Trial-to-trial sequential dependencies in a social and non-social Simon task

Abstract

Recent research has shown that joint-action effects in a social Simon task provide a good index of action co-representation. The present study aimed to specify the mechanisms underlying joint action by considering trial-to-trial transitions. Using non-social stimuli, we assigned a Simon task to two participants. Each was responsible for only one of two possible responses. This task was performed alone (Individual go/nogo task) and in cooperation with another person who was sitting alongside (Joint go/nogo task). As a further control task, we added a Standard Simon task. Replicating previous findings (Sebanz et al. in Cognition 88:B11-B21, 2003), we found no spatial compatibility effect in the Individual go/nogo task but we did find one in the Joint go/nogo task. A more detailed analysis showed that a sequential modulation of the Simon effect was present in both the Joint and the Individual go/nogo tasks. We found reliable Simon effects in trials following Simon compatible trials not only in the Joint go/nogo task but also to a somewhat smaller extent in the Individual go/nogo task. For both these go/nogo tasks, sequential modulation effects were stronger for nogo/go transitions than for go/go transitions. This suggests that low-level feature binding and repetition mechanisms contribute to the social Simon effect related to the specific requirement not to respond on nogo trials.

What is Shared in Joint Action? Issues of Co-representation, Response Conflict, and Agent Identification

“…However, recent findings by Liepelt and colleagues (2010) seem to favor the actor co-representation account. Liepelt et al (2010), using target position (left vs. right side of the screen) instead of pointing direction of fingers as irrelevant spatial information, investigated trial-to-trial sequential modulations of the joint Simon effect in order to get a more complete understanding of its underlying mechanisms (see Liepelt et al 2010, for details). Liepelt et al (2010) replicated Sebanz et al's (2003) findings, showing an overall Simon effect (on trial N) in the joint but not the individual condition of their single response go/nogo version of the Simon task.…”

Keys and seats: Spatial response coding underlying the joint spatial compatibility effect

“…This experimental setting of joint task performance elicited an SCE (a joint SCE, a.k.a. the social Simon effect; Sebanz et al, 2003), which is particularly surprising, given that SCEs are remarkably reduced or even absent when participants respond to only one task-relevant stimulus feature (e.g., only to red stimuli) by exclusively operating either the left or the right response button in an individual go/no-go task (Hommel, 1996a;Liepelt, Wenke, Fischer, & Prinz, 2011;Shiu & Kornblum, 1999). 1 On the basis of these initial findings, Sebanz et al (2003) considered joint SCEs as evidence for action co-representation: Following their account, participants not only form cognitive representations of their own action, but also of the coactor's action.…”

When humanoid robots become human-like interaction partners: Corepresentation of robotic actions.

“…The Simon Effect is absent when the participant has to respond to only one of the two stimuli disregarding the other (Individual Go/Nogo Task). When two participants share the Simon task, so that one participant responds to only one stimulus (e.g., square) and the other participant responds to the other stimulus (diamond), a Simon Humanoid robots become human-like partners 4 Effect is reintroduced, which is called the Social Simon Effect or SSE (Hommel, Colzato, & van den Wildenberg, 2009;Liepelt, Wenke, Fischer, & Prinz, 2011;Sebanz, Knoblich, Prinz, & Wascher, 2006). Although each participant has the same task as in an individual go/nogo situation, partnering the two individuals in a shared task setting reinstates the Simon Effect in each of them.…”