On marching to two different drummers: Perceptual aspects of the difficulties.

Abstract

People have remarkable difficulty generating two responses that must follow different temporal sequences, unless the temporal patterns are simply related (e.g., periods in 2:1, 3:1 relation). For example, it is hard to tap to two conflicting rhythms presented concurrently (i.e., a polyrhythm) using the right and left hands (Klapp, 1979), or to tap while articulating a conflicting speech utterance (Klapp, 1981). The present experiments indicate that difficulties in processing conflicting rhythms occur even when people must (a) merely monitor the stimuli and indicate the termination of one rhythmic sequence or (b) tap with a single hand. Responding to polyrhythms is thus difficult even without multiple limb coordination. Furthermore, the difficulty of two-handed tapping to polyrhythms that involve two different tones was found to decrease as the pitch difference between the tones was decreased. This result indicates that the difficulty of rhythmic coordination can be perceptually manipulated in a striking fashion. Polyrhythmic performance thus provides an excellent opportunity for examining possible interactions of perceptual and motor organizations.

Effects of attentional set and rhythmic complexity on attending

“…In part this may be due to the very subtle timing differences among the three experimental rhythms that were, otherwise, equivalent. Using much more complex rhythms, Klapp et al (1985) did find faster reaction times to final elements of a binary rhythm than to those terminating a complex rhythm. But this cannot be the whole answer in the present case, because early in the session there was a significant advantage for the binary: People were reliably faster in responding to high-tone targets in the binary rhythm than to ones in the mixed rhythm when they had to divide their attending.…”

Working-memory and auditory localization: Demand for central resources impairs performance

“…This coordination is thought to result in a more successful use of resources, rather than a competition for these facilities (see Wickens, 1992). Certainly in the 536 MERAT AND GROEGER most extreme case, the outcome of such coordination is thought to be the performance of the two tasks as a single-task (Klapp, Hill, Tyler, Martin, Jagcinski, & Jones, 1985). Finally, Heuer (1996) states that when tasks are performed concurrently, they rely on the same timing control, and, consequently, performance is impaired if a slow task is paired with a fast task.…”

Hesitations in Continuous Tracking Induced by a Concurrent Discrete Task

“…In the present experiments, the infrequent auditory stimulus may "grab" attention, possibly through a mild form of the "startle reaction" (Landis & Hunt, 1939 According to integration theory (Klapp, Hill, Tyler, Martin, Jagacinski , ?>. Jones, 1985;Kramer, Wickens, & Donchin, 1985), (Navon & Gopher, 1979;Wickens, 1984b;Wickens, Sandry, & Vidulich, 1983).…”