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Updated: Aug 29, 2025

Irrelevant Stimuli and Action Control: Analyzing the Influence of Ignored Stimuli via the Distractor-Response Binding Paradigm

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Binding of Task-Irrelevant Action Features and Auditory Action Effects.

Sámuel Varga^1,2, Roland Pfister³, Bence Neszmélyi³

¹Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary.

Journal of Cognition

|September 8, 2022

Summary

Auditory stimuli can bind to motor responses. This study found that while auditory stimulus repetition did not significantly alter pinch force, it did increase response duration similarity, suggesting attention to task-irrelevant response features.

Keywords:

action control action parameters action-effect binding binding and retrieval response force

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Area of Science:

Motor Control
Auditory Perception
Human Factors

Background:

Auditory stimuli are known to bind with discrete, task-relevant motor response features.
The binding of continuous, task-irrelevant response features to auditory stimuli remains less understood.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate whether continuous, task-irrelevant motor response features (force, duration) bind to and are retrieved by auditory stimuli.
To determine if auditory stimulus repetition influences pinch response force and duration.

Main Methods:

Two experiments involving participants performing a pinch task with auditory feedback.
Varying auditory stimuli (repeating vs. changing tones) between prime and probe phases of trials.
Analyzing pinch response parameters such as peak force and duration.

Main Results:

No significant similarity increases were observed for most force-related parameters (peak force, area under force curve).
A higher correlation in response durations was found between prime and probe trials when auditory tones repeated compared to when they changed.
This suggests a subtle binding effect for response duration, but not force.

Conclusions:

Auditory stimulus repetition has a limited effect on binding continuous, task-irrelevant pinch response features.
Response duration shows some evidence of binding to repeated auditory stimuli, unlike force.
Findings highlight the role of perceptual discriminability and attentional deployment to task-irrelevant response aspects.