When given the chance to choose between two tasks, one willmore likely choose the easier, less demanding task. Thiseffect has been shown in various domains and referred to asthe law of minimum effort or demand avoidance. Themeasure of demand avoidance that is currently used is theproportion of low-demand choices. We show that the currentmeasure is not appropriate for accurately assessing individualdifferences in demand avoidance, because the process ofdemand selection is contingent upon the process of demanddetection. Subsequently, we suggest a new measure ofdemand avoidance that combines demand detection anddemand selection. We show that the new measure of demandavoidance correlates in the expected direction (i.e.,negatively) with established measures of willingness andability to carry out cognitively demanding tasks. We proposea novel, performance-based measure of cognitive effortavoidance that can be used to enhance the validity of researchin cognition, perception, and neurosciences.

When given the chance to choose between two tasks, one will more likely choose the easier, less demanding task.This effect has been shown in various domains and referred to as the law of minimum effort or demand avoidance. Kooland colleagues (2010, 2013) designed the demand selection task (DST) and showed that most of their participants exhibitedclear demand avoidance. We attempted to replicate and extend their results in a series of three studies. Here we argue thatDST confounds demand detection and demand selection, which weakens its ability to reliably measure demand avoidance indifferent populations. In our first study, most participants did not show reliable demand avoidance and those who showed ithad higher working memory capacity. The following two studies aimed to de-confound the two processes. We define a newmeasure of demand avoidance that affords a more robust estimation of demand avoidance in different populations.