Proactive cues facilitate faster action reprogramming, but not stopping, in a response-selective stop signal task

Salomoni, Sauro E.; Gronau, Quentin F.; Heathcote, Andrew; Matzke, Dóra; Hinder, Mark R.; Heathcote, Andrew · 2023 · Scientific Reports

DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-46592-0

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Summary

This study investigates how proactive cues influence action inhibition and reprogramming in complex motor scenarios, specifically addressing inconsistencies in previous research on response-selective stopping. While simple stopping tasks are well-understood, less is known about inhibiting one component of a multi-component action (e.g., stopping a left-hand press while continuing a right-hand press). Prior studies using standard stop signal reaction time (SSRT) models yielded conflicting results regarding whether proactive cues speed up or slow down the inhibitory process. The authors argue that standard race models are inappropriate for selective stopping because they fail to account for the simultaneous initiation of a new response. To resolve this, the study employed a multi-modal approach combining behavioral data, electromyography (EMG), and a novel computational model. Thirty-seven healthy adults performed a bimanual response-selective stop signal task under reactive (no prior information) and proactive (cue indicating which hand might need to stop) conditions. The researchers used a fine-grained EMG algorithm to detect partial muscle bursts associated with cancelled actions and RT-generating bursts for executed responses. They also applied a Bayesian hierarchical "simultaneously inhibit and start" (SIS) model, which posits that a stop signal simultaneously triggers global inhibition of the initial bimanual action and the initiation of a new unimanual response. This method allowed for more accurate estimation of stopping latency and the effects of cueing on distinct motor processes. The results demonstrated that proactive cues significantly slowed initial bimanual responses and accelerated the subsequent unimanual responses, thereby reducing the "stopping delay" (the interference effect where successful stop trials are slower than go trials). EMG data confirmed that proactive cueing led to earlier onset of the re-initiated unimanual response and a higher proportion of trials with completely cancelled motor activity (fewer partial bursts). Crucially, both the EMG analysis of partial burst cancellation times and the SIS model fitting revealed that proactive cues had a negligible effect on the speed of the global stopping process itself. The best-fitting model constrained the stopping parameters to be invariant across conditions, while allowing go and reprogramming parameters to vary. These findings clarify that proactive cues facilitate faster action reprogramming by strategically slowing initial responses and speeding up the new selective response, rather than by accelerating the inhibitory mechanism. This resolves previous contradictions in the literature, which arose from the misuse of simple-stopping models that conflate stopping speed with response preparation. The study supports the theoretical framework that selective stopping involves simultaneous global inhibition and selective facilitation, providing a more precise understanding of how prior knowledge modulates complex motor control.

Key finding

Proactive cues reduce the stopping delay by slowing initial bimanual responses and speeding up unimanual reprogrammed responses, but they have a negligible effect on the speed of the inhibitory process itself.

Methodology

lab_experiment

Sample size: 37

Provenance

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Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant on 2026-06-10; verification: verified.

Topics

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• task switching