Temporal cue–target overlap is not essential for backward inhibition in task switching

Abstract

Lag 2 repetition costs are a performance cost observed when participants return to a task after just one intervening trial of a different task, compared to returning after a longer interval (AB A vs. CB A sequences, where A, B, C are tasks). This effect is known as backward inhibition (BI) and is thought to reflect the need to overcome inhibition applied specifically to Task “A” during disengagement at trial n – 1. Druey and Hübner (2007) have suggested that employment of such a specific inhibitory mechanism relies upon the cue and the target of the task overlapping temporally. We provide evidence across three experiments (including a direct replication attempt) that this is not the case, and that the presence of task-specific BI relies to some extent on the need to translate the cue–target relationship into working memory. Additionally, we provide evidence that faster responses in no overlap conditions are driven by low-level perceptual differences between target displays across overlap conditions. We conclude that BI is an effective sequential control mechanism, employed equally in cases of temporally overlapping and temporally separated cues and targets.

Keywords:

• Task switching
• Backward inhibition
• Cue processing
• Working memory

Acknowledgments

We thank Ronald Hübner, Nachshon Meiran, and an anonymous reviewer for their thoughtful and detailed comments on the current draft. We are also grateful to Katherine Arbuthnott, W. Trammell Neill, and an anonymous reviewer for their constructive comments on a previous version of this paper consisting of Experiment 1. We also thank Steve Tipper for thoughtful insights and suggestions that led to Experiment 2.

This research was conducted as part of James A. Grange's doctoral dissertation.

Notes

¹ Retaining 87.07% of the raw data still left on average 110.58 trials per block, equating to an average of 55.29 trials per lag 2 comparison for each block submitted for analysis.

² Breakdown of this interaction only totals 26 participants as lag 2 repetition costs from 2 participants were equivalent between overlap conditions.