Age-related slowing of response selection and production in a visual choice reaction time task

A three-choice reaction-time task was used to investigate the source-of-stimulation effect, that is, the tendency for subjects to react faster and more accurately to a stimulus if the spatial locations of the stimulus and the response correspond than if they do not. Auditory stimuli varied on dimensions of tonal frequency and spatial location, although only the former was relevant for response selection. Responses were found to be faster for the conditions in which stimulus location and response location corresponded than for those in which they did not, but stimulus location had no effect on differences between the two hands with bimanual responses. These results support the hypothesis that the source-of-stimulation effect is due to response plans which interact at a level prior to the programming of the motor response.

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Response-Selection Processes in Paranoid and Nonparanoid Schizophrenia

Perceptual and Motor Skills ◽

10.2466/pms.1977.44.2.499 ◽

1977 ◽

Vol 44 (2) ◽

pp. 499-505 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Richard W. J. Neufeld

Keyword(s):

Reaction Time ◽

Choice Reaction Time ◽

Response Selection ◽

Reaction Time Task ◽

Choice Reaction Time Task ◽

Time Task ◽

Selection Processes ◽

Crt Response

Previous research (Marshall, 1973) has shown that the most pronounced component of deficit on a choice reaction time task among a mixed schizophrenic sample involved response-selection processes. Other evidence has indicated that paranoids may be more deficient in this respect than nonparanoids. Hence, it was hypothesized that the former subgroup of schizophrenics would display response-selection deficit while the latter subgroup would display either less or no deficit. Response-selection processes were re-examined using the CRT paradigm with comparisons carried out among paranoid and nonparanoid schizophrenics and a group of nonschizophrenic controls. Results indicated that only the paranoid schizophrenics displayed abnormally retarded response-selection operations, the nonparanoid schizophrenics being nonsignificantly discriminable from the controls. It was suggested that past evidence of CRT response-selection deficit among mixed schizophrenics might have been attributable primarily to the performance of the paranoids, whose performance appears to be adversely affected by an increase in the number of dimensions relevant to response selection.

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The Changing Pattern of Perceptual Analytic Strategies and Response Selection with Practice in a Two-Choice Reaction time task

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology ◽

10.1080/00335557843000025 ◽

1978 ◽

Vol 30 (3) ◽

pp. 417-427 ◽

Cited By ~ 42

Author(s):

Ben (C) Fletcher ◽

P. M. A. Rabbitt

Keyword(s):

Reaction Time ◽

Choice Reaction Time ◽

Response Selection ◽

Reaction Time Task ◽

Choice Reaction Time Task ◽

Connectionist Model ◽

Previous Response ◽

Perceptual Analysis ◽

Time Task ◽

Primary Hypothesis

In the experiment reported here the primary hypothesis proposed, which was supported by the data, was that subjects performing a two-choice self-paced serial RT task would learn to change their strategy of perceptual analysis of signals presented to them as they became progressively more practised. Early in practice each signal is identified as a particular state of the display and an appropriate response is then made. Well practised subjects, however, select their responses by reference to the change or constancy between successive displays. This strategy implies that the assumptions made by the generally accepted simple S-R connectionist model of two-choice serial RT may be quite misleading, since the choice of any particular response must be determined not only by the display state but also by what the previous response had been.

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