When expectancies collide: Action dynamics reveal the interaction between stimulus plausibility and congruency

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Computational Neuroscience
• Human-Computer Interaction

Background:

• Cognitive systems utilize expectancy mechanisms for processing stimulus plausibility and sequential congruency.
• Understanding the temporal dynamics of these cognitive processes is crucial for modeling decision-making.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the interaction between stimulus plausibility and sequential congruency.
• To examine the temporal signatures of activation competition during decision responses using computer mouse-tracking.

Main Methods:

• Two computer mouse-tracking experiments were conducted using a cross-modal verification task.
• Participants verified sentence-scene pairs varying in plausibility and congruency.
• Presentation order (sentence-scene vs. scene-sentence) was manipulated to assess differential processing.

Main Results:

• Implausible yet congruent stimuli led to less accurate and slower responses compared to implausible and incongruent stimuli.
• Complex angular mouse trajectories were observed for implausible congruent stimuli, irrespective of presentation order.
• A dissociation was found between the temporal signatures of plausibility and congruency detection.

Conclusions:

• Plausibility and congruency detection exhibit distinct temporal signatures in decision responses.
• Mouse-tracking provides a sensitive measure for uncovering the temporal dynamics of cognitive processes.
• This research offers novel insights into the interplay of cognitive mechanisms during stimulus evaluation.