Kray Jutta, Eber Jutta, Karbach Julia
Department of Psychology, Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany.
Dev Sci. 2008 Mar;11(2):223-36. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2008.00673.x.
This study examined the influence of verbal self-instructions on age differences in task switching. Task-switching ability, measured as the difference between performance in single-task blocks and in mixed-task blocks in which participants switch between two tasks (mixing costs), increases during childhood and decreases in old age. To measure the influence of language on task switching, we compared conditions in which participants either (a) named the next task to be performed (i.e. task-relevant verbalization), (b) verbalized words not related to the task at hand (i.e. task-irrelevant verbalization), or (c) did not verbalize (control condition). Results indicated that mixing costs were substantially reduced under task-relevant verbalization and increased under task-irrelevant verbalization. Moreover, age-related differences in mixing costs were increased when the use of inner speech was disrupted and were reduced when participants performed task-relevant verbalization. These findings suggest that verbal self-instructions are a useful tool for retrieving the next task goal and for reducing action-control deficits in younger children and older adults.
本研究考察了言语自我指令对任务转换中年龄差异的影响。任务转换能力通过单任务块和混合任务块（参与者在两个任务之间进行切换）中的表现差异（混合成本）来衡量，在儿童期会提高，在老年期会下降。为了衡量语言对任务转换的影响，我们比较了以下几种情况：（a）参与者说出下一个要执行的任务（即与任务相关的言语表达）；（b）说出与手头任务无关的词语（即与任务无关的言语表达）；或（c）不进行言语表达（控制条件）。结果表明，在与任务相关的言语表达下，混合成本大幅降低，而在与任务无关的言语表达下则增加。此外，当内部言语的使用受到干扰时，混合成本中与年龄相关的差异会增加，而当参与者进行与任务相关的言语表达时，这种差异会减少。这些发现表明，言语自我指令是一种有用的工具，可用于检索下一个任务目标，并减少年幼儿童和老年人在行动控制方面的缺陷。
