Citation

Altmann EM. J. Exp. Psychol. Learn. Mem. Cogn. 2007; 33(5): 892-899.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA. ema@msu.edu

Copyright

(Copyright © 2007, American Psychological Association)

DOI

10.1037/0278-7393.33.5.892

PMID

17723067

Abstract

The compound-cue model of cognitive control in task switching explains switch cost in terms of a switch of task cues rather than of a switch of tasks. The present study asked whether the model generalizes to Lag 2 repetition cost (also known as backward inhibition), a related effect in which the switch from B to A in ABA task sequences is costlier than is the same switch in CBA task sequences. The model suggests that Lag 2 repetition cost should be absent from A'BA task sequences, in which A' and A are different cues for the same task. The cost is robust on such sequences, which suggests that cue-independent, task-specific representations are necessary for explaining task-switching performance and that the compound-cue model has limited explanatory power.

Language: en