Incongruent Trials Research Articles

Linking cognitive control to language comprehension: proportion congruency effects in syntactic ambiguity resolution

ABSTRACT Two experiments investigated the effect of sustained cognitive control engagement on syntactic ambiguity resolution. Participants heard (Experiment 1) or read (Experiment 2) garden path sentences like “Put the kiwi on the rectangle on the circle”, in which “on the rectangle” could temporarily reflect either a destination of “Put” or modifier of “kiwi”, and they viewed visual arrays with a kiwi on a rectangle and an empty rectangle and circle. Cognitive control was manipulated experimentally by interleaving sentence trials among either mostly incongruent or mostly congruent Stroop trials. Across both experiments, garden path mouse cursor movements to incorrect destinations were reduced when sentence trials were interleaved among mostly incongruent Stroop trials, and in Experiment 2, garden path reading time effects were also reduced in this condition. These results suggest that a high proportion of incongruent trials supports the sustained engagement of cognitive control and causally improves sentence comprehension across (i.e. spoken and written) modalities.

Audiovisual integration in the McGurk effect is impervious to music training.

The McGurk effect refers to an audiovisual speech illusion where the discrepant auditory and visual syllables produce a fused percept between the visual and auditory component. However, little is known about how individual differences contribute to the McGurk effect. Here, we examined whether music training experience-which involves audiovisual integration-can modulate the McGurk effect. Seventy-three participants completed the Goldsmiths Musical Sophistication Index (Gold-MSI) questionnaire to evaluate their music expertise on a continuous scale. Gold-MSI considers participants' daily-life exposure to music learning experiences (formal and informal), instead of merely classifying people into different groups according to how many years they have been trained in music. Participants were instructed to report, via a 3-alternative forced choice task, "what a person said": /Ba/, /Ga/ or /Da/. The experiment consisted of 96 audiovisual congruent trials and 96 audiovisual incongruent (McGurk) trials. We observed no significant correlations between the susceptibility of the McGurk effect and the different subscales of the Gold-MSI (active engagement, perceptual abilities, music training, singing abilities, emotion) or the general musical sophistication composite score. Together, these findings suggest that music training experience does not modulate audiovisual integration in speech as reflected by the McGurk effect.

The contribution of difficulty of an irrelevant task to task conflict.

In the standard colour-word Stroop task, participants are presented with colour words and required to respond to their colour while ignoring their meaning. Two types of conflict might occur in such experiments: information conflict and task conflict. Information conflict reflects the processing of two contradicting pieces of information and is indicated by shorter reaction times (RTs) in congruent than in incongruent trials. Task conflict reflects the additional effort associated with performing two tasks, as opposed to one, and is indicated by shorter RTs in neutral trials than in congruent trials (termed reverse facilitation). While information conflict is commonly seen in Stroop and Stroop-like tasks, task conflict is rarely observed. In the present study, participants were presented with coloured segments that, by applying Gestalt principles, could be perceived as colour words. We found that incongruent trials were slower than congruent trials, suggesting that participants successfully perceived the colour words, which led to involuntary reading. In addition, reversed facilitation was found so that neutral trials (i.e., trials that only consist of one task) were faster than congruent trials (as well as incongruent trials; both consist of two tasks). The presence of both interference from the incongruent trials and reverse facilitation suggests that involuntary reading could also occur in scenarios requiring cognitive effort.

Flanker interference at both stimulus and response levels decreases with age

When trying to identify the colour of a target, people’s performance is impaired by nearby distractors of different colours. It is controversial whether these interference effects originate from competing stimuli, competing responses or from both simultaneously. These interference effects may also differ depending on a person’s age. Comparisons between studies show mixed results, while differences in experimental design and data analysis complicate the interpretation. In our study, we manipulated the relative proportions of congruent and incongruent trials with respect to both stimuli and responses. Considering this aspect, we asked whether people resolve stimulus and response interference differently at different ages. 92 children (6–14 years), 25 young adults (20–43 years) and 33 older adults (60–84 years) performed a coloured version of the Eriksen flanker task. Since reaction times and errors were correlated, inverse efficiency scores were used to address speed-accuracy trade-offs between groups. Absolute interference effects were used to measure relationships with age. The results showed first, unexpectedly, that response interference was comparable between stimulus- and response-balanced conditions. Second, performance at all ages was significantly influenced both by competing stimuli and responses. Most importantly, the size of interference effects decreased with age. These findings cast some doubt on the conclusions of previous studies, and raise further questions about how cognitive control is best measured across the lifespan.

Effects of Cognitive Inhibition Preceding Voluntary Step Responses to Visual Stimuli in Young and Older Adults.

Age-related changes in executive functions, especially inhibitory control, correlate to decreased balance control and increased fall risk. However, only a few studies focused on the performance of tasks integrating balance and inhibitory control. This study aims to determine the effects of cognitive inhibition preceding the initiation of voluntary steps in young and older adults. Performance of 3 stepping tasks (a Simon, Flanker, and a combined Simon-Flanker task [SFT]) were analyzed in 23 young adults and 43 older adults. Each task included congruent and incongruent trials in different step directions. Analyses focused on temporal aspects of step responses as identified by changes in Center of Pressure (CoP) and foot position. A 3-way repeated-measures ANOVA was used to evaluate "inhibition," "age," and "task" effects. With large effect sizes, "inhibition" as well as "age" resulted in longer durations of an initial preparatory phase as well as the step response phase. The SFT showed the largest "task" effects. Duration of CoP movement had the largest impact on total step execution in older adults. A significant interaction effect of "age*inhibition" was found on the duration of CoP movement, but not on CoP onset. Overall, our results demonstrate that cognitive inhibition has more impact in older adults, the longer duration of CoP movements in older adults may reflect an ineffective step preparation. Our examination of the duration of subsequent phases which comprise perceptual processing and conflict resolution, response initiation, and step execution sheds light on how cognitive inhibition affects voluntary stepping behavior in young and older adults.

Implementation of an online spacing flanker task and evaluation of its test–retest reliability using measures of inhibitory control and the distribution of spatial attention

The flanker task (Eriksen & Eriksen, Perception & Psychophysics, 16(1), 143-149, 1974) has been highly influential and widely used in studies of visual attention. Its simplicity has made it popular to include it in experimental software packages and online platforms. The spacing flanker task (SFT), in which the distance between the target and flankers varies, is useful for studying the distribution of attention across space as well as inhibitory control. Use of the SFT requires that the viewing environment (e.g., stimulus size and viewing distance) be controlled, which is a challenge for online delivery. We implement and evaluate an online version of the SFT that includes two calibration pretests to provide the necessary control. Test–retest and split-half reliability of the online version was compared with a laboratory version on measures of inhibitory control and measures of the distribution of attention across space. Analyses show that the online SFT is comparable to laboratory testing on all measures. Results also identify two measures with good test–retest reliability that hold promise for studying performance in the SFT: the mean flanker effect (ICC = 0.745) and RTs on incongruent trials across distances (ICC = 0.65–0.71).

Reinforcement learning of adaptive control strategies

Humans can up- or downregulate the degree to which they rely on task information for goal-directed behaviour, a process often referred to as cognitive control. Adjustments in cognitive control are traditionally studied in response to experienced or expected task-rule conflict. However, recent theories suggest that people can also learn to adapt control settings through reinforcement. Across three preregistered task switching experiments (n = 415), we selectively rewarded correct performance on trials with either more (incongruent) or less (congruent) task-rule conflict. Results confirmed the hypothesis that people rewarded more on incongruent trials showed smaller task-rule congruency effects, thus optimally adapting their control settings to the reward scheme. Using drift diffusion modelling, we further show that this reinforcement of cognitive control may occur through conflict-dependent within-trial adjustments of response thresholds after conflict detection. Together, our findings suggest that, while people remain more efficient at learning stimulus-response associations through reinforcement, they can similarly learn cognitive control strategies through reinforcement.

Response-Category Conflict and Control Mode Determine Memory Performance for Distractors in a Flanker Paradigm.

Cognitive conflicts can lead to better memory for task-relevant information. However, little is known about memory performance for task-irrelevant information. The present study investigated memory performance of task-irrelevant distractors using a Flanker paradigm. In two experiments (N = 699), participants first completed a study phase with 56 flanker trials. The stimuli consisted of trial-unique pictures. A congruent trial consisted of a target flanked by two identical pictures from the same category (e.g., all mammals). An incongruent trial consisted of a target and flankers from different stimulus categories (e.g., a mammal flanked by two identical birds), which results in a response-category conflict. To explore the impact of different control modes, congruent and incongruent trials were presented in pure blocks (allowing a proactive control mode) or in mixed blocks (requiring a reactive control mode). Afterwards, recognition memory was tested in a surprise memory test. In general, the results showed better memory for congruent than incongruent flankers in pure blocks. In contrast in mixed blocks, the results showed better memory for incongruent than for congruent flankers. Thus, memory performance for distractors varies systematically with response-category conflict and control mode.

Higher sensory processing sensitivity: increased cautiousness in attentional processing in conflict contexts

ABSTRACT While interest grows in investigating sensory processing sensitivity (SPS), few studies have employed objective behavioural measures to directly explore the underlying attentional processing. The present study utilised two modified versions of the Emotional Attention Networks Test Integration (E-ANTI) to investigate whether and how emotion interacts with three attentional networks associated with SPS when emotion information was target-irrelevant (Experiment 1) and target-relevant (Experiment 2), respectively. Both experiments involved four manipulated within-subject factors: Signal (tone vs. no-tone), Cue Validity (valid vs. invalid), Flanker Congruency (congruent vs. incongruent), and Emotion (fearful vs. happy). Linear mixed models were employed, and three attentional networks were successfully captured in both experiments. In Experiment 1, we observed that as SPS increased, the difference in reaction time between valid and invalid cue conditions decreased, especially in incongruent trials. Participants rated fearful faces as more arousing than happy faces as SPS increased. In Experiment 2, we found that slow responding to fearful faces reduced as SPS increased, particularly in incongruent trials. The observed effects related to SPS in both experiments were particularly pronounced in incongruent conditions, suggesting that SPS may modulate attentional processes in high-conflict situations. Overall, higher SPS may be associated with increased cautiousness in conflict contexts.

Instructing somebody else to act: motor co-representations in the instructor.

Instructions enable humans to perform novel tasks quickly. This is achieved by creating and activating the instruction representation for upcoming tasks, which can then modulate ongoing task behaviour in an almost 'reflexive' manner, an effect called instruction-based reflexivity. While most research has focused on understanding how verbal instructions are represented within the 'instructed' (i.e. the person receiving instructions), here we focus on how the instructor's (i.e. the person giving instructions) behaviour is affected through instructing. In a series of three experiments and one pooled analysis, we extended the classical instruction-based reflexivity paradigm to a novel social variant in which the instructions are given by an instructor (rather than visual computer-generated instructions). We found an instruction-based reflexivity effect for the instructor, that is, the instructor's task performance was better on congruent compared to incongruent trials (i.e. Experiments 1 and 2, pooled analysis). This suggests that the instructor represents the instructions of the instructed in an action-oriented format. However, this did not depend on the specific task of the instructed (i.e. Experiment 1), nor is it exclusively social (i.e. Experiment 3).

Mediating role of inhibitory control in relationships between cardiovascular fitness and academic achievement in preadolescents.

Cardiovascular fitness (CRF) has been consistently linked to cognitive performance and academic achievement, and inhibitory control has been recognized as a key predictor of academic success. However, few studies have explored whether inhibitory control mediates the relationship between CRF and academic performance in children, and the existing findings are inconclusive because of certain limitations. This study investigated the mediating role of inhibitory control in the association between CRF and academic achievement among preadolescents while also addressing the related limitations. This study enrolled a total of 175 elementary school students (70 girls, mean age=11.17years, standard deviation=0.7), who participated in a half-mile test for assessing their CRF level. Additionally, inhibitory control was measured using the Stroop Color and Word Test (Stroop test), and language and mathematics tests were administered to measure their academic performance. The results revealed that the participants with higher CRF levels achieved superior performance in tasks requiring a high level of inhibitory control (r=0.291, P<0.001) and in Chinese language (r=-0.415, P<0.001) and mathematics (r=-0.366, P<0.001) tests even when gender, age, and body fat were considered. Furthermore, a mediation analysis revealed that inhibitory control, as measured through the incongruent trials of the Stroop test, partially mediated the relationship between CRF and academic performance (language: indirect effect=-0.013, 95% CI [-0.019, -0.008]; math: indirect effect=-0.013, 95% CI [-0.021, -0.009]). These findings have major implications for child development, emphasizing the key role of inhibitory control in the beneficial effects of CRF on academic achievement.

Double task switching: An investigation into the effects of similarity and task-rule congruency on cognitive flexibility.

Similarity between tasks is an understudied factor in research on cognitive flexibility. This behavioural experiment had 31 participants perform a task switch paradigm in which participants were required to switch between 4 tasks of varying similarity. The experiment was constructed in a way that simultaneously allows for investigating the impact of mental fatigue and task-rule congruency on the participants. The results indicate that similarity between tasks substantially impacts performance with different effects on RT and accuracy. While learning effects may have negated the impact of mental fatigue across the 5 experimental blocks, a significant decrease in performance was observed within blocks. Furthermore, the exploratory analysis proposes a novel interaction between task-rule incongruent trials and the task of the previous trial. These results support the notion that neither the interference view of cognitive flexibility nor the reconfiguration view are fully adequate at explaining task switch costs if similarity is added as a factor. The presented study presents strong evidence that fundamental findings in the domain of cognitive flexibility may not map linearly to more ecological settings where tasks are often more dissimilar.

Acute Bouts of Aerobic Exercise Do Not Modulate Task-Evoked Midfrontal Theta Oscillations in School-Age Children

While acute aerobic exercise has been found to have a facilitative effect on task components with varied cognitive control demands in school-age children, its effects on specific neural processes evoked by a cognitive control task remain underexplored. The objective of the current study was to examine the effects of acute aerobic exercise on task-evoked midfrontal theta event-related synchronization (ERS)—which plays a crucial role in supporting cognitive control. Thirty-three preadolescent children were recruited into this within-subjects, crossover study. Participants engaged in an aerobic exercise condition and a seated rest condition in a counterbalanced order. After both conditions, participants completed a flanker task, with concurrent EEG data collection. The results revealed no differences in midfrontal theta ERS following acute aerobic exercise as compared with following the control condition. However, midfrontal theta ERS was higher during congruent trials relative to incongruent trials following control condition but not following aerobic exercise. Collectively, acute bouts of aerobic exercise do not appear to modulate the control and behavioral monitoring processes indexed by midfrontal theta ERS during cognitive control in children.

Kreativnost i izvedba Simonova zadatka

The aim of this study was to examine performance in the Simon task regarding individual differences in creative behavior measured by The Inventory of Creative Activities and Achievements (ICAA; Diedrich et al., 2018). The study included 105 students and 57 younger working-age individuals (from 19 to 36 years of age). Three-way analyses of variance were carried out on the reaction time in the Simon task given the congruence of the previous and current trials and below/above average results on creative activities and achievements scales. The reaction time in the Simon task was on average shorter in congruent than in incongruent trials (the Simon effect), as well as in the trials preceded by congruent than in those preceded by incongruent trials. The Simon effect was only present in trials preceded by a congruent trial, while reaction times in the trials preceded by incongruent trials were shorter in incongruent than in congruent trials (the Gratton effect). However, neither the Simon nor the Gratton effect were more pronounced within more or less creative participants, but the participants with an above average result on the scale of creative activities reacted on average more slowly than individuals with below the average score. The correlations between the scores on the creativity measures and the different reaction times and indices of the Simon and Gratton effect were not significant. The expected effects related to the Simon task have been obtained in this study, but further research is needed to try to replicate the findings regarding the flexibility of inhibitory control measured by performance in the Simon task and creative behavior.

The Interaction between Congruency and Numerical Ratio Effects in the Nonsymbolic Comparison Test.

The nonsymbolic comparison task is used to investigate the precision of the Approximate Number Sense, the ability to process discrete numerosity without counting and symbols. There is an ongoing debate regarding the extent to which the ANS is influenced by the processing of non-numerical visual cues. To address this question, we assessed the congruency effect in a nonsymbolic comparison task, examining its variability across different stimulus presentation formats and numerical proportions. Additionally, we examined the variability of the numerical ratio effect with the format and congruency. Utilizing generalized linear mixed-effects models with a sample of 290 students (89% female, mean age 19.33 years), we estimated the congruency effect and numerical ratio effect for separated and intermixed formats of stimulus presentation, and for small and large numerical proportions. The findings indicated that the congruency effect increased in large numerical proportion conditions, but this pattern was observed only in the separated format. In the intermixed format, the congruency effect was insignificant for both types of numerical proportion. Notably, the numerical ratio effect varied for congruent and incongruent trials in different formats. The results may suggest that the processing of visual non-numerical parameters may be crucial when numerosity processing becomes noisier, specifically when numerical proportion becomes larger. The implications of these findings for refining the ANS theory are discussed.

Evidence for conflict monitoring during speech recognition in noise.

During difficult tasks, conflict can benefit performance on a subsequent trial. One theory for such performance adjustments is that people monitor for conflict and reactively engage cognitive control. This hypothesis has been challenged because tasks that control for associative learning do not show such "cognitive control" effects. The current study experimentally controlled associative learning by presenting a novel stimulus on every trial of a picture-speech conflict task and found that performance adjustments still occur. Thirty-one healthy young adults listened to and repeated words presented in background noise while viewing pictures that were congruent or incongruent (i.e., phonological neighbors) with the word. Following conflict, participants had higher word recognition (+17% points) on incongruent but not congruent trials. This result was not attributable to posterror effects nor a speed-accuracy trade-off. An analysis of erroneous responses showed that participants made more phonologically related errors than nonrelated errors only on incongruent trials, demonstrating elevated phonological conflict when the picture was a neighbor of the target word. Additionally, postconflict improvements appear to be due to better resolution of phonological conflict in the mental lexicon rather than decreased attention to the picture or increased attention to the speech signal. Our findings provide new evidence for conflict monitoring and suggest that cognitive control helps resolve phonological conflict during speech recognition in noise.

10 Pupil Dilation During the Stroop Task Offers a Sensitive and Scalable Biomarker of Locus Coeruleus Integrity

Objective:Neuronal dysfunction of the locus coeruleus (LC), the primary producer of norepinephrine, has been identified as a biomarker of early Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathophysiology. Norepinephrine has been implicated in attentional control, and its reduced cortical circulation in AD may be associated with selective attentional difficulties. Additionally, greater pupil dilation indicates greater effort needed to perform a cognitive task, and greater compensatory effort to perform the digit span task has been found in individuals at risk for AD. In this study, we examined associations between a neuroimaging biomarker of the LC and pupil dilation during the Stroop task as a sensitive measure of attentional control.Participants and Methods:64 older adults without dementia were recruited from the San Diego community (mean [SD] age = 74.3 [6.3]; 39 cognitively unimpaired and 25 with mild cognitive impairment). All participants underwent magnetic resonance imaging of the LC and generated behavioral data from a computerized Stroop task that included 36 incongruent trials (e.g., GREEN presented in red ink), 36 congruent trials (e.g., GREEN presented in green ink), and 32 neutral trials (e.g., LEGAL presented in green ink) in a randomized presentation. Mean pupil dilation for each trial (change relative to baseline at the start of each trial) was measured at 30 Hz using the Tobii X2-30 system (Tobii, Stockholm, Sweden) and averaged within each Stroop condition. Paired t-tests assessed for differences in mean pupil dilation across incongruent and congruent Stroop conditions. Iterative re-weighted least squares regression was used to assess the association between a rostral LC contrast ratio measure derived from manually marked ROIs and mean pupil dilation during incongruent trials divided by congruent trials, adjusting for age, sex, and education. Follow-up analyses also assessed the association of these variables with mean reaction time (RT) for incongruent trials divided by congruent trials.Results:Mean pupil dilation significantly differed across conditions (t = 3.74, mean difference = .13, 95% CI [.06, .20]) such that dilation was higher during the incongruent condition (mean [SD] dilation = .18 [.38] mm) relative to the congruent condition (mean [SD] dilation = .05 [.35] mm). A significant association was observed between pupil dilation and LC contrast ratio, such that increased levels of mean dilation during incongruent trials relative to congruent trials were observed at lower levels of LC contrast ratio (i.e., lower LC integrity; r = -.37, 95% CI [-.55, -.13]). This association was not observed for mean dilation during only congruent trials (r = -.08, 95% CI [-.31, .18]). Additionally, neither LC contrast ratio [r = .24, 95% CI [-.02, .46]) nor mean incongruent/congruent pupil dilation (r = .14, 95% CI [-.13, .37]) were associated with incongruent/congruent RT.Conclusions:Findings suggest that increased pupil dilation during a demanding attentional task is indicative of increased compensatory effort needed to achieve the same level of performance for individuals with reduced LC biomarker integrity. Pupillometry assessment offers a low-cost, non-invasive, and scalable biomarker of LC dysfunction that may be indicative of preclinical AD.

59 Investigating the Relationship Between Neuropsychological Test Performance and Electrophysiological Measures of Semantic Functioning in Alzheimer's Disease.

Objective:Improving the timeline for intervention in Alzheimer's disease (AD) has considerable potential to delay and mitigate disability and suffering. Neuropsychological assessment is useful for distinguishing AD from normal aging and other dementias but is less useful in preclinical detection due to its limited sensitivity. The N400 (N4), a language-based EEG event-related potential (ERP) related to semantic functioning, is a promising candidate marker of AD with potential to improve early detection and monitoring of AD. For example, studies have shown that individuals with AD show a reduced N4 "effect"—a smaller difference in the size of the N4 to semantically congruent vs. incongruent word-pairs. The goal of this study is to assess the presence of the N4 effect in healthy seniors, and those with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or mild AD, and to evaluate associations between performance on the Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status (RBANS) and the N4 across these samples.Participants and Methods:Fifty older adults (intact=27, combined MCI/mild AD group=23; "impaired") completed neuropsychological testing, including the RBANS, as part of a larger study. Participants were re-contacted and returned for EEG assessment between several weeks to one year later. During EEG recording, participants completed a word-pair judgement paradigm, which involved distinguishing between semantically congruent and incongruent word-pairs. Data was collected and analyzed according to customized N4 analysis scripts provided as part of ERPCORE, an online resource for acquiring and analyzing common ERP components (Kappenman et al., 2021; https://osf.io/thsqg/). The change in N4 amplitude between congruent and incongruent trials (the N4 effect) was used as an index of participants' semantic functioning. Participants' N4 effect was quantified using the mean amplitude from 300-550 milliseconds poststimulus at electrode Cz.Results:Repeated measures ANOVAs indicated a significant effect of trial type on the N400 amplitude in the intact individuals (F(1, 26)=77.66, p&lt;.001), which remained significant in the sample as a whole (F(1, 48)=65.18, p&lt;.001). Although intact participants numerically showed a larger N4 effect (intact: M=-4.02, SD=2.37; impaired: M=-2.60, SD=3.40), the expected group-by-trial interaction was not significant (F(1, 48)=3.01, p=.089). Correlational analyses revealed no significant associations between the N4 effect and the RBANS Total Scale scores (r=-.14, p=.32), nor for the Immediate Memory (r=-.002, p=.99), Visuospatial/Constructional (r=-.069, p=.63), Language (r=-.15, p=.30) Attention (r=-.21, p=.14), or Delayed Memory (r=-.18 p=.58) indexes.Conclusions:Results confirmed the presence of the N4 effect in intact participants and in the sample as a whole. Although the N4 effect was numerically smaller in the impaired group as expected, this difference was not significant in the present sample. Likewise, we observed no evidence for associations between the size of N4 effect and performance on RBANS indexes. Overall, the present study provides mixed evidence for the utility of the N4 as a biomarker in mild AD. Factors that may have contributed to the lack of associations between the N4 effect and the RBANS include the limited sample size and variable lengths of time between participants' initial cognitive assessments and EEG testing.

Total Sleep Deprivation Triggers a Compensatory Mechanism During Conflict Monitoring Process: Evidence From Event-Related Potentials.

Sleep deprivation impairs cognitive function and is accompanied by a simultaneous compensatory effect, one of the brain's capacities to maintain function in emergency situations. However, the time course of the compensatory effect is unclear. In this study, 22 male participants completed a pronunciation working memory task that included congruent and incongruent stimuli trials with EEG recordings before and after total sleep deprivation (TSD). Behavioral performance analysis showed that after TSD, the participants' reaction time (RT) was shortened, but accuracy was reduced significantly. Analysis of event-related potential (ERP) results showed that the amplitude of N2 (an early visual ERP) was larger (i.e., more negative) after TSD than at baseline. A significant interaction between congruency and sleep condition was seen. Compared to that before TSD, the increase in amplitude of P3 (a stimulus-induced positive deflection component) under an incongruent stimulus was larger than that under a congruent stimulus after TSD. Moreover, a significant negative correlation was found between P3 amplitude and RT. Our results suggest that TSD impairs cognitive function. Meanwhile, the brain activates a compensatory mechanism after TSD, which is comprehensive during the conflict-detection and information-updating stages. This study provides a fresh viewpoint for understanding how TSD affects cognitive function.

The Effect of Linguistic Code-switching on CognitiveInhibition in Bilingualism: Evidence from Stroop Tests

Linguistic code-switching is a common phenomenon among bilinguals that requires extensive executive control to manage two languages. However, limited research has specifically examined whether frequent code-switching enhances cognitive inhibition as measured by the Stroop test. Understanding this relationship has important implications for harnessing bilingual advantages in inhibition and executive functioning. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate whether bilingual adolescents who engage in code-switching demonstrate improved cognitive inhibition compared to monolingual peers. Participants were 81 Chinese-English bilinguals aged 14-18, who were assigned to English reading, Chinese reading, or mixed language reading groups. Participants then completed Stroop tests. Results revealed the mixed language group had significantly faster response times on incongruent Stroop trials compared to both monolingual groups, indicating enhanced cognitive inhibition from code-switching. No significant difference emerged between the English and Chinese groups, implying monolingual reading in either language does not differentially impact inhibition.