What am I doing? It depends

Actions can be identified at a range of levels, from higher level, outcome-related descriptions to lower level, movement-related descriptions. But how do these levels of identification influence the experience of control (agency) over a task? We addressed the relation between the level of action identification and agency using a hierarchical task modeled from typing. Participants memorized letter sequences and reported them by moving a cursor to targets that contained letters. To manipulate lower level (aiming) difficulty, the targets were either large or small. To manipulate higher level (memory) difficulty, the letter sequences were either constant or random within a block. We found effects of higher and lower level difficulty on agency and action identification. Moreover, we found interactive effects of higher and lower level difficulty on performance. We discuss these findings in terms of contributions to the study of agency, and some differences from the results of previous studies of action identification.

Files

Metadata

Work Title What am I doing? It depends
Subtitle agency and action identification
Access
Open Access
Creators
  1. Cory A. Potts
  2. Richard A. Carlson
License In Copyright (Rights Reserved)
Work Type Article
Publisher
  1. Psychologische Forschung
Publication Date April 11, 2021
Publisher Identifier (DOI)
  1. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-021-01510-9
Deposited July 15, 2021

Versions

Analytics

Collections

This resource is currently not in any collection.

Work History

Version 1
published

  • Created
  • Added Potts___Carlson_2021_Psychological_Research.docx
  • Added Creator Cory A. Potts
  • Added Creator Richard A. Carlson
  • Published
  • Updated
  • Updated
  • Updated