Willingness or ability? Motivational and cognitive underpinnings of educational attainment in younger adults.

In this study we examined cognitive and motivational underpinnings of educational attainment in younger adults. In particular, we were interested in whether cognitive abilities and / or the willingness to engage in cognitively effortful behaviour differentially predict educational outcomes. To assess cognitive function, we applied a broad range of well-established measures of cognitive abilities as well as a sequential decision-making task that provides a computational proxy for goal-directed learning and decision strategies. To assess inter-individual differences in the willingness to engage in cognitively effortful behavior we used the need for cognition (NFC) questionnaire and two experimental paradigms that assessed the effects of reward sensitivity on cognitive effort expenditure. The results show that 1) Goal-directed decision strategies and NFC are positively associated with university grade point average (GPA) whereas cognitive abilities show no direct relationship to educational outcomes. 2) Goal-directed learning and decision-strategies are positively predicted by cognitive abilities (fluid intelligence and attention) 3.) NFC is also positively predicted by fluid intelligence, and shows a negative association with reward sensitivity. In short, these findings highlight the importance of looking beyond cognitive ability alone to consider how motivational traits and goal-directed learning strategies contribute to educational success.