Similar to other executive functions, inhibitory control is thought to be a dynamic process that can be influenced by variations in task difficulty. However, little is known about how different task parameters alter inhibitory performance and processing as a task becomes more difficult. The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of varying task difficulty, via manipulation of reacti...

A new parameter for estimating the difficulty of a continuous speech recognition task, called speech decoding difficulty, is presented in this work. It is obtained from the language model defined for the recognition task and the phonetic similarity between the transcriptions of the words that make up the vocabulary used. Two variants of the proposed task difficulty measure are introduced: ideal...

Sequential modulation of congruency effects in conflict tasks indicates that cognitive control quickly adapts to changing task demands. We investigated in four experiments how this behavioral congruency-sequence effect relates to different levels of perceived task difficulty in a flanker and a Stroop task. In addition, online measures of pupil diameter were used as a physiological index of effo...