Department of Psychology, Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Germany.
Department of Psychology, Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Germany; Department of Sciences, Medical School Berlin, Germany.
Cognition. 2022 Jul;224:105053. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2022.105053. Epub 2022 Feb 23.
The present study investigated mechanisms of adaptive cognitive control in working memory (WM). WM is conceived as a system for short-term maintenance, updating and manipulation of representations required for goal-directed action. Adaptive control refers to the finding of flexible adjustments of control processes based on conflict. For instance, a higher frequency of incongruent stimuli, that is, stimuli evoking conflicting response tendencies, leads to a higher level of cognitive control as reflected by smaller congruency effects (i.e., the difference between congruent and incongruent items). Likewise, conflict on the previous trial leads to a higher level of cognitive control on the current trial. To investigate adaptive control in WM, we used a modified Sternberg paradigm. Participants memorized two differently colored lists of four digits (i.e., 2 5 7 1), in which corresponding positions in both lists contained the same digits (congruent items) or different digits (incongruent items). Participants were required to make a match/mismatch judgement (Experiment 1 and 2) or to recollect the correct digit at a probed position in one of the two lists (Experiment 3). In all experiments, we could replicate both hallmark effects of adaptive control, the proportion congruency effect, and the congruency sequence effect. Our results strongly support the assumption that WM representations can be dynamically adapted based on the amount of conflict, and that adaptive control of WM follows the same principles that have previously been shown for selective attention.
本研究旨在探究工作记忆（WM）中自适应认知控制的机制。WM 被认为是一个用于短期维持、更新和操作目标导向行为所需表示的系统。自适应控制是指根据冲突灵活调整控制过程的发现。例如，更高频率的不一致刺激，即引发冲突反应倾向的刺激，会导致更高水平的认知控制，表现为更小的一致性效应（即一致和不一致项目之间的差异）。同样，前一次试验中的冲突会导致当前试验中更高水平的认知控制。为了研究 WM 中的自适应控制，我们使用了一种改良的 Sternberg 范式。参与者记忆两个不同颜色的四位数字列表（即 2 5 7 1），其中两个列表中的对应位置包含相同的数字（一致项目）或不同的数字（不一致项目）。参与者需要做出匹配/不匹配判断（实验 1 和 2）或回忆在两个列表之一的探测位置上正确的数字（实验 3）。在所有实验中，我们都可以复制自适应控制的两个标志性效应，即比例一致性效应和一致性序列效应。我们的结果强烈支持这样的假设，即 WM 表示可以根据冲突的数量进行动态调整，并且 WM 的自适应控制遵循以前在选择性注意中显示的相同原则。
