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01-09-2009 | Original Article

Strategic capacity sharing between two tasks: evidence from tasks with the same and with different task sets

Auteurs: Carola Lehle, Ronald Hübner

Gepubliceerd in: Psychological Research | Uitgave 5/2009

Abstract

The goal of the present study was to investigate the costs and benefits of different degrees of strategic parallel processing between two tasks. In a series of experiments with the dual-task flanker paradigm, participants were either instructed to process the tasks serially or in parallel, or—in a control condition—they received no specific instruction. Results showed that the participants were able to adjust the degree of parallel processing as instructed in a flexible manner. Parallel processing of the two tasks repeatedly led to large costs in performance and to high crosstalk effects compared to more serial processing. In spite of the costs, a moderate degree of parallel processing was preferred in the condition with no specific instruction. This pattern of results was observed if the same task set was used for the two tasks, but also if different ones were applied. Furthermore, a modified version of the central capacity sharing (CCS) model (Tombu and Jolicoeur in J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 29:3–18, 2003) was proposed that accounts also for crosstalk effects in dual tasks. The modified CCS model was then evaluated by fitting it successfully to the present data.

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We define central capacity similar to the capacity of cognitive control by Lavie, Hirst, De Fockert, & Viding (2004): it encompasses postperceptual operations associated with higher cognitive functions which have been demonstrated to impose a large decline in performance when conducted concurrently with other operations. Besides response selection (Pashler, 1994a), these operations likely encompass also memory consolidation (e.g., Jolicoeur & Dell’Acqua, 1998), mental rotation (Band & Miller, 1997), suppression of response priming (Stürmer, Seiss, & Leuthold, 2005) and presumably also difficult conditions of stimulus selection (e.g., Jolicoeur et al., 2006; Magen & Cohen, 2005). There is definitively a need for further clarification, respectively, integration or dissociation of the different operations. However, this is not at the scope of the present study.

That we included the particular proportion of 50% Altering-flanker and 50% Fixed-flanker trials had the following reason: In a dual-task experiment where flanker stimuli changed on every trial, participants adopted a strategy of very serial processing (Hübner & Lehle, 2007; Experiment 4). In contrast, if the flankers did not change, a parallel strategy was preferred (Hübner & Lehle, 2007, Experiments 2A, B, C). Thus, by mixing Altering-flanker and Fixed-flanker trials equally, we intended to create a condition that itself neither induces an extreme parallel nor an extreme serial processing strategy.

To analyze practice effects, we conducted several ANOVAs for the two experiments and the different instruction conditions—containing block number as a factor. There, we revealed always a main effect of block number, i.e., the response times (RT1 and RT2) decreased with increasing practice. However, there was no significant interaction of block and congruency.

The variance across subjects was rather high in all Experiments reported in the present study, which indicates that there was some between-subjects variability in the degree of serial or parallel processing that was applied in the dual tasks. However, the mean SD in Experiment 1B was not increased, but even smaller compared to Experiment 1A (198 vs. 228 ms in RT1; 214 vs. 237 ms in RT2). This was also the case for Experiment 2B compared to Experiment 2A (185 vs. 232 ms in RT1; 199 vs. 269 ms in RT2).

Since our hypothesis corresponded to a one-tailed statistical test, and the F test is two-tailed, the result can be considered as significant.

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Titel: Strategic capacity sharing between two tasks: evidence from tasks with the same and with different task sets
Auteurs: Carola Lehle
Ronald Hübner
Publicatiedatum: 01-09-2009
Uitgeverij: Springer-Verlag
Gepubliceerd in: Psychological Research / Uitgave 5/2009
Print ISSN: 0340-0727
Elektronisch ISSN: 1430-2772
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-008-0162-6

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