How does economic status moderate the effect of scarcity cues on attentional performance?

Matti Vuorre

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How does economic status moderate the effect of scarcity cues on attentional performance?

Matti Vuorre based on reviews by Ernst-Jan de Bruijn and Leon Hilbert

A recommendation of:

STAGE 1

Do Scarcity-Related Cues Affect the Sustained Attentional Performance of the Poor and the Rich Differently?

Peter Szecsi, Miklos Bognar, Barnabas Szaszi https://osf.io/5sdbp version 2

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Abstract

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Submission: posted 18 January 2024
Recommendation: posted 25 June 2024, validated 26 June 2024

Cite this recommendation as:
Vuorre, M. (2024) How does economic status moderate the effect of scarcity cues on attentional performance?. Peer Community in Registered Reports, . https://rr.peercommunityin.org/PCIRegisteredReports/articles/rec?id=672

Recommendation

This Stage 1 registered report by Szecsi et al. (2024) seeks to clarify whether individuals' economic conditions moderate how scarcity cues affect their attentional performance. This idea has been previously explored: Here, the authors aim to clarify understanding of the how scarcity cues affect cognition by studying a large and diverse Hungarian sample with improved experimental methods.

Specifically, while it has been previously reported that financially less well-off individuals' are differentially affected by finance-related stimuli (e.g. Shah et al., 2018), Szecsi et al. (2024) argue that prior studies have used small samples with insufficient consideration of potentially important demographic variables. Therefore, the generalizability of prior studies might be lacking.

Second, Szecsi et al. (2024) aim to conduct a more realistic experiment by asking participants to free-associate in response to financial scarcity-related cues, whereas prior studies have often focused on simply querying for rating responses, which might not sufficiently engage the related cognitive mechanisms that could be most affected.

In the proposed study, then, the authors will rigorously test whether financially less well-off individuals have lower attentional performance while experiencing scarcity-related cues than individuals who are financially better off, and that attentional performance does not differ while experiencing non-scarcity related cues. Ultimately, Szecsi et al. propose to shed light on theories of scarcity-related cognition that posit overall decrements in attentional performance irrespective of individuals' financial status.

The Stage 1 manuscript was initially reviewed by two experts in the area, who both recommended several improvements to the study. The authors then thoroughly revised their write-up and protocol, and the two reviewers were satisfied with the substance of these revisions. Based on these evaluations, the recommender judged that the Stage 1 criteria were met and awarded in-principle acceptance. There were remaining editorial clarifications and suggestions which the authors can incorporate in their eventual Stage 2 report.

URL to the preregistered Stage 1 protocol: https://osf.io/3zdyb

Level of bias control achieved: Level 6. No part of the data or evidence that will be used to answer the research question yet exists and no part will be generated until after IPA.

List of eligible PCI RR-friendly journals:

References

1. Shah, A. K., Zhao, J., Mullainathan, S., & Shafir, E. (2018). Money in the mental lives of the poor. Social Cognition, 36, 4-19. https://doi.org/10.1521/soco.2018.36.1.4

2. Szecsi, P., Bognar, M., & Szaszi, B., (2024). Do Scarcity-Related Cues Affect the Sustained Attentional Performance of the Poor and the Rich Differently? In principle acceptance of Version 2 by Peer Community in Registered Reports. https://osf.io/3zdyb

Conflict of interest:
The recommender in charge of the evaluation of the article and the reviewers declared that they have no conflict of interest (as defined in the code of conduct of PCI) with the authors or with the content of the article.

Reviews

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Reviewed by Ernst-Jan de Bruijn, 07 Jun 2024

The authors have adequately addressed all my previous comments, resulting in a clearly improved protocol. I believe the study is now ready for execution.

The proposed study is well-designed and adequately powered, addressing a significant gap in the scarcity literature. There remain two main risks. First, the experimental manipulation (priming) may not work as intended, as demonstrated in some prior studies. The authors acknowledge this risk, and indeed, this could be a valuable finding in itself. Second, conducting the experiment in an online setting may affect the quality of the responses. Importantly, the authors have incorporated several quality checks to monitor and mitigate this issue.

Given these potential risks, I suggest conducting a pre-test of the experiment using a small sample. This may provide insights into the magnitude of these issues. I'll leave it to the authors to decide whether such a pre-test would be valuable.

Reviewed by Leon Hilbert, 24 Jun 2024

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Evaluation round #1

DOI or URL of the report: https://osf.io/ha4gr

Version of the report: 1

Author's Reply, 24 May 2024

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Decision by Matti Vuorre, posted 07 Mar 2024, validated 07 Mar 2024

Dear authors, thank you for submitting “Scarcity-Related Cues and the Poor’s Cognitive Performance: Stage 1 Registered Report” for evaluation at PCI: RR. I received two reviews from area experts, both of whom recommended several improvements. I am pleased to invite a revision with accompanying responses in which you can address the reviewers’ comments. My decision will depend on how you address each of the reviewers' concerns and suggestions.

I would like to see you pay particular attention to the following points:
1. Ensuring that you have sufficient evidence that your priming manipulation works in eliciting scarcity related cognitions irrespective of any downstream effects those might have on cognitive performance.
2. Better explaining why the sustained attention measure is most appropriate.

In addition, I have some smaller recommendations:
1. I think the term "poor" in the title and elsewhere is not useful; you are examining how poverty index moderates the association, instead of focusing only on individuals low on that index.
2. Consider making the online tasks (SART) and their source code available to readers.
3. Explain the SART scoring in more detail for readers who might not have prior experience with it.
4. Better explain the role of AIC in the analyses; it is not clear if any AIC difference is treated as meaningful and then used in decision-making. On my reading it does not appear to add value above and beyond p < or > .05.

Reviewed by Ernst-Jan de Bruijn, 27 Feb 2024

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Reviewed by Leon Hilbert, 23 Feb 2024

The authors aim to conduct a highly powered study as a RR to test the effect of scarcity related cues in the poor on cognitive performance. Overall, I think the current submission is of high quality and shows very good scientific rigor.

I have some methodological suggestions which I consider relevant, but easy to address (see document attached).

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