Dual tasking

Session chaired by Christoph Naefgen

Multimodal multitasking: The influence of modality compatibility in the context of task-switching and dual-tasking

Symposium organized by Denise N. Stephan and Erik Friedgen

Talking on a cell-phone while driving ‐ this classic multitasking example indicates that we are acting in a multimodal environment choosing from a vast variety of possible responses. While numerous studies demonstrated that multitasking is costly, these multitasking costs vary substantially depending on the specific modality mappings (i.e., compatibility) even if the degree of sensory and motor interference is equated across conditions. More specifically, performing multiple modality-compatible tasks either simultaneously (i.e., dual task) or in alternation (i.e., task switching) over a short time range leads to less performance costs than performing incompatible tasks. To explain this influence of modality compatibility the ideomotor idea is embraced, suggesting that actions are preceded by the anticipation of their sensory consequences. Accordingly, it is argued that stimuli matching the anticipated response consequences in terms of modality are modality-compatible (e.g., vocal responses generate auditory effects, i.e., auditory-vocal tasks are modality-compatible). This symposium provides an overview of the current state of the art followed by the new and diverse insights regarding modality compatibility, like the role of natural effects of the responses (i.e., sound of one's own speech) in contrast to inducing action effects experimentally, the effect of modality compatibility on voluntary task choices, the influence of fatigue on modality-compatibility effects, the impact of modality compatibility on between-task adjustments, as well as possible training effects. Against this background, different explanations for the cause of modality-compatibility effects ‐ a monitoring bottleneck, shortened central stages, resource competition, or crosstalk ‐ will be discussed.

Action and cognitive control

Session chaired by Christina U. Pfeuffer

Perception and action in sports

Symposium organized by Iris Güldenpenning and Andrea Polzien

Action planning in sports is based on the perception of mostly complex situations and the intention to achieve a certain goal. Therefore, the study of the interplay between perception and action is a central topic of sports psychology. A particularly relevant aspect of perception in sport is anticipation, that is, the prediction of perceived actions. To make the right decisions, athletes, but also referees, rely on different sensory modalities (e.g., visual, auditory, tactile) as well as contextual information. In the first presentation, Müller and colleagues speak about the use of auditory and contextual information for anticipating ball flight in tennis. Following this, Meyer and colleagues show that the anticipation of the direction of penalty kicks is facilitated when a weight is attached to the kicking leg of the shooters. Wühr and Memmert studied the offside decisions of referees and were able to show that a better contrast between the background (i.e., football turf) and the players (i.e., the jersey color) leads to more offside decisions. In basketball, timeouts are used to give tactical instructions to the players. The fourth presentation by Krause and Weigelt focuses on how different rotation angles of visual tactic boards in basketball affect the information processing and execution performance of athletes and novices. Athletes not only use different sensory and contextual information to anticipate actions, but also use deceptive actions to hinder their opponents' anticipation performance. The question arises whether the execution of a deceptive action comes with a cost for the deceptive player. Böer and colleagues address this question in the fifth talk, which examines the cost of performing a head fake in basketball.

From coordinating bodies to coordinating minds – Decision making processes in joint action

Symposium organized by Luke McEllin and Arianna Curioni

From dancing tango to moving office furniture, many of our daily interactions involve joint actions whereby we coordinate our actions in space and time in order to achieve individual and shared goals. Whilst the sensorimotor processes that guide action coordination, such as motor planning, action prediction, and movement adaptation are well understood, the decision-making processes that support joint action have been relatively less investigated. This is surprising considering the multitude of decisions that we need to make in social settings, even before we start to coordinate with each other. Deciding who to interact with and who to avoid, judging the properties of objects in the environment in light of each other's perspectives, and figuring out how to distribute effort between actors, are crucial in ensuring the interaction runs smoothly. Sometimes we even need to consider whether or not it's worth carrying out a task jointly in the first place. This symposium aims to advance our understanding of the decision-making processes involved in joint action by presenting several empirical studies that explore how actors deal with the different decisions they are faced with, and how these decisions affect (and are affected by) the joint action. We will explore the mechanisms by which actors decide firstly whether or not to engage in a coordinated interaction (Talk 1), secondly who to interact with (Talk 2). We will then talk about how individual actors use their partner's perspective to make more accurate judgements (Talk 3), and how individuals use their partner's effort level in order to decide themselves how much effort to invest into a task (Talk 4). The last two talks will explore how efficiency (Talk 5) and fairness (Talk 6) influence decisions on task distribution.

Basal and early cognition – Thinking with no or little brain

Symposium organized by Jannes Freiberg and Julian Keil

Recently the scope of cognition research has broadened. In addition to the focus on the complex mammalian brains, mental faculties of life have been studied from molecules over unicellular organisms and plants to simple nervous systems. Findings in all these groups suggest that behavioral flexibility, memory and cognition are not exclusive to complex brains, but instead can be found in a multitude of organisms with simple nervous systems and those without neurons. This suggests that many cognitive adaptations may have evolved convergently in unrelated species, making cognition a trait of life itself. Here we report studies performed at Kiel University on cognition in flatworms and plants. These were conducted to investigate which cognitive traits may be similar to many forms of life. In flatworms, we can show that one of the earliest brains in evolution is capable of learning and may exhibit universal features of more complex animals like lateralization and ongoing neural oscillations in the EEG signal. Furthermore, we suggest that very different structures from another evolutionary pathway may achieve a comparable functionality to a nervous system. This is supported by two studies on plants, showing habituation and memory in two very different species.

Conducting chronometric research online: Examples, tools, and best practices from language and eye tracking research

Symposium organized by Anna K. Kuhlen and Kirsten Stark

In the wake of the pandemic, labs closed down and many researchers resorted to conducting their experiments online. Aside from supporting pandemic containment, online research comes with many other benefits compared to lab-based research, and is therefore likely to stay: Online studies promise greater efficiency in data collection, in particular when testing larger samples, and the possibility to reach out to a more heterogeneous subject population. In this symposium we will feature different approaches for running chronometric studies online. Our focus will be on best practice examples in fields that, upon first sight, may not lend themselves easily to online solutions and have therefore only recently begun to explore these potentials. For example, experiments relying on very precise measurements of reaction times or eye movements, experiments requiring the recording (and analysis) of overt speech and its tight synchronization with visual stimulus presentation, experimental settings that enable or evoke the impression of being in a social interaction, or experiments targeting sensitive populations. Our speakers have each innovated unique and creative approaches to address these challenges and will present their approaches alongside different platform combinations, for example jsPsych, SoSci Survey, Gorilla, and JATOS.

Instrumentation

Session chaired by Jan Crusius

Theory and methodology

Session chaired by Sebastian Musslick

Time and spatial perception

Session chaired by Anke Huckauf

Spatial cognition

Session chaired by Christiane Lange-Küttner

Multisensory perception

Session chaired by Christoph Schütz

Source memory

Symposium organized by Nikoletta Symeonidou and Hilal Tanyas

Source memory is a crucial cognitive function that enables us to remember episodic details of information. This symposium will bring together six researchers who will present recent evidence obtained from various substantive and methodological research questions about source memory. First, Tanyas et al. present an extension of the two-high-threshold multinomial processing tree model of source monitoring to response time data to measure the relative speeds of item and source memory in addition to item and source memory performance. Then, Kuhlmann et al. report recent results on the differences in patterns of item versus source forgetting, revealing that hippocampus-dependent source memory is more resilient to shorter-term interference-based forgetting but susceptible to longer-term decay-based forgetting (relative to item memory). Focusing on more applied source memory research, Kroneisen and Thielmann showed that especially people with low levels on the HEXACO personality factor "Agreeableness" had better source memory for cheaters. Following this, Symeonidou et al. present two studies investigating whether the age-related positivity bias found in item memory also shows in source memory for positive sources. Next, Schellhaas et al. query whether processing of faces in threatening contexts/sources can influence our automatic emotional reaction towards these faces in the absence of conscious recollection. Finally, Niedziałkowska et al. investigate memory processes that contribute to false recognition of distractors that share source features (e.g., category and color) with targets.

Working memory I

Session chaired by Klaus Oberauer

Test-potentiated learning: Recent research in the memory laboratory and applied educational settings

Symposium organized by Bernhard Pastötter

Testing potentiates learning and long-term retention. For instance, a direct benefit of testing, referred to as the (backward) testing effect, is the finding that retrieval practice of previously studied information improves its long-term retention more than other forms of reprocessing the information do (e.g., restudy or concept mapping). In addition, there are indirect benefits of testing. For instance, testing potentiates relearning of the previously studied information (test-potentiated learning with feedback) and also enhances new learning of subsequently studied other information (forward testing effect). The speakers of this symposium present their recent research on the benefits of testing, both in the memory laboratory (Abel, Kliegl, Pastötter) and applied educational settings (Glaser, Kubik, Weissgerber), examining mediating and moderating factors and addressing both theoretical and practical aspects.

Cognition in the context of language and culture I: Processing and representing linguistic information

Symposium organized by Annelie Rothe-Wulf

Commonly, cognitive and perceptual processes are investigated independently from the specific linguistic, social or cultural context. The two-part symposium intends to close this gap by focusing upon the interplay of language and cognition and by exploring the variability of cognitive processes based on diverse cultural, social or linguistic systems. This first session focusses on the processes involved when we perceive, encode, and represent linguistic information. The experiment of Gerwien and Stutterheim thoughtfully scrutinizes the cognitive processes fundamental to verbal interference effects which are frequently used to investigate language-cognition interactions. In addition, Beck and Konieczny will shed light on the way we perceive and process language by examining the connection of eye-movements and rhythmic subvocalization during silent reading of rhymed language. Using saccadic and mouse tracking measures, Marberg et al. investigate top-down and bottom-up factors that moderate the patterns of attention allocation when generating gist. The final three talks will account for the impact of social, cultural and communicative contexts on cognition.  Investigating adults and children in German or Arabic language contexts, Schlenter and Penke scrutinize the way animacy of noun words and the literacy of participants affect performance in a picture naming task. Feldmeth presents a series of four experiments that examine whether linguistically represented gender characteristics influence perspective taking in the action-sentence compatibility effect paradigm. Finally, the study of temporal referencing representations of Herb and Rothe-Wulf intends to unravel linguistic influences on cognition by manipulating the specific language context and by scrutinizing variations in the dominant language.

Cognition in the context of language and culture II: Diversity across domains and human development

Symposium organized by Annelie Rothe-Wulf

What factors of linguistic and cultural diversity might drive differences in cognitive processes? How does culturally and linguistically embedded cognition evolve during human development? What methods can we apply to tackle these questions across domains? The second part of the symposium attempts to catch a glimpse of possible research approaches across a variety of domains that are capable to respond to these questions. Kuhlen and Rahman introduce the shared picture-word interference paradigm for two participants that uncovers the influence of social interaction on language processing. Jurkat and Kärtner look at the role of language for the development of holistic vs. analytical attention styles in 4- to 9-year-old children, thus exploring two fundamental concepts of cross-cultural research.  Investigating space-pitch associations of Turkish and Dutch children, Dolscheid et al. provide evidence for cross-cultural similarities in the acquisition of thickness-pitch associations, but variability for the development of height-pitch terminology. Considering the domains of space and time, Heer and Rothe-Wulf investigate to what extent temporal concepts of Aymara-Spanish speakers vary with changes in the linguistic contexts. In line with these findings, Dudojć and Bender show the prevalence of cultural diversity in finger counting systems highlighting the variability in numeral cognition and discussing the impact of finger counting habits and notational systems on cognitive number processing. Finally, the symposium concludes with the overarching talk of Straffon and Øhrn looking at the co-evolution of cognition and culture by investigating how human technologies evolved during human evolution and what cognitive capabilities are required for these accomplishments.

Language and reading

Session chaired by Eva Belke

An interdisciplinary view on trust processes in human-technology interaction

Symposium organized by Johannes Kraus and David Scholz

Trust as a subjective prerequisite for interpersonal reliance has gained importance in the application to the interaction with technology in various fields (e.g., AI-based diagnostic, automated driving, human-robot interaction). The goal of this symposium is bringing together researchers from different psychological domains investigating trust processes in technology interaction. With this, we hope to initiate a fruitful discussion to enhance communication and consensus in theorizing and methods in different fields of applied psychological trust research. The first talk of Kraus introduces the Three Stages of Trust framework as a psychological framework for experimentally investigating trust in the interaction with technological systems. The second talk of Scholz et al. introduces a validation study of a propensity to trust scale along with implications for experimental trust in technology research. The third talk of Schlicker et al. presents a study in which the role of prior experience and explanation styles on trust in automated decision making. The fourth talk of Langer et al. presents a study in which formation and calibration of trust in human- vs. technology-based personnel selection over time were compared. The fifth talk of Sondern et al. summarize an experiment in which the effects of a human and an AI in job negotiations on trust were compared. In the sixth talk of Heinrich et al. an online study is presented, which indicated higher trust levels for a cooperative vs. non-cooperative driving automation and a conservative automated driving style. Taken together, the six talks present interdisciplinary work on the role of psychological processes involved in formation and calibration of technology trust and compare human-human and human-technology trust.

Scalable interactions

Symposium organized by Anke Huckauf, Marian Sauter, and Tobias Grundgeiger

The global advancement of ubiquitous computing environments shapes our day-to-day interactions. Notebooks, smartphones, desktop computers, cars, intelligent lighting, or multi-room entertainment systems offer a plethora of interaction techniques using touch, voice, mouse, gestures, or gaze. The shift from interacting with dedicated "computers" to interacting with distributed ensembles of computational devices (so-called pervasive computing environments) will fundamentally change our understanding of interacting with a "system". While the trend towards pervasive computing environments is already apparent, we have a scant understanding of how to scale interaction paradigms to assure for recognition and comparable functioning, when the number, diversity and complexity of devices increase. In the DFG priority program 2199 "Scalable Interaction Paradigms for Pervasive Computing Environments", an interdisciplinary consortium investigates scalable interaction paradigms. From a psychological perspective, relevant questions address design issues as well as effects of various ways of scaling interaction in pervasive environments. In this symposium, we present project-related research that is of special interest to experimental psychologists. In particular, we show how to investigate crowd attention in large online environments (Marian Sauter et al), how interactions with technology in safety-critical domains (i.e. anesthesiology) shape user experience (Anna Hohm et al), how drones can be used to facilitate interactions in virtual and mixed reality (Matthias Hoppe et al), how sensory illusions can be used to enrich haptic experiences (Marco Kurzweg et al) and finally, how we can further study technology interactions in large dynamic social contexts (Alarith Uhde et al).

Virtual reality and human-machine interaction

Session chaired by Melissa Le Hoa Võ

Same, but different: Overlap and distinctions of process tracing methods

Symposium organized by Rima-Maria Rahal

Process tracing methods are increasingly used to gain a closer understanding of the dynamics underlying cognitive processes and to allow for more fine-grained tests of theoretical predictions. They comprise many different tools, including eye-tracking, and the recording of movement trajectories in decision tasks (e.g., mouse-tracking). Each method has different prerequisites and advantages, and some of the methods may capture different processes, including information acquisition, information processing, and information weighting. This symposium aims to provide an overview of the current state of process tracing studies, providing an opportunity to discuss methodological and theoretical challenges when using different process tracing techniques. We will search for common ground and unique advantages of different process tracing methods. Specifically, two individual talks focus on studying information processing in situations of advice taking via eye-tracking (Fiedler), and on understanding the estimation process of judgments influenced by anchoring via mouse-tracking (Schulte-Mecklenbeck). Two further talks focus on inferences that can be drawn from movement tracking, comparing implications of curvature trajectories in comparison to reaction time analyses (Wulff), and comparing computer mouse behavior and self-reports (Rahal). The final talk uses two process tracing methods, eye-tracking and mouse-tracking, and discusses the insights that can be drawn from jointly modeling these data, as well as the advantages and challenges of this approach (Frame).

Methods of decision-making research

Session chaired by Sebastian Horn

Decisions from experience

Session chaired by Veronika Zilker

More than “truth by repetition” - Novel insights on the effects of repeating information

Symposium organized by Felix Speckmann and Anne Irena Weitzel

Judging a given statement as true or false is an important but non-trivial task that people perform every day. In times of fake news, conspiracy theories, alternative facts, and misinformation campaigns, it can be difficult to correctly judge the truthfulness of a statement. This judgment process is influenced by repetition: People are more likely to believe repeated information than novel information. This effect is called the “repetition-induced truth effect” or simply the “truth effect”. Understanding the underpinnings of and the processes involved in the truth effect is highly relevant because it can lead to effective interventions targeted at reducing the credibility of false information. In this symposium, we present our work on various aspects of the truth effect while also going beyond mere truth judgments to include different effects of repetition. First, Teresa Garcia-Marques will present work on the attenuation of the truth effect when using emotional statements. Second, Christian Unkelbach will present research on the interplay of monetary incentives and advisors and how they influence truth judgments. Third, Anne Irena Weitzel talk about work on the evaluative consequences for advisors if their advice is incongruent with repetition. Fourth, Rita Silva will present research examining the influence of source trustworthiness on judgments of truth. Fifth, Felix Speckmann will present work on the effect of repetition on judgments of knowledge (i.e., “Did you know this before the experiment?”). Sixth, Jasmin Richter will show work examining the influence of repetition on perceived morality of statements.

Social cognition and behavior

Session chaired by Daniel W. Heck

Akzeptanz automatisierter Fahrzeuge

Symposium organized by Mark Vollrath

Zukünftige automatisierte Fahrzeuge werden sich noch lange Zeit im Mischverkehr mit menschlichen Verkehrsteilnehmern (andere Autofahrer, Fußgänger und Radfahrer) aufhalten und mit diesen interagieren. Für die Akzeptanz der Fahrzeuge und damit deren Gebrauch bzw. Kauf ist wichtig, dass sich einerseits die Insassen dieser Fahrzeuge (als Passagiere), andererseits die anderen menschlichen Verkehrsteilnehmer bei diesen Interaktionen und dem speziellen Verhalten der automatisierten Fahrzeuge wohl und sicher fühlen. In diesem Symposium werden Ansätze und Ergebnisse zu diesem Problemkreis diskutiert, um so zu einer menschzentrierten Entwicklung der Automation beizutragen. Von der psychologischen Seite her geht es um ein besseres Verständnis davon, welches Verhalten in Interaktionen im Verkehr angenehm und angemessen erscheint.

Sichere und komfortable Interaktion von Verkehrsteilnehmenden mit hochautomatisierten Fahrzeugen im Straßenverkehr

Symposium organized by Christine Sutter and Michael Oehl

Der Mischverkehr mit Fahrzeugen unterschiedlicher Automatisierungsgrade wird das Straßenverkehrsgeschehen der kommenden Jahre prägen. Eine wichtige Voraussetzung für die Verkehrssicherheit wird dabei die sichere, eindeutige und erwartungskonforme Interaktion der Verkehrsteilnehmenden mit hoch- und vollautomatisiert betriebenen Fahrzeugen sein ‐ im Fahrzeuginneren mit den Nutzenden des Fahrzeugs sowie außerhalb des Fahrzeugs mit umgebenden Verkehrsteilnehmenden. Diese Interaktion kann beispielsweise nach außen über externale Mensch-Maschine-Schnittstellen erfolgen, deren Designs bislang in eher nur 1-zu-1-Szenarien untersucht wurden. Inzwischen müssen diese Mensch-Maschine-Interaktionen allerdings ökologisch valider bspw. für urbanen Mischverkehr in zunehmend komplexeren Verkehrsszenarien erforscht werden. In den sechs ausführlichen Vorträgen des Symposiums werden dazu empirische Befunde vorgestellt und jeweils kurz diskutiert. Der Fokus wird besonders auf den verkehrspsychologischen Determinanten einer sicheren und komfortablen Interaktion für die Verkehrsteilnehmenden mit Fahrzeugen im hoch- oder vollautomatisierten Betrieb liegen. In der abschließenden Gesamtdiskussion im Plenum werden die Grenzen der Mensch-Maschine-Schnittstellen in komplexeren Verkehrsszenarien ausgelotet sowie die Bandbreite der Gestaltungs- und Evaluierungsmöglichkeiten einer sicheren und komfortablen Verkehrsraumnutzung durch Fahrzeugautomatisierung auf Grundlage der neuen empirischen Befunde erörtert.

Traffic psychology

Session chaired by Elisabeth Shi