Sequential response organization in humans or 'how do people get their act together'

摘要

Abstract: Sequential response organization is assessed experimentally based on the degree of association between behavioral elements in a simple binary choice task. The thermodynamic formalism for dynamical systems provides a quantitative framework to determine fluctuations of response organization. The order parameter approach proposed by Haken is used to extract organizational principles that determine the association of consecutive behavioral elements. The results indicate that (1) the fluctuations of local dynamical entropies are significantly larger in humans compared to the randomized data sets; (2) the switching and duration order parameter determine critically the sequential organization of response elements in the binary choice task paradigm. Thus, sequential response organization is characterized by the predictable repetition of similar behavioral actions that are initiated frequently or predictable repetitive switching between different behavioral actions. In contrast, unpredictable sequences of behavioral actions emerge from infrequently initiated and moderate switching between response elements.!35