A conflict monitoring account of the control mechanisms involved in dual-tasking

The present study investigates the cognitive mechanism underlying the control of interference during dual-task coordination. Partially inspired by the Conflict Monitoring Hypothesis (Botvinick et al., 2001), we test the assumption that dual-task interference is resolved by a top-down adaptation mechanism that is responsible for behavioral adjustments in the prioritization of the coordinated tasks. In a series of two experiments, we measured conflict adaptation to the so-called Gratton effect—the decrease in dual-task interference following incompatible trials. In Experiment 1 the primary task was a low demand choice discrimination task, while in Experiment 2 the primary task was an updating task that imposes a continuous load on working memory. The secondary task was a tone discrimination task. Both experiments consistently showed that the response conflict of previous trial triggers top-down behavioral adjustments that reduce interference. We conclude that dual-task interference shows strong similarities to Stroop-like types of cognitive interference, namely in the way that suboptimal performance is dealt with by the cognitive system