Uncovering the structure of self-regulation through data-driven ontology discovery

TLDR

Psychological science has identified many cognitive processes but struggles to build cumulative knowledge because siloed traditions and a focus on explanation over prediction hinder the study of complex constructs such as self‑regulation. The study aims to derive a psychological ontology of self‑regulation by examining individual differences across behavioral tasks, self‑report surveys, and real‑world outcomes. Using a data‑driven approach, the authors construct the ontology from a broad set of behavioral tasks, surveys, and self‑reported outcomes related to self‑regulation. The ontology reveals that tasks and surveys are largely unrelated, that within each domain reliable traits emerge, that surveys modestly predict real‑world outcomes while tasks do not, and that self‑regulation lacks coherence, suggesting data‑driven ontologies are essential for cumulative science.

Abstract

Abstract Psychological sciences have identified a wealth of cognitive processes and behavioral phenomena, yet struggle to produce cumulative knowledge. Progress is hamstrung by siloed scientific traditions and a focus on explanation over prediction, two issues that are particularly damaging for the study of multifaceted constructs like self-regulation. Here, we derive a psychological ontology from a study of individual differences across a broad range of behavioral tasks, self-report surveys, and self-reported real-world outcomes associated with self-regulation. Though both tasks and surveys putatively measure self-regulation, they show little empirical relationship. Within tasks and surveys, however, the ontology identifies reliable individual traits and reveals opportunities for theoretic synthesis. We then evaluate predictive power of the psychological measurements and find that while surveys modestly and heterogeneously predict real-world outcomes, tasks largely do not. We conclude that self-regulation lacks coherence as a construct, and that data-driven ontologies lay the groundwork for a cumulative psychological science.