Disentangling stimulus and response compatibility as potential sources of backward crosstalk

• Published in: Attention, perception & psychophysics Vol. 82; no. 7; pp. 3415 - 3431
• Main Authors: Rieger, Tobias, Miller, Jeff
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.10.2020; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Behavioral Science and Psychology; Between-subjects design; Cognitive Psychology; Experiments; Feedback (Response); Humans; Psychology; Psychomotor Performance; Reaction Time; Refractory Period, Psychological; Shared Resources and Services; Stimuli; Dual-tasking; Response compatibility; Backward crosstalk effect; Stimulus compatibility; Flanker task
• ISSN: 1943-3921; 1943-393X; 1943-393X
• DOI: 10.3758/s13414-020-02039-6

In two experiments ( N = 60 each), we investigated the locus of backward crosstalk effects in dual tasking. Specifically, we embedded the typical flanker task within a dual-task paradigm by assigning stimulus-response (S-R) rules to the flankers. In Experiment 1 , participants were instructed to first respond to the center letter and only respond to the flanker if the center was a no-go stimulus (i.e., prioritized processing paradigm). Mapping condition was varied between-subjects to be either matched (i.e., same S-R rule for flankers as for center letters), reversed (i.e., opposite S-R rule for flankers), or neutral (i.e., different letters for flankers with separate S-R rules). The results indicated that the backward crosstalk effect was mainly driven by a stimulus-based compatibility, as indicated by a significant S 2 −R 1 compatibility effect in the matched and reversed conditions, with little change in this effect between the matched and reversed conditions. Experiment 2 replicated and extended these findings to a psychological refractory period paradigm. The present findings suggest that in the matched and reversed conditions, there was only one S-R rule active at a time.