M.Sc. Kathrin Treittinger

• 10/2023 - current: Doctorate (Dr. phil.), University of Regensburg, topic: "The (in)flexibility of control adaptations", first supervisor: Prof. Dr Gesine Dreisbach
• 10/2021 - 07/2023: Master of Science in Psychology, University of Regensburg, topic: "Flipping Cards Together: A Novel Paradigm to Study the Role of Affect in Interindividual Response Conflict"
• 10/2018 - 08/2021: Bachelor of Science in Psychology, University of Regensburg, Topic: "Follow you, follow me? A new (online) paradigm to study interindividual response conflict"

• 10/2023 - current: PhD student at the Chair of General and Applied Psychology (Prof. Dr Gesine Dreisbach), University of Regensburg
• 10/2022 - 08/2023: Research assistant at the Chair of General and Applied Psychology (Prof. Dr Gesine Dreisbach), University of Regensburg
• 04/2020 - 08/2022: Student assistant at the Chair of Statistics and Risk Management (Prof. Dr Rösch), University of Regensburg

• (In-)flexibility of control adjustments
• Context-specific effects on switch costs
• Affective modulation of cognitive control
• Joint action

• Treittinger, K., Yang, S., Fischer, R., & Dreisbach, G. (accepted). The Asymmetric List Shift Effect - Flexible Adaptation to New Context Demands?. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics.

• Treittinger, K. (2023). Flipping cards together: A novel paradigm to study the role of affect in interindividual response conflict [Unpublished master’s thesis]. University of Regensburg.
• Treittinger, K. (2021). Follow you, follow me? Ein neues (Online-)Paradigma zur Untersuchung interindividueller Antwortkonflikte [Unpublished bachelor’s thesis]. University of Regensburg.

• Treittinger, K.*, Yang, S., Fischer, R., & Dreisbach, G. (2026, March 17). Context-specific proportion switch effects in stable and volatile environments: The selective influence of context change trials [Paper Presentation]. 68th Conference of Experimental Psychologists (TeaP), Tübingen, Germany.
  * chair of a mixed-topic session.
• Treittinger, K., Yang, S., Fischer, R., & Dreisbach, G. (2025, May 26). The asymmetric list shift effect: Selective practice or asymmetric control adaptation? [Poster presentation]. 14th Workshop of General Psychology for Doctoral Students (A-Dok), Aachen, Germany.
• Treittinger, K., Yang, S., Fischer, R., & Dreisbach, G. (2025, March 12). The asymmetric list shift effect: Selective practice or asymmetric control adaptation? [Paper presentation]. 67th Conference of Experimental Psychologists (TeaP), Frankfurt, Germany.
• Treittinger, K., Yang, S., Fischer, R., & Dreisbach, G. (2024, June 14). Insight into: First attempts to replicate the original study by Abrahamse et al. (2013) in a within-participant design [Paper presentation]. 13th Workshop of General Psychology for Doctoral Students (A-Dok), Heidelberg, Germany.

• Treittinger, K. (2026, May 04). Breaking the set: The influence of a sudden context change on control adaptation. Joint Cognitive Control Colloquium of the Universities of Greifswald and Regensburg, Virtual meeting.
• Treittinger, K. (2026, January 12). Context-specific proportion switch effects in stable and volatile environments: The selective influence of context change trials. Joint Cognitive Control Colloquium of the Universities of Greifswald and Regensburg, Virtual meeting.
• Treittinger, K. (2025, June 2). Investigations on the context-specific proportion switch effect. Joint Cognitive Control Colloquium of the Universities of Greifswald and Regensburg, Virtual meeting.
• Treittinger, K. (2024, July 15). The asymmetric list shift effect by Abrahamse et al. (2013) in a within-participant design. Joint Cognitive Control Colloquium of the Universities of Greifswald and Regensburg, Virtual meeting.
• Treittinger, K. (2024, January 30). Insight into: First attempts to replicate the original study by Abrahamse et al. (2013) in a within-participant design. Joint Cognitive Control Colloquium of the Universities of Greifswald and Regensburg, Virtual meeting.

• WS 2025/26: PSY-BSc-M03.1: Experimental Psychology Project Seminar I
• WS 2024/25: PSY-BSc-M19.4: Human-Machine Interaction I

• Bachelor's theses
• Master's theses

Further information on the supervision of theses can be found here.

Adaptive control forms the basis of cognitive and behavioral flexibility. It is sensitive to normal aging and its malfunction is closely related to neurological and psychiatric conditions. In general, human beings have the astonishing ability to flexibly adapt action and thought in response to changing requirements from the environment. At the same time, they can be surprisingly stuck in set, for example when they continue using a formerly successful but no longer adaptive processing strategy. Such stuck-in-set phenomena, originally reported in problem solving tasks (Luchins, 1942) are not restricted to neuropsychological abnormalities like perseveration in frontal lobe patients but have recently also been reported for control strategies in context processing- and response conflict-tasks in healthy individuals (e.g., Abrahamse, Duthoo, Notebaert, & Risko, 2013; Hefer & Dreisbach, 2017). In this research project, we intend to investigate two so far highly neglected phenomena that expose a weakness of the much-vaunted cognitive flexibility: (1) The asymmetrical costs when switching between a shielded and a more relaxed mode of control, which show that it can be harder to let go from a shielding control mode and switch to a more relaxed control mode than vice versa.  And (2) the observation that the flexibility to adapt control to different context demands is further limited by the volatility and frequency of context changes. The importance of adaptive control for cognitive and behavioral flexibility highlights the need for understanding the underlying cognitive mechanisms (e.g., the flexible (dis)engagement of different control states), which may offer fertile grounds for subsequent translational research.

PI - Projekt 1: Prof. Dr. Gesine Dreisbach (University of Regensburg)
Ph.D. student: M.Sc. Kathrin Treittinger (University of Regensburg)

PI - Projekt 2: Prof. Dr. Rico Fischer (University of Greifswald) (external link, opens in a new window)
Ph.D. student: M.A. Shu Yang (University of Greifswald) (external link, opens in a new window)

• German Society of Psychology (DGPs)
• Professional Association of German Psychologists (BDP)

• Orcid