I suggest to read the whole to understand it, but only this part is needed for you: Providing overrides from modules You need then only find the configuration you want to override in runtime, and do it based on the current user role. The field config pattern you are looking for is the following: field.field.entity_type.bundle.field_name The auto_create is under 'settings/handler_settings'. HOW TO FIND AND EXAMINE THE CONFIGS YOU NEED Configs are also entities. They can be feetched with EntityTypeManager. To see what type of entities you have in the system you have the "getDefinitions()" method. Then all you have to do, is to find the right storage (getStorage($config_entity_type)), and then load it by ID. Printing it out with kint, will give you a nice overview how the entity looks like, and how the settings are stored. You can also "drush cex" your configuration. In this case configuration files will be created. The same scheme can be also found here. It gives also a good overview.