Contextualized control ‐ disruption or retrieval?

Kurzfassung/Abstract

Recent literature shows that cognitive control is dependent on contextual information. For example, it has been shown that the congruency sequence effect (CSE), the most widely used behavioral marker for control adaptations, is larger in trial sequences with identical context in prime and probe than in sequences with context changes between prime and probe. Binding accounts suggest that this is due to control states that become bound to the context, and re-encountering that context leads to the retrieval of the bound control state. However, this view is challenged by a disruption account stating that control is proactively maintained until it is disrupted by change in context. We contrasted, these two accounts by adding a disruption trial between prime and probe displayed in a context that is always different to prime and probe (e. g. A-B-A or A-B-C context sequences). The binding account would predict control state retrieval, if prime and probe trial share the same context. However, the disrupt account would predict a continuous control decrease, as the context changes in all successive trials (prime to disruption trial and disruption trial to probe). I will discuss findings from this paradigm with regard to binding and control theories.