Affect dynamics or response bias? The relationship between extreme response style and affect dynamics in a controlled...

Area of Science:

• Psychological Science
• Behavioral Research Methods

Background:

• Intensive longitudinal data (ILD) capture momentary affect and dynamics like variability.
• Self-report data in ILD may be influenced by response biases, such as extreme responding.
• The impact of extreme responding on affect dynamics estimates is a growing concern.

Purpose of the Study:

• To experimentally assess the relationship between extreme responding and affect dynamics.
• To investigate how extreme response style traits influence measures of affect variability and temporal dependencies.
• To evaluate the measurement quality of ILD for psychological assessments.

Main Methods:

• A controlled experiment with a large sample (N = 1,398).
• Measurement of extreme responding via background questionnaires.
• Repeated induction of affect using a probabilistic reward task (T = 140 trials per person).

Main Results:

• Individuals with high extreme response style traits exhibited significantly higher affect variability.
• Extreme responding was not associated with moment-to-moment temporal dependencies in affect.
• Extreme responding did not influence participants' reactivity to affective stimuli.

Conclusions:

• Extreme responding inflates measures of affect variability in ILD.
• Measurement evaluation is crucial for accurate psychological assessments using ILD.
• Future research should focus on improving the assessment of affect dynamics in ILD.