title: Remember the touch: tactile distractors retrieve previous responses to targets.
abstract: In selection tasks where target stimuli are accompanied by distractors, responses to target stimuli, target stimuli and the distractor stimuli can be encoded together as one episode in memory. Subsequent repetition of any aspect of such an episode can lead to the retrieval of the whole episode including the response. Thus, repeating a distractor can retrieve responses given to previous targets; this mechanism was labeled distractor-response binding and has been evidenced in vision and audition. Yet, previous research suggests possibly different distractor processing in the tactile as compared to the visual modality. In the present study, we therefore used a selection task in which participants always responded to one tactile stimulus while ignoring another. Evidence for the integration of tactile distractors with target responses was found in response times and errors. Our results indicate that binding of responses to distractors is a cognitive process that is independent of the stimulus' modality.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Behaviorial Sciences, Department of Psychology, Saarland University, Campus A2.4, 66123 Saarbrücken, Germany.
authors.forename: Birte
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Moeller
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Frings
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D003463:Cues; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D010812:Physical Stimulation; D011601:Psychophysics; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D013334:Students; D014110:Touch / Q000502:physiology*; D014495:Universities