Evidence for a response preparation bottleneck during dual-task performance: Effect of a startling acoustic stimulus on the psychological refractory period |
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Authors: | Dana Maslovat Romeo Chua Hunter C Spencer Christopher J Forgaard Anthony N Carlsen Ian M Franks |
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Institution: | 1. School of Kinesiology, University of British Columbia, Canada;2. School of Human Kinetics, University of Ottawa, Canada |
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Abstract: | The present study was designed to investigate the mechanism associated with dual-task interference in a psychological refractory period (PRP) paradigm. We used a simple reaction time paradigm consisting of a vocal response (R1) and key-lift task (R2) with a stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) between 100 ms and 1500 ms. On selected trials we implemented a startling acoustic stimulus concurrent with the second stimulus to determine if we could involuntarily trigger the second response. Our results indicated that the PRP delay in the second response was present for both control and startle trials at short SOAs, suggesting the second response was not prepared in advance. These results support a response preparation bottleneck and can be explained via a neural activation model of preparation. In addition, we found that the reflexive startle activation was reduced in the dual-task condition for all SOAs, a result we attribute to prepulse inhibition associated with dual-task processing. |
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Keywords: | 2330: Motor Processes 2340: Cognitive Processes |
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