Abstract
It has been argued that the psychological refractory period (PRP) effect is eliminated with two ideomotor compatible tasks when instructions stress fast and simultaneous responding. Three experiments were conducted to test this hypothesis. In all experiments, Task 1 required spatially compatible manual responses (left or right) to the direction of an arrow, and Task 2 required saying the name of the auditory letter A or B. In Experiments 1 and 3, the manual responses were keypresses made with the left and right hands, whereas in Experiment 2 they were left–right toggle-switch movements made with the dominant hand. Instructions that stressed response speed reduced reaction time and increased error rate compared to standard instructions to respond fast and accurately, but did not eliminate the PRP effect on Task 2 reaction time. These results imply that, even when response speed is emphasized, ideomotor compatible tasks do not bypass response selection.
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Notes
In Lien et al.’s (2002) study, the interval varied as a function of the subject’s reaction time, the time for the experimenter to enter the identity of the vocal response into the computer, and whether error feedback of 1,000 ms was provided.
Using the notation illustrated in Fig. 1, the central bottleneck model makes a simple prediction for RT2 at short SOAs and long SOAs. Assuming that a bottleneck delay occurs on every trial at short SOAs but never at long SOAs,
$${\rm RT2}_{\text{(long SOA)}} = 2A + 2B +2C$$$${\rm RT2}_{\text{(short SOA)}} = 1A + 1B + 2B + 2C - {\rm SOA} = {\rm RT1} - 1C + 2B + 2C - {\rm SOA}.$$Therefore,
$${\rm PRP} = {\rm RT2}_{\text{(short SOA)}} - {\rm RT2}_{\text{(long SOA)}} = 1A + 1B - 2A - {\rm SOA}.$$It follows that,
$${\rm PRP} =RT1 - 1C - 2A - {\rm SOA}.$$
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Shin, Y.K., Cho, Y.S., Lien, MC. et al. Is the psychological refractory period effect for ideomotor compatible tasks eliminated by speed-stress instructions?. Psychological Research 71, 553–567 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-006-0066-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-006-0066-2