A PSYCHOPHYSIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF DEVELOPMENTAL DIFFERENCES IN THE ABILITY TO RESIST INTERFERENCE

Age-related changes in visual selective attention were studied using an arrow variety of the Eriksen flanker paradigm: Children (5-12 years old) and adults responded to a centrally presented arrow surrounded by congruent or incongruent arrows or neutral diamonds. Overt performance measures showed the typical increase in response latency and error incidence to incongruent stimulus arrays relative to congruent and neutral arrays. Analysis of measures derived from event-related brain potentials suggested that incongruent arrays delay both stimulus evaluation and response activation. The interference effect on stimulus evaluation did not discriminate between age groups. By contrast, the interference effect on correct response activation showed a pronounced age-related reduction. This pattern of findings points to response competition and inhibition as major sources of developmental differences in the ability to resist interference. It was concluded that the current findings are consistent with late-selection or hierarchical models of selective attention development.