Article révisé par les pairs
| Résumé : | The aim of the study was to examine whether or not choice reaction time (RT) depends on catch-trial frequency. The results show a significant increase of mean RT as the catch-trial frequency increases from zero to 0.77. A similar effect has been shown previously in simple RT experiments. The interpretation of these effects on simple RT supposes the existence of an inverse relationship between catch-trial frequency and anticipated response frequency. This cannot be extended to a choice RT task since the subject must wait for the stimulus to arrive before deciding which is the appropriate response. The interpretation of the present results proposes preparatory adjustments prior to the arrival of the stimulus. Sequential effects found suggest that (1) the tendency to prepare for a stimulus at a trial was stronger when a stimulus was presented at the preceding trial than after a catch-trial, and (2) the frequency effects of catch-trials can be explained completely in terms of sequential effects. © 1978. |
