Nanne Kukkonen

About

 

I am inspired by the challenge of measuring mental activity that we all experience but find surprisingly difficult to define in precise terms. Over the years I have found the beauty of experimental psychology to be its capacity to illuminate  how similar to each other, yet idiosyncratic, we humans can be. While behavioral, neural, and physiological measures can give us information about how people generally are, models are often improved by adding information about the differences between people: what our values are, what motivates us, what our current mood is, and so on.

 

My doctoral research focused on how effort valuation turns into exertion of effort. In general, humans tend to exert more effort when it is worth it, that is, when the reward outweighs the behavioral cost. Our research shows that this isn't always the case – dynamic adjustments of effort might only come about when the reward pertains to multiple shots at a task, rather than a one-off attempt. Additionally, my research ranges from pro-environmental effort to the ways in which the brain supports dynamic effort exertion based on current demands and rewards.

Effort research

 

How does our ability to predict the costs and benefits of effort influence the way we adapt our effort levels? When are people more likely to exert effort for the environment rather than for other outcomes? Click here for a list of articles answering these questions and more.