School of Psychology, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang, 330022, China.
School of Psychology, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang, 330022, China.
Neuropsychologia. 2021 Jun 18;156:107828. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2021.107828. Epub 2021 Mar 13.
Previous studies have investigated sequence effect on task switching and found that increased cognitive control in preceding trials would transfer to the current trial. However, it remains unclear whether response variations during task repetition can enhance cognitive control and promote task switching. In the present study, we designed two sequence contexts, the response-change (r-change) and response-repeat (r-repeat) contexts, by adopting a classical task-switching paradigm in which participants were asked to make an odd-even or large-small judgment of the presented digit. The only difference between the two sequence contexts was whether responses varied frequently during task repetition. Behavioral results showed that the r-change context induced smaller switch costs and higher accuracy for task switching than the r-repeat context. Event-related potential (ERP) results revealed (1) the effect of context on N2 amplitudes, with greater N2 in the r-change context than the r-repeat context at frontal-central regions; (2) the interaction between context and transition type during the stimulus-locked P3 component, with a marked context effect for the task-switch trials; (3) non-significant context effect on task switching during the response-locked P3 component. These findings suggest that response variations during a sequence of task-repeat trials can trigger the increase in cognitive control that promotes the efficiency of followed task switching.
先前的研究已经调查了序列效应对任务转换的影响，发现在前一个试次中增加的认知控制会转移到当前试次。然而，目前尚不清楚在任务重复期间的反应变化是否可以增强认知控制并促进任务转换。在本研究中，我们通过采用经典的任务转换范式设计了两种序列情境，即反应变化（r-change）和反应重复（r-repeat）情境，参与者被要求对呈现的数字进行奇偶或大小判断。两种序列情境的唯一区别是在任务重复期间反应是否频繁变化。行为结果表明，r-change 情境比 r-repeat 情境诱导的任务转换的转换代价更小，准确性更高。事件相关电位（ERP）结果揭示了（1）情境对 N2 振幅的影响，在额-中央区域 r-change 情境的 N2 比 r-repeat 情境更大；（2）在刺激锁定的 P3 成分中，情境和转换类型之间的相互作用，对于任务转换试次有明显的情境效应；（3）在反应锁定的 P3 成分中，任务转换的情境效应不显著。这些发现表明，在任务重复序列期间的反应变化可以引发认知控制的增加，从而提高后续任务转换的效率。
