When awareness gets in the way: Reactivation aversion effects resolve the generality/specificity paradox in...

Area of Science:

• Cognitive psychology
• Human experimental psychology
• Neuroscience

Background:

• Interference tasks reveal domain-specific adaptations (congruency sequence effects [CSEs]) between trials.
• Within trials, different distractor types often interact, suggesting domain-general control.
• This presents a paradox regarding the domain specificity of cognitive control.

Purpose of the Study:

• To resolve the apparent paradox between between-trial and within-trial control mechanisms.
• To investigate the nature of within-trial interactions in interference tasks.
• To examine the influence of prime awareness and age on these effects.

Main Methods:

• Utilized a fully factorial hybrid prime-Simon design across three experiments with 130 participants.
• Manipulated prime awareness (supraliminal vs. subliminal) and assessed congruency sequence effects (CSEs).
• Compared performance between younger and older adults to identify age-related differences.

Main Results:

• Confirmed simultaneous presence of non-interacting, domain-specific CSEs and interacting, 'domain-general' within-trial effects.
• Demonstrated that within-trial interactions occur with supraliminal but not subliminal primes.
• Observed disproportionately enlarged within-trial interactions in older adults.

Conclusions:

• Interference effects and CSEs reflect direct sensorimotor control.
• Within-trial interactions do not stem from sensorimotor control but from higher-level processing 'confusion' (reactivation aversion effect [RAE]).
• This confusion effect is modulated by prime awareness and is exacerbated in older adults.