Plasticity of Task Switching in Childhood: Mechanisms and Sequential Progression

在瞬息万变的世界中，经常需要在不同的任务之间切换，以调整行为以适应不断变化的环境并实现长期目标。随着孩子们的成长，他们面临着越来越多需要在任务之间灵活切换的情况，比如从一节课切换到下一节课，寻找解决问题的替代方法，或者在听老师讲课时做笔记。然而，切换到不同的任务是有代价的：在高切换任务条件下，儿童比成年人反应更慢，犯更多的错误，这可能反映了认知控制过程及其潜在神经回路的长期发展。基于以往的研究表明，认知控制过程的年龄差异随着任务转换的练习而减小，本研究旨在阐明(a)儿童在练习过程中提高任务转换表现的机制；(b)这些改进中个体差异的前因。具体而言，我建议在本项目中检验：(I)相对于单任务训练或无任务训练组，练习任务转换是否能改善儿童（9-10岁）任务转换的不同认知控制成分；（ii）任务转换中与练习相关的改进在多大程度上反映了在练习之前参与的认知过程的更高效率，认知过程和支持任务转换的任务表征的性质的变化，或两者兼而有之；(3)个体在训练前的发展状态差异能否预测任务转换可塑性的个体差异。我将通过阐明行为和神经生理学理论和分析水平来解决这些研究问题。

In a rapidly changing world, switching between different tasks is often required to adjust behavior to changing circumstances and to achieve long-term goals. As children grow up, they face an increasing number of situations that require flexible switching between tasks, such as shifting mental gears from one lesson to the next, finding alternative ways to solve a problem, or taking notes while listening to a teacher. However, switching to a different task comes at a cost: children are slower and make more errors than adults under high-switch task conditions, presumably reflecting the protracted development of cognitive control processes and their underlying neural circuitry. Building on previous research suggesting that age differences in cognitive control processes decrease with task-switching practice, the proposed study aims at elucidating (a) the mechanisms that allow children to improve their task-switching performance during practice; and (b) the antecedents of individual differences in these improvements. Specifically, I propose to examine in this project: (i) whether practicing task switching improves different cognitive control components of task switching in children (9–10 years) relative to single-task training or no training groups; (ii) the extent to which practice-related improvements in task switching reflect greater efficiency of cognitive processes engaged prior to practice, changes in the nature of the cognitive processes and task representations supporting task switching, or both; (iii) whether individual differences in developmental status prior to training predict individual differences in task-switching plasticity. I will address these research questions by articulating behavioral and neurophysiological theories and levels of analysis.