Department of Psychology, University of Regensburg, Universitätsstr. 31, D-93053, Regensburg, Germany.
Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci. 2021 Jun;21(3):534-548. doi: 10.3758/s13415-020-00825-1.
Meta-control is necessary to regulate the balance between cognitive stability and flexibility. Evidence from (voluntary) task switching studies suggests performance-contingent reward as one modulating factor. Depending on the immediate reward history, reward prospect seems to promote either cognitive stability or flexibility: Increasing reward prospect reduced switch costs and increased the voluntary switch rate, suggesting increased cognitive flexibility. In contrast, remaining high reward prospect increased switch costs and reduced the voluntary switch rate, suggesting increased cognitive stability. Recently we suggested that increasing reward prospect serves as a meta-control signal toward cognitive flexibility by lowering the updating threshold in working memory. However, in task switching paradigms with two tasks only, this could alternatively be explained by facilitated switching to the other of two tasks. To address this issue, a series of task switching experiments with uncued task switching between three univalent tasks was conducted. Results showed a reduction in reaction time (RT) switch costs to a nonsignificant difference and a high voluntary switch rate when reward prospect increased, whereas repetition RTs were faster, switch RTs slower, and voluntary switch rate was reduced when reward prospect remained high. That is, increasing reward prospect put participants in a state of equal readiness to respond to any target stimulus-be it a task repetition or a switch to one of the other two tasks. The study thus provides further evidence for the assumption that increasing reward prospect serves as a meta-control signal to increase cognitive flexibility, presumably by lowering the updating threshold in working memory.
元控制对于调节认知稳定性和灵活性之间的平衡是必要的。来自（自愿）任务转换研究的证据表明，绩效相关的奖励是一个调节因素。根据即时奖励历史，奖励前景似乎促进了认知的稳定性或灵活性：增加奖励前景降低了转换成本，增加了自愿转换率，表明认知灵活性增加。相反，保持高奖励前景增加了转换成本，降低了自愿转换率，表明认知稳定性增加。最近，我们提出增加奖励前景通过降低工作记忆中的更新阈值来作为认知灵活性的元控制信号。然而，在只有两个任务的任务转换范式中，这也可以通过更容易地切换到两个任务中的另一个任务来解释。为了解决这个问题，进行了一系列具有三个单一任务的无提示任务转换的任务转换实验。结果表明，当奖励前景增加时，反应时间（RT）转换成本降低到无显著差异，自愿转换率很高，而重复 RT 更快，转换 RT 更慢，自愿转换率降低当奖励前景保持高位时。也就是说，增加奖励前景使参与者处于对任何目标刺激做出反应的同等准备状态——无论是任务重复还是切换到其他两个任务之一。因此，该研究进一步证明了这样的假设，即增加奖励前景作为一种元控制信号，通过降低工作记忆中的更新阈值，增加认知灵活性。
