Sticky plans: Inhibition and binding during serial-task control.
Recent evidence suggests substantial response-time costs associated with lag-2 repetitions of tasks within explicitly controlled task sequences [Koch, I., Philipp, A. M., Gade, M. (2006). Chunking in task sequences modulates task inhibition. Psychological Science, 17, 346-350; Schneider, D. W. (2007). Task-set inhibition in chunked task sequences. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 14, 970-976], a result that has been interpreted as inhibition of no-longer relevant tasks. Experiments 1-3 confirm much larger lag-2 costs under serial-control than under externally cued conditions, but also show (a) that these costs occur only when sequences contain at least two distinct chunks and (b) that direct lag-2 repetitions are not a necessary condition for their occurrence. This pattern suggests the hypothesis that rather than task-set inhibition, the large lag-2 costs observed in complex sequences, reflect interference resulting from links between positions within a sequential plan and the individual tasks controlled by this plan. The remaining experiments successfully test this hypothesis (Experiment 4), rule out chaining accounts as a potential alternative explanation (Experiment 5), and demonstrate that interference results from information stored in long-term memory rather than working memory (Experiment 6). Implications of these results for an integration of models of serial-order control and serial memory are discussed.
Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403, United States. mayr@uoregon.edu
Ulrich
U
Mayr
D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D003463:Cues; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology*; D012691:Serial Learning / Q000502:physiology*