Perception and response selection are core processes in the generation of overt behavior. Selective attention is known to facilitate behavioral performance by altering perceptual processes. It remains unclear, however, whether selective attention can aid the resolution of response conflict, and if so, at what stage of processing this takes place. In two experiments, an endogenous cuing task was combined with a flanker task to assess the interaction of selective attention with response selection. The results of Experiment 1 show that cuing reduces the flanker-congruency effect when the cue and flanker are presented in close temporal proximity to each other. The results of Experiment 2 demonstrate that pre-but not post-cuing the target reduced the congruency effect, showing that selective attention can affect performance, but is ineffective once stimulus processing has proceeded to response selection. Our results provide evidence that selective attention can aid the resolution of response conflict by altering early perceptual processing stages.Keywords Attention: Selective . Perception and ActionThe ability to interact with objects in our environment is an important everyday skill. Without this ability, we would be unable to drive a car or pick up a coffee mug. It is commonly assumed that there are three main stages of information processing that underlie interactions with the environment: stimulus perception, response selection, and response execution (Sternberg, 1969). Each of these stages is necessary, since an object must be identified and a response toward the object chosen in order for a response to be carried out. Successful behavior requires mechanisms to selectively attend to task-relevant stimuli, and to resolve competition between different response options. The cognitive system is unable to process all of the information that is available in the environment at once, and mechanisms of selective attention ensure prioritization of goal-relevant information over irrelevant information (e.g., Deutsch & Deutsch, 1963;Lavie, 1995;Treisman, 1969). Similarly, during response-selection stages, conflict might arise between goal-relevant responses and goal-irrelevant responses (e.g., Kornblum, Hasbroucq & Osman, 1990;Ridderinkhof, 2002). This might also involve prioritization of the goal-relevant information. The central question addressed in the present studies was how selective visual attention assists in the resolution of response competition.Competition during response selection is often studied with flanker paradigms (Eriksen & Eriksen, 1974) in which participants respond to a target stimulus while ignoring any surrounding task-irrelevant stimuli. If the flankers are associated with a different response (incongruent flankers) than that appropriate for the target stimulus, task performance is poorer as compared with when the target is flanked by neutral distractors that are not associated with a response (e.g., Eriksen & Eriksen, 1974;Eriksen & Schultz, 1979;Ridderinkhof & van der Molen, 1995). This f...