Event-related potentials reveal multiple components of proactive and reactive control in task switching

Event-related potentials (ERPs) provide the researcher with superb temporal resolution, tracking neural activity at the scalp with millisecond precision. As behavioral measures usually only collect a response from the subject at the end of a sequence of events (e.g. an experimental trial in task switching, which consists of task cues and stimuli), inferences about the participant s responses to the various components of the trial are inevitably somewhat indirect. The use of ERP recording, on the other hand, allows the collection of electrophysiological measures through an experimental trial, whether or not a participant makes an overt response. This chapter examines what ERP effects say about the nature of proactive and reactive control processes that contribute to task switching performance. It focuses primarily on the cued-trials paradigm because, by providing control over the onset and duration of the preparation interval, it can temporally dissociate the contributions of proactive and reactive control processes on task switching performance.