How two share two tasks: evidence of a social psychological refractory period effect

Abstract

A strong assumption shared by major theoretical approaches to cognition posits that the human cognitive system has a limited capacity for information processing. Evidence supporting this claim comes from the dual-task paradigm in which one cognitive system has to process two tasks simultaneously. In this study, we examined whether bottleneck-like processing can also be elicited when a dual task is shared between two individuals. Under dual-task instructions giving priority to Task 1, we found evidence of a psychological refractory period effect in dual-task and joint-task conditions. Under equal priority instructions, we replicated the finding of a psychological refractory period effect in the dual-task, but not in the joint-task condition. These findings are in line with the assumption that a social psychological refractory period effect can be induced across two individuals. We suggest that this effect is due to task-specific monitoring requirements. We discuss our findings with respect to both dual-task and joint action theories.