valence remaining intact. Our finding of blunted sensitivity to increases in local confidence offers a mechanistic basis for how persistent underconfidence is maintained in the face of intact performance.
Source: Nature Communications
Language: English
Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $6,990
Funders: Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, Wellcome Trust, Government of the United Kingdom, UK Research and Innovation, National Institute for Health and Care Research, University College London, Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, HORIZON EUROPE Framework Programme
OpenAlex ID: W4407837907