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Temporal Distinctiveness in Task Switching: Assessing the Mixture-Distribution Assumption.

James A Grange¹

¹School of Psychology, Keele University Keele, UK.

Frontiers in Psychology

|March 5, 2016

Summary

Temporal distinctiveness (TD) theory explains task switching costs by proposing that response times are a mixture of fast and slow processes. This study provides statistical and modeling evidence supporting TD accounts of task switching.

Keywords:

computational model decay interference task switching

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Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Human Memory
Neuroscience

Background:

Task switching research traditionally explains reduced switch costs with longer response-cue intervals (RCI) via decay processes.
An alternative interference-based account suggests RCI affects temporal distinctiveness (TD) of memory traces, influencing retrieval probability.
This TD account predicts response times (RTs) are a mixture of fast (successful retrieval) and slow (failed retrieval) processes.

Purpose of the Study:

To assess the evidence for the mixture-distribution assumption in temporal distinctiveness (TD) data within task switching.
To evaluate whether RT distributions in task switching are best explained by a mixture of fast and slow processes.

Main Methods:

Statistical analysis using the fixed-point property test to find evidence for mixture-distributions.
Fitting a mathematical process model incorporating mixture-distributions to response time distribution data.

Main Results:

The fixed-point property test provided statistical evidence supporting mixture-distributions in TD data.
A mathematical process model with mixture-distributions at its core demonstrated a good fit to the response time data.
Both methods converged to support the mixture-distribution assumption.

Conclusions:

The findings provide strong support for temporal distinctiveness (TD) accounts of task switching.
The mixture-distribution assumption is a valid and useful framework for understanding task switching performance.
This research advances our understanding of memory retrieval processes in cognitive tasks.