Commonsense and theorizing about action control agree in assuming that human behavior is (mainly) driven by goals, but no mechanistic theory of what goals are, where they come from, and how they... Show moreCommonsense and theorizing about action control agree in assuming that human behavior is (mainly) driven by goals, but no mechanistic theory of what goals are, where they come from, and how they impact action selection is available. Here I develop such a theory that is based on the assumption that GOALs guide Intentional Actions THrough criteria (GOALIATH). The theory is intended to be minimalist and parsimonious with respect to its assumptions, as transparent and mechanistic as possible, and it is based on representational assumptions provided by the Theory of Event Coding (TEC). It holds that goal-directed behavior is guided by selection criteria that activate and create competition between event files that contain action-effect codes matching one or more of the criteria-a competition that eventually settles into a solution favoring the best-matching event file. The criteria are associated with various sources, including biological drives, acquired needs (e.g., of achievement, power, or affiliation), and short-term, sometimes arbitrary, instructed aims. Action selection is, thus, a compromise that tries to satisfy various criteria related to different driving forces, which are also likely to vary in strength over time. Hence, what looks like goal-directed action emerges from, and represents an attempt to satisfy multiple constraints with different origins, purposes, operational characteristics, and timescales-which among other things does not guarantee a high degree of coherence or rationality of the eventual outcome. GOALIATH calls for a radical break with conventional theorizing about the control of goal-directed behavior, as it among other things questions existing cognitive-control theories and dual-route models of action control. Show less
Two different variations of joint task switching led to different conclusions as to whether co-acting individuals share the same task-sets. The present study aimed at bridging this gap by... Show moreTwo different variations of joint task switching led to different conclusions as to whether co-acting individuals share the same task-sets. The present study aimed at bridging this gap by replicating the version in which two actors performed two different tasks. Experiment 1 showed switch costs across two actors in a joint condition, which agreed with previous studies, but also yielded even larger switch costs in a solo condition, which contradicted the claim that actors represent an alternative task as their own when it is carried out by the co-actor but not when no one carries it out. Experiments 2 and 3 further examined switch costs in the solo condition with the aim to rule out possible influences of task instructions for and experiences with the other task that was not assigned to the actor. Before participants were instructed on the second of the two tasks, switch costs were still obtained without a co-actor when explicit task names ("COLOUR" and "SHAPE") served as go/nogo signals (Experiment 2), but not when arbitrary symbols ("XXXX" and "++++") served as go/nogo signals (Experiment 3). The results thus imply that switch costs depend on participants' knowledge of task cues being assigned to two different tasks, but not on whether the other task is performed by a co-actor. These findings undermine the assumption that switch costs in the joint conditions reflect shared task-sets between co-actors in this procedure. Show less
Attitudes (or opinions, preferences, biases, stereotypes) can be considered bindings of the perceptual features of the attitudes' object to affective codes with positive or negative connotations,... Show moreAttitudes (or opinions, preferences, biases, stereotypes) can be considered bindings of the perceptual features of the attitudes' object to affective codes with positive or negative connotations, which effectively renders them "event files" in terms of the Theory of Event Coding. We tested a particularly interesting implication of this theoretical account: that affective codes might "migrate" from one event file to another (i.e., effectively function as a component of one while actually being part of another), if the two files overlap in terms of other features. We tested this feature-migration hypothesis by having participants categorize pictures of fictitious outer space characters as members of two fictitious races by pressing a left or right key, and to categorize positive and negative pictures of the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) as positive and negative by using the same two keys. When the outer space characters were later rated for likability, members of the race that was categorized by means of the same key as positive IAPS pictures were liked significantly more than members of the race that was categorized with the same key as negative IAPS pictures - suggesting that affective feature codes from the event files for the IAPS pictures effectively acted as an ingredient of event files for the outer space characters that shared the same key. These findings were fully replicated in a second experiment in which the two races were replaced by two unfamiliar fonts. These outcomes are consistent with the claim that attitudes, opinions, and preferences are represented in terms of event files and created by feature binding. Show less
