Stephan Denise Nadine, Josten Johanna, Friedgen Erik, Koch Iring
Institute of Psychology, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany.
Institute for Automotive Engineering, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany.
J Cogn. 2021 Jan 21;4(1):9. doi: 10.5334/joc.129.
Modality compatibility refers to the similarity between the stimulus modality and the modality of response-related sensory consequences (e.g., vocal output produces audible effects). While previous studies found higher costs of task switching with stimulus-response modality-incompatible tasks (auditory-manual and visual-vocal), the present study was aimed to explore the generality of modality compatibility by examining a new response modality (pedal responses). Experiment 1 showed that the effect of modality compatibility generalizes to pedal responses when these replaced manual responses used in previous studies (i.e., higher switch costs when switching between auditory-pedal and visual-vocal tasks compared to switching between auditory-vocal and visual-pedal tasks). However, in single-task conditions there was no influence of modality compatibility. Experiment 2 was designed to examine whether modality compatibility depends on the frequency of task switches. To this end, one task occurred very frequently, overall decreasing the task switching frequency. Importantly, the results showed a robust task-switching benefit of modality-compatible mappings even for a highly frequent task, suggesting that the sustained representation of potentially competing response modalities affects task-switching performance independent from the actual frequency of the tasks. Together, the data suggest that modality compatibility is an emergent phenomenon arising in task-switching situations based on the necessity to maintain but at the same time separate competing modality mappings, which are characterized by ideomotor ''backward'' linkages between anticipated response effects and the stimuli that called for this response in the first place.
模态兼容性是指刺激模态与反应相关感觉后果的模态之间的相似性（例如，语音输出产生可听效果）。虽然先前的研究发现，刺激-反应模态不兼容任务（听觉-手动和视觉-语音）的任务切换成本更高，但本研究旨在通过考察一种新的反应模态（踏板反应）来探究模态兼容性的普遍性。实验1表明，当踏板反应取代先前研究中使用的手动反应时，模态兼容性的影响也适用于踏板反应（即，与听觉-语音和视觉-踏板任务之间的切换相比，听觉-踏板和视觉-语音任务之间的切换具有更高的切换成本）。然而，在单任务条件下，模态兼容性没有影响。实验2旨在检验模态兼容性是否取决于任务切换的频率。为此，一项任务出现的频率非常高，总体上降低了任务切换频率。重要的是，结果表明，即使对于一项高频任务，模态兼容映射也具有强大的任务切换优势，这表明潜在竞争反应模态的持续表征会影响任务切换性能，而与任务的实际频率无关。总之，数据表明，模态兼容性是任务切换情境中出现的一种新兴现象，其基于维持但同时分离竞争模态映射的必要性，这些映射的特征是预期反应效果与最初引发该反应的刺激之间的观念运动“反向”联系。
