Contextual recruitment of cognitive control in preadolescent children and young adults

Surrey, Caroline; Kretschmer-Trendowicz, Anett; Altgassen, Mareike; Fischer, Rico

doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2019.02.002

Cited by 10 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 81 publications

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“…These similar profiles suggest that children used the same neurocognitive processes as adults to monitor and resolve conflict but with less efficiency, and that theta oscillations likely play a key role in coordinating these processes across development (see also Adam et al, 2020). This is in line with growing research suggesting similar control adjustment dynamics in children and adults (Ambrosi et al, 2020;Gonthier et al, 2021;Larson et al, 2012;Surrey et al, 2019). However, some important differences in theta activity did emerge between children and adults.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 65%

Midfrontal theta oscillations and conflict monitoring in children and adults

Chevalier

Hadley

Balthrop

2021

Developmental Psychobiology

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Conflict monitoring is central in cognitive control, as detection of conflict serves as a signal for the need to engage control. This study examined whether (1) midfrontal theta oscillations similarly support conflict monitoring in children and adults, and (2) performance monitoring difficulty influences conflict monitoring and resolution. Children (n = 25) and adults (n = 24) completed a flanker task with fair or rigged response feedback. Relative to adults, children showed a smaller congruency effect on midfrontal theta power, overall lower midfrontal theta power and coherence, and (unlike adults) no correlation between midfrontal theta power and N2 amplitude, suggesting that reduced neural communication efficiency contributes to less efficient conflict monitoring in children than adults. In both age groups, response feedback fairness affected response times and the P3, but neither midfrontal theta oscillations nor the N2, indicating that performance monitoring difficulty influenced conflict resolution but not conflict monitoring.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 65%

Midfrontal theta oscillations and conflict monitoring in children and adults

Chevalier

Hadley

Balthrop

2021

Developmental Psychobiology

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“…The fact that PC effects were present in the 5- to 6-year-old group in all five experiments and in two different tasks suggests that this skill is already relatively reliable, even early in development. The fact that PC effects did not increase with age could also be seen as converging evidence that behavioral patterns of performance based on implicit cognitive control are relatively invariant throughout development (Larson et al, 2012; McDermott et al, 2007; Surrey et al, 2019; Wiersema et al, 2007; Wilk & Morton, 2012). On a related note, these results also confirm that preschoolers are capable of monitoring the difficulty of an ongoing task, at least at an implicit level; this is in line with a growing literature demonstrating early metacognitive skills (e.g., Paulus et al, 2013; Roebers, 2017); at least when supported by task cues rather than self-initiated (O'Leary & Sloutsky, 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 85%

“…Two studies have shown that preschoolers make fewer errors following new task rules when old and new rules conflict on a high proportion of trials, a conceptually close analogue to PC effects (Marcovitch et al, 2007; 2010). A couple of studies have also revealed PC effects in children from 9 years onward, with no change up to adulthood (Surrey et al, 2019; Wilk & Morton, 2012), leaving untouched the question of earlier ability. In this study, we focus on whether preschoolers can demonstrate PC effects.…”

Section: Developmental Evidence As a Window Into Explicit And Implici...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The first aspect of our study was to test whether ISPC and especially LWPC effects could be observed at all in this age group. As a point of reference, we also included 8- to 10-year-old children, an age category in which PC effects seem comparable to adult levels (Surrey et al, 2019; Wilk & Morton, 2012). The second aspect of our study was to test whether ISPC and LWPC effects increased from 5–6 years old to 8–10 years old.…”

Section: Developmental Evidence As a Window Into Explicit And Implici...mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Learning-based before intentional cognitive control: Developmental evidence for a dissociation between implicit and explicit control.

Gonthier¹,

Ambrosi²,

Blaye³

2021

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

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Cognitive control can be triggered by explicit or implicit events; it has been proposed that these two possibilities tap into dissociable mechanisms. In this study, we investigate this idea by testing whether young children, who struggle with explicitly triggered control, can demonstrate proportion congruency effects-which are based on implicit learning of task regularities and thus indicative of implicitly triggered control. In a series of five experiments, preschoolers indeed demonstrated significant proportion congruency effects, including both list-wide proportion congruency (LWPC) and item-specific proportion congruency (ISPC) effects, in a Stroop-like task and in a flanker task. These effects did not increase with age, contrary to what is typically observed for explicit control. These results demonstrate that young children show early evidence of cognitive control-including proactive control-when it is triggered by implicit events, at an age where explicit control, and particularly proactive control, is not yet functional. By showing evidence of an early ability for fine-grained adjustments of cognitive control when control cues are learned implicitly, these results support the proposed functional dissociation between explicit and implicit cognitive control.

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“…Indeed, most LSPC research has oriented the stimuli vertically, presumably based on Crump and colleagues' early work(Crump et al, 2006(Crump et al, , 2008Crump & Milliken, 2009) that defined their two location contexts as above and below fixation Crump et al (2006). did not specify why they chose this design, but what is clear is that the majority of subsequent LSPC research has also defined locations as above and below fixation (e.g.,Bugg et al, 2020;Crump et al, 2008Crump et al, , 2017Crump & Milliken, 2009;Diede & Bugg, 2016;Gottschalk & Fischer, 2017;Hübner & Mishra, 2016;Hutcheon & Spieler, 2017;Surrey et al, 2017Surrey et al, , 2019vel Grajewska et al, 2011;Vietze & Wendt, 2009;Weidler et al, 2021; but see, e.g.,King et al, 2012, for a left-right example).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

How is location defined? Implications for learning and transfer of location-specific control.

Weidler¹,

Pratt²,

Bugg³

2022

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Perfor

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Much research has explored location-specific proportion compatibility (LSPC) effects (i.e., how the appearance of a stimulus in certain locations can reactively trigger different attentional control settings) to elucidate mechanisms underlying reactive control. Recently, however, failures to reproduce key evidence showing transfer of LSPC effects (originally reported in Crump & Milliken, 2009) have called into question whether control per se supports these effects. Notably, Crump and Milliken (2009), and all studies attempting to reproduce their findings, presented stimuli in two locations, one above and one below fixation. Inspired by research on differences between horizontal and vertical meridians, we examined the consequences of defining location in this way compared with alternatives. Experiments 1 and 2 demonstrated that LSPC effects are robust when location is defined as left versus right and larger than when location is defined as upper versus lower, and additionally demonstrated LSPC effects for two locations within the same coarse spatial category (e.g., left vs. farther left). In Experiment 3, we aimed to reproduce Crump and Milliken's key findings using left and right locations for the first time. Critically, we found transfer of the LSPC effect to diagnostic items across two designs and the first evidence for a robust experiment wide LSPC effect for inducer items. Our findings support theories positing that LSPC effects reflect location-specific attentional control and more generally suggest that choosing a definition of location is not a minor methodological decision but critically impacts learning and transfer of location-specific attentional control. Public Significance StatementSuccessfully accomplishing daily tasks requires focusing on relevant, while ignoring irrelevant, stimuli, by employing attentional control. Prior research has shown that attentional control can be allocated differentially across different areas of space depending on where it is most needed (i. e., locations where there are more often irrelevant stimuli that must be ignored). Here we examine how relationships between the locations needing differential control (e.g., are they in different vertical categorical locations-upper vs. lower, different horizontal categorical locations-left vs. right, or within the same category-both within left) influence the allocation of attentional control and demonstrate that some spatial layouts naturally lend to more efficient flexible attentional control. In other words, the degree to which humans can vary the amount of attentional control they exert to accomplish certain tasks is dependent on where stimuli for these tasks appear.

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Contextual recruitment of cognitive control in preadolescent children and young adults

Cited by 10 publications

References 81 publications

Midfrontal theta oscillations and conflict monitoring in children and adults

Midfrontal theta oscillations and conflict monitoring in children and adults

Learning-based before intentional cognitive control: Developmental evidence for a dissociation between implicit and explicit control.

How is location defined? Implications for learning and transfer of location-specific control.

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