Schumacher E H, Seymour T L, Glass J M, Fencsik D E, Lauber E J, Kieras D E, Meyer D E
Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute and Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-1650, USA.
Psychol Sci. 2001 Mar;12(2):101-8. doi: 10.1111/1467-9280.00318.
A fundamental issue for psychological science concerns the extent to which people can simultaneously perform two perceptual-motor tasks. Some theorists have hypothesized that such dual-task performance is severely and persistently constrained by a central cognitive "bottle-neck," whereas others have hypothesized that skilled procedural decision making and response selection for two or more tasks can proceed at the same time under adaptive executive control. The three experiments reported here support this latter hypothesis. Their results show that after relatively modest amounts of practice, at least some participants achieve virtually perfect time sharing in the dual-task performance of basic choice reaction tasks. The results also show that observed interference between tasks can be modulated by instructions about differential task priorities and personal preferences for daring (concurrent) or cautious (successive) scheduling of tasks. Given this outcome, future research should investigate exactly when and how such sophisticated skills in dual-task performance are acquired.
心理科学的一个基本问题是人们在多大程度上能够同时执行两项感知运动任务。一些理论家假设，这种双任务表现受到中央认知“瓶颈”的严重且持续的限制，而另一些人则假设，在适应性执行控制下，针对两项或更多任务的熟练程序性决策和反应选择可以同时进行。这里报告的三个实验支持了后一种假设。他们的结果表明，经过相对适度的练习后，至少一些参与者在基本选择反应任务的双任务表现中几乎实现了完美的时间分配。结果还表明，观察到的任务间干扰可以通过关于不同任务优先级的指令以及对大胆（并行）或谨慎（连续）任务安排的个人偏好来调节。鉴于这一结果，未来的研究应该确切调查这种双任务表现中的复杂技能是何时以及如何获得的。
