EVEN WITH TIME, CONFLICT ADAPTATION IS NOT MADE OF EXPECTANCIES

Abstract

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In conflict tasks, congruency effects are modulated by the sequence of preceding trials. This modulation has been interpreted as a strategic reconfiguration of cognitive control, depending on the amount of conflict encountered on the very last trial, and occurring unconditionally whenever there is time to produce it (Notebaert, Gevers, Verbruggen & Liefooghe, 2006). Jiménez and Méndez (2013) arranged a 4-choice Stroop task with a response-to-stimulus interval (RSI) of 0 ms, and they found that, under these conditions, congruency effects may become dissociated from the explicit expectancies assessed over analogous, but independent, trials. The present study generalizes this phenomenon to a condition with larger RSI, and it shows that participants’ performance does not rely on expectancies unless the task includes a specific requirement to generate and report on these expectancies. The results are interpreted as providing new insights with respect to the status of conflict adaptation effects.

Keywords

• cognitive control
• Stroop task
• conflict adaptation
• reactive control
• expectancies
• sequential congruency