Task Moderates the Relationship Between the SNARC-Like Effect and OPE in the Processing of Ordinal Sequences When LTM and WM Sequences Overlap

LTM sequenceWM sequence additive-factor logic stimulus-response compatibilityPrevious studies have indicated that information from both the LTM sequence and WM sequence can systematically influence individual action control; however, it has not been determined how ordinal sequences influence individual action control when information from the LTM and WM sequences overlaps.The present study first activated WM by successively presenting five letters and subsequently investigated the above question in an LTM-sequence classification task (Experiment 1), a WM-sequence classification task (Experiment 2) and a letter-colour classification task (Experiment 3).The results showed that (1) both a SNARC-like effect relevant to the LTM sequence and an OPE relevant to the WM sequence were present in the LTM-sequence classification task.(2) Only the OPE was present in the WM-sequence classification task.(3) The SNARC-like effect was only present in the trials where the WM sequence was consistent and was reversed in the trials where the WM sequence was inconsistent; the OPE was only present when the LTM sequence-response was consistent but was absent when the LTM sequence-response was inconsistent.(4) The OPE and SNARClike effect interacted in the letter-colour classification task but did not interact in the LTM-sequence or WM-sequence classification task.These results imply that the task determines (1) how the ordinal sequence influences individual action control and (2) whether the LTM sequence and WM sequence are encoded in the same stage (parallel processing) or in different stages (serial processing).