creators_name: Gilbert, Sam J creators_name: Shallice, Tim type: preprint datestamp: 2002-02-28 lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:54:53 metadata_visibility: show title: Task Switching: A PDP Model subjects: cog-psy full_text_status: public keywords: task switching; task set; Stroop effect; parallel distributed processing; executive functions abstract: When subjects switch between a pair of stimulus–response tasks, reaction time is slower on trial N if a different task was performed on trial N-1. We present a parallel distributed processing (PDP) model that simulates this effect when subjects switch between word reading and color naming in response to Stroop stimuli. Reaction time on ‘switch trials’ can be slowed by an extended response selection process which results from (a) persisting, inappropriate states of activation and inhibition of task-controlling representations; and (b) associative learning, which allows stimuli to evoke tasks sets with which they have recently been associated (as proposed by Allport & Wylie, 2000). The model provides a good fit to a large body of empirical data, including findings which have been seen as problematic for this explanation of switch costs, and shows similar behavior when the parameters are set to random values, supporting Allport and Wylie’s proposal. date: 2002 date_type: published refereed: TRUE referencetext: Allport, A., & Wylie, G. (2000). ‘Task-switching’, stimulus-response bindings, and negative priming. In S. Monsell & J. S. Driver (Eds.), Control of cognitive processes: Attention and Performance XVIII (pp. 35-70). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Allport, [D.] A., Styles, E. A., & Hsieh, S. (1994). Shifting intentional set: Exploring the dynamic control of tasks. In C. Umilta & M. Moscovitch (Eds.), Attention and performance XV (pp. 421-452). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Asaad, W. F., Rainer, G., & Miller, E. K. (2000). Task-Specific Neural Activity in the Primate Prefrontal Cortex. Journal of Neurophysiology, 84, 451-459. Atkinson, R. C., & Shiffrin, R. M. (1968). Human memory: A proposed system and its control processes. In K. W. Spence and J. T. Spence (Eds.), The psychology of learning and motivation, vol. 2. New York: Academic Press. Bundesen, C. (1990). A theory of visual attention. Psychological Review, 97, 523-547. Burgess, N. (1995). A solvable connectionist model of immediate recall of ordered lists. In D. S. Touretzky, G. Tesauro, & T. K. Leen (Eds.), Advances in neural information processing systems (pp. 51-58). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Cohen, J. D., Braver, T. S., & O'Reilly, R. C. (1996). A computational approach to prefrontal cortex, cognitive control and schizophrenia: recent development and current challenges. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. B., 351, 1515-1527. Cohen, J. D., Dunbar, K., & McClelland, J. L. (1990). On the control of automatic processes: A parallel distributed processing account of the Stroop effect. Psychological Review, 97, 332-361. Cohen, J. D., & Huston, T. A. (1994). Progress in the use of interactive models for understanding attention and performance. In C. Umilta & M. Moscovitch (Eds.), Attention and performance XV (pp. 453-476). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Cohen, J. D., & Servan-Schreiber, D. (1992). Context, cortex and dopamine: A connectionist approach to behavior and biology in schizophrenia. Psychological Review, 99, 45-77. Cohen, J. D., Usher, M., & McClelland, J. L. (1998). A PDP approach to set size effects within the Stroop task: Reply to Kanne, Balota, Spieler, and Faust (1998). Psychological Review, 105, 188-194. Cooper, R., & Shallice, T. (2000). Contention Scheduling and the Control of Routine Activities. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 17, 297-338. Dayan, P. (1998). A hierarchical model of binocular rivalry. Neural Computation, 10, 1119-1136. De Jong, R. (1995). Strategical determinants of compatibility effects with task uncertainty. Acta Psychologica, 88, 187-207. De Jong, R. (2000). An Intention-Activation Account of Residual Switch Costs. In S. Monsell & J. S. Driver (Eds.), Control of cognitive processes: Attention and Performance XVIII. (pp. 357-376). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. De Jong, R., Emans, B., Eenshuistra, R., & Wagenmakers, E-J. (submitted). Structural and strategical determinants of intentional task control. Dunbar, K., & MacLeod, C. (1984). A Horse Race of a Different Color: Stroop Interference Patterns With Transformed Words. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 10, 622-639. Fuster, J. M. (1997). The Prefrontal Cortex. 3rd ed. Philadelphia: Lippincott-Raven. Glaser, M. O., & Glaser, W. R. (1982). Time course analysis of the Stroop phenomenon. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 8, 875-894. Gopher, D., Armony, L., & Greenshpan, Y. (2000). Switching tasks and attention policies. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 129, 308-339. Gopher, D., Weil, M., & Siegel, D. (1989). Practice under changing priorities: an approach to training of complex skills. Acta Psychologica, 71, 147-179. Goschke, T. (2000). Intentional reconfiguration and involuntary persistence in task-set switching. In S. Monsell & J. S. Driver (Eds.), Control of cognitive processes: Attention and Performance XVIII (pp. 331-355). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Jersild, A. T. (1927). Mental set and shift. Archives of Psychology, Whole No. 89. Kanne, S. M., Balota, D. A., Spieler, D. H., & Faust, M. E. (1998). Explorations of Cohen, Dunbar, and McClelland’s (1990) Connectionist Model of Stroop Performance. Psychological Review, 105, 174-187. Kieras, D. E., Meyer, D. E., Ballas, J. A., & Lauber, E. J. (2000). Modern computational perspectives on executive mental processes and cognitive control: Where to from here? In S. Monsell & J. Driver (Eds.), Control of Cognitive Processes: Attention and Performance XVIII. Cambridge, MA, MIT Press. Kimberg, D. Y., Aguirre, G. K., & D’Esposito, M. (2000). Neural Activity Associated with Task-Switching: An fMRI Study. Poster presented at meeting of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, San Francisco, April 2000. Lauber, E. J. (1995). Executive control of task switching operations. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI. Logan, G. D. (1979). On the use of a concurrent memory load to measure attention and automaticity. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 5, 189-207. Logan, G. D. (1980). Attention and automaticity in Stroop and priming tasks: Theory and data. Cognitive Psychology, 12, 523-553. Logan, G. D. (1985). Executive control of thought and action. Acta Psychologica, 60, 193-210. Logan, G. D., & Gordon, R. D. (2001). Executive Control of Visual Attention in Dual-Task Situations. Psychological Review, 108, 393-434. MacLeod, C. M. (1991). Half a century of research on the Stroop effect: An integrative review. Psychological Bulletin, 109, 163-203. Mayr, U., & Keele, S. W. (2000). Changing Internal Constraints on Action: The Role of Backward Inhibition. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 129, 4-26. Mayr, U., & Kliegl, R. (2000). Task-set switching and long-term memory retrieval. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learming, Memory and Cognition, 26, 1124-1140. McClelland, J. L., & Rumelhart, D. E. (1981). An interactive activation model of context effects in letter perception: Part 1. An account of basic findings. Psychological Review, 88, 159-188. Meiran, N. (1996). Reconfiguration of processing mode prior to task performance. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 22, 1423-1442. Meiran, N. (2000a). Modeling cognitive control in task-switching. Psychological Research, 63, 234-249. Meiran, N. (2000b). Reconfiguration of Stimulus Task Sets and Response Task Sets during Task Switching. . In S. Monsell & J. S. Driver (Eds.), Control of cognitive processes: Attention and Performance XVIII (pp. 377-399). Cambridge, MA: MIT press. Meiran, N., Chorev, Z., & Sapir, A. (2000). Component Processes in Task Switching. Cognitive Psychology, 41, 211-253. Meuter, R. F. I., & Allport, D. A. (1999). Bilingual language switching in naming: Asymmetrical costs of language selection. Journal of Memory and Language, 40, 25-40. Meyer, D. E., & Kieras, D. E. (1997). EPIC – A computational theory of executive cognitive processes and multiple-task performance: Part 1. Basic mechanisms. Psychological Review, 104, 3-65. Meyer, D. E., & Kieras, D. E. (1999). Précis to a practical unified theory of cognition and action: Some lessons from computational modeling of human multiple-task performance. In D. Gopher & A. Koriat (Eds.), Attention and Performance XVII (pp. 15-88). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Miller, E. K., & Cohen, J. D. (2001). An integrative theory of prefrontal cortex function. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 24, 167, 202. Monsell, S. (1996). Control of mental processes. In V. Bruce (Ed.), Unsolved Mysteries of the Mind (pp. 93-148). Hove, E. Sussex: Erlbaum (UK) Taylor and Francis. Monsell, S., Azuma, R., Eimer, M., Le Pelley, M., & Strafford, S. (1998). Does a prepared task switch require an extra (control) process between stimulus onset and response selection? Poster presented at the 18th International Symposium on Attention and Performance, Windsor, England. Monsell, S., & Driver, J. S. (Eds.) (2000). Control of cognitive processes: Attention and Performance XVIII. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Monsell, S., Taylor, T. J., & Murphy, K. (2001). Naming the color of a word: Is it responses or task sets that compete? Memory and Cognition, 29, 137-151. Monsell, S., Yeung, N. P., & Azuma, R. (2000). Reconfiguration of task-set: Is it easier to switch to the weaker task? Psychological Research, 63, 250-264. Norman, D. A. & Shallice, T. (1986). Attention to action: Willed and automatic control of behaviour. In R. J. Davidson, G. E. Schwartz, & D. Shapiro (Eds.), Consciousness and self-regulation (Vol. 4, pp. 1-18). New York: Plenum. Nosofsky, R. M., & Palmeri, T. J. (1997). An exemplar-based random walk model of speeded classification. Psychological Review, 104, 266-300. O'Reilly, R. C. & Farah, M. J. (1999). Simulation and Explanation in Neuropsychology and Beyond. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 16, 49-72. Palmeri, T. J. (1997). Exemplar similarity and the development of automaticity. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 23, 324-354. Phaf, R. H., Van der Heijden, A. H. C., & Hudson, P. T. W. (1990). SLAM: A connectionist model for attention in visual selection tasks. Cognitive Psychology, 22, 273-341. Posner, M. I. (1980). Orienting of attention. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 32, 3-25. Posner, M. I., & Snyder, C. R. R. (1975). Attention and cognitive control. In R. L. Solso (Ed.), Information processing and cognition: The Loyola Symposium. Hillsdale, N. J.: Erlbaum, 1975. Roberts, S., & Pashler, H. (2000). How persuasive is a good fit? A comment on theory testing. Psychological Review, 107, 358-367. Rogers, R. D., & Monsell, S. (1995). Costs of a predictable switch between simple cognitive tasks. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 124, 207-231. Rogers, R. D., Sahakian, B. J., Hodges, J. R., Polkey, C. E., Kennard, C., & Robbins, T. W. (1998). Dissociating executive mechanisms of task control following frontal lobe damage and Parkinson’s disease. Brain, 121, 815-842. Rubinstein, J., Meyer, D. E., & Evans, J. E. (2001). Executive control of cognitive processes in task switching. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27, 763-797. Salthouse, T. A., Fristoe, N., McGurthy, K. E., & Hambrick, D. Z. (1998). Relation of task switching to speed, age, and fluid intelligence. Psychology and Aging, 13, 445-461. Schwartz, M. F., Reed, E. S., Montgomery, M., Palmer, C., & Mayer, N. H. (1991). The quantitative description of action disorganisation after brain damage: A case study. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 8, 381-414. Shallice, T. (1982). Specific impairments of planning. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, B, 298, 199-209. Shallice, T. (1988). From neuropsychology to mental structure. Cambridge: CUP. Shallice, T. (1994). Multiple Levels of Control Processes. In C. Umilta & M. Moscovitch (Eds.), Attention and performance XV (pp. 395-420). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Spector, A., & Biederman, I. (1976). Mental set and shift revisited. American Journal of Psychology, 89, 669-679. Stroop, J. R. (1935). Studies in interference in serial verbal reactions. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 18, 643-662. Sudevan, P., & Taylor, D. A. (1987). The Cuing and Priming of Cognitive Operations. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 13, 89-103. Tornay, F. J., & Milán, E. G. (2001). A more complete task-set reconfiguration in random than in predictable task switch. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 54A, 785-803. Waszak, F., Hommel, B., & Allport, A. (submitted). Task-switching and long-term priming: Role of episodic S-R bindings in task-shift costs. Wylie, G., & Allport, A. (2000). Task switching and the measurement of “switch costs”. Psychological Research, 63, 212-233. Yeung (1999). Switching between simple cognitive tasks: interactions between executive control and task properties. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, England. Zhang, H., Zhang, J., & Kornblum, S. (1999). A Parallel Distributed Processing Model of Stimulus-Stimulus and Stimulus-Response Compatibility. Cognitive Psychology, 38, 386-432. citation: Gilbert, Sam J and Shallice, Tim (2002) Task Switching: A PDP Model. [Preprint] document_url: http://cogprints.org/2087/3/Gilbert_%26_Shallice_-_Task_Switching.pdf