Processes by category¶

The 19 categories, each with its scope statement and the processes filed under it. Every process is in exactly one category. The category pages add what is out of scope, open issues, and each process’s aliases, tasks and references. The alphabetical list has the same processes in name order.

Associative Learning and Reinforcement ¶

Learning of stimulus-stimulus, stimulus-response, and action-outcome contingencies under reinforcement; Pavlovian and instrumental conditioning; extinction; reversal; model-based and model-free reinforcement learning; reward prediction error.

Associative learning ¶

Learning of co-occurrence relations between stimuli or between stimuli and responses. Engaged by 7 tasksCausal Learning TaskContextual Cueing TaskDigit Symbol Substitution TaskImplicit Association TaskPaired Associates Learning TaskPavlovian Fear Conditioning TaskProbabilistic Classification Learning Task. No aliases.

Extinction ¶

Decrease in a previously reinforced response when reinforcement is withheld; a form of new inhibitory learning rather than erasure. Engaged by 1 taskPavlovian Fear Conditioning Task. 1 aliasextinction learning.

Goal-directed behavior ¶

Behavior that is sensitive to current outcome value, characteristic of action–outcome learning. Engaged by 1 taskInstrumental Conditioning Task. 1 aliasgoal-directed action.

Habit ¶

Behavior that is insensitive to the current value of its outcome, characteristic of stimulus–response learning. Engaged by 1 taskInstrumental Conditioning Task. 1 aliashabit learning.

Instrumental conditioning ¶

Learning that an action produces an outcome; also called operant conditioning. Encompasses both goal-directed (action–outcome) and habitual (stimulus–response) control, studied via reinforcement schedules and outcome-devaluation procedures. Engaged by 1 taskInstrumental Conditioning Task. 1 aliasOperant conditioning.

Model-based learning ¶

Reinforcement learning that uses an internal model of the environment’s transition and reward structure to plan. Engaged by 1 taskTwo-Stage Decision Task. 1 aliasmodel-based reinforcement learning.

Model-free learning ¶

Reinforcement learning from cached value estimates updated by prediction errors, without an explicit model of the environment. Engaged by 1 taskTwo-Stage Decision Task. 1 aliasmodel-free reinforcement learning.

Pavlovian conditioning ¶

Learning that a neutral stimulus predicts a biologically significant outcome, leading to conditioned responding. Engaged by 1 taskPavlovian Fear Conditioning Task. 2 aliasesclassical conditioningPavlovian.

Policy learning ¶

Direct learning of a mapping from states to actions without necessarily estimating values. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Reinforcement learning ¶

Learning to select actions that maximize cumulative reward through experience with reward prediction errors. Engaged by 7 tasksInstrumental Conditioning TaskIowa Gambling TaskMulti-Armed Bandit TaskProbabilistic Classification Learning TaskProbabilistic Selection TaskReversal Learning TaskTwo-Stage Decision Task. No aliases.

Reversal learning ¶

Relearning after contingencies between stimuli (or responses) and outcomes are switched. Engaged by 1 taskReversal Learning Task. No aliases.

Reward prediction error ¶

Signed difference between received and expected reward, instantiated by phasic midbrain dopamine firing. Engaged by 7 tasksCausal Learning TaskInstrumental Conditioning TaskIowa Gambling TaskMulti-Armed Bandit TaskProbabilistic Selection TaskReversal Learning TaskTwo-Stage Decision Task. No aliases.

Value learning ¶

Acquisition of the expected value of stimuli, actions, or states from experience with outcomes. Engaged by 2 tasksMulti-Armed Bandit TaskProbabilistic Selection Task. No aliases.

Auditory and Pre-Attentive Deviance Processing ¶

Pitch perception, auditory tone discrimination, acoustic processing, auditory perception; the family of processes indexed by MMN / oddball paradigms.

Acoustic processing ¶

Low-level analysis of sound, including frequency, intensity, and temporal structure. Engaged by 1 taskMismatch Negativity Task. No aliases.

Auditory perception ¶

Perception of sound, including pitch, timbre, loudness, and spatial location. Engaged by 2 tasksAuditory Masking TaskMismatch Negativity Task. No aliases.

Auditory tone discrimination ¶

Judgment of whether two tones differ in pitch, intensity, or duration. Engaged by 1 taskMismatch Negativity Task. 1 aliastone discrimination.

Pitch perception ¶

Perception of the highness or lowness of a sound, related to fundamental frequency. Engaged by 1 taskMismatch Negativity Task. 1 aliaspitch processing.

Awareness, Agency, and Metacognition ¶

Conscious experience of perception (perceptual awareness, masking); metacognitive monitoring and control; sense of agency; body ownership; interoceptive awareness; self-referential processing; feeling of knowing; judgment of learning; mind wandering; self-monitoring; attentional awareness.

Attentional awareness ¶

Awareness of the current focus and content of attention. Engaged by 2 tasksRapid Serial Visual Presentation TaskVisual Masking Task. No aliases.

Body ownership ¶

The experience that a body or body-part belongs to the self, revealed by multisensory illusions in which synchronous visuo-tactile or visuo-proprioceptive input shifts the perceived location of the body. Engaged by 1 taskBody Ownership Illusion Task. No aliases.

Feeling of knowing ¶

Judgment that information currently not retrievable would be recognized if presented. Engaged by 1 taskFeeling-of-Knowing Task. No aliases.

Interoceptive awareness ¶

Conscious perception of internal bodily signals such as heartbeat, respiration, and visceral state; indexed by heartbeat-detection accuracy, heartbeat-evoked potentials, and interoceptive sensibility measures. Engaged by 2 tasksBody Ownership Illusion TaskHeartbeat Detection Task. 1 aliasinteroception.

Judgment of learning ¶

Prediction of future memory performance made during or after encoding. Engaged by 1 taskJudgment-of-Learning Task. No aliases.

Masking ¶

Reduction in visibility or detectability of a target stimulus by a temporally or spatially adjacent masker. Engaged by 2 tasksAuditory Masking TaskVisual Masking Task. No aliases.

Metacognitive control ¶

Regulation of cognition based on metacognitive monitoring - study-time allocation, strategy selection, answer withholding, and restart decisions - linking second-order evaluation to first-order behavior. Engaged by 3 tasksDirected Forgetting TaskJudgment-of-Learning TaskThink/No-Think Task. No aliases.

Metacognitive monitoring ¶

Second-order evaluation of ongoing first-order cognition - how confident one is in a perception, memory, or judgment - yielding reportable assessments that dissociate from first-order accuracy. Engaged by 6 tasksFeeling-of-Knowing TaskHeartbeat Detection TaskIntentional Binding TaskJudgment-of-Learning TaskRemember/Know TaskSustained Attention to Response Task. No aliases.

Mind wandering ¶

Task-unrelated thought that arises during an ongoing task. Engaged by 3 tasksContinuous Performance TaskPsychomotor Vigilance TaskSustained Attention to Response Task. 2 aliasestask-unrelated thoughtmind-wandering.

Perceptual awareness ¶

Conscious access to perceptual content. Engaged by 2 tasksRapid Serial Visual Presentation TaskVisual Masking Task. 1 aliasconscious perception.

Self-monitoring ¶

Ongoing evaluation of one’s own performance against task goals and expected outcomes. Engaged by 6 tasksHeartbeat Detection TaskImitation-Inhibition TaskProspective Memory TaskSource Memory TaskSustained Attention to Response TaskVerbal Fluency Task. No aliases.

Self-referential processing ¶

Processing of information in relation to the self, yielding enhanced encoding for self-relevant material and characteristic engagement of cortical midline structures (mPFC, PCC). Engaged by 3 tasksAutobiographical Memory TaskBody Ownership Illusion TaskSelf-Referential Encoding Task. 1 aliasself-referential.

Sense of agency ¶

The experience of being the cause of one’s own actions and their sensory consequences, dissociable into implicit (intentional binding) and explicit (authorship judgment) components. Engaged by 1 taskIntentional Binding Task. No aliases.

Cognitive Flexibility and Higher-Order Executive Function ¶

Task-set reconfiguration (set shifting), rule updating, strategy selection, goal maintenance. Current inhabitants: goal maintenance, set shifting, strategy use.

Goal maintenance ¶

Active holding of task goals, rules, or sub-goals in a form that biases ongoing processing. Engaged by 1 taskTask Switching Task. No aliases.

Set shifting ¶

Flexible reconfiguration of the task set in response to a change in task demands; the primary experimental operationalization of cognitive flexibility, measured by task-switching paradigms and the WCST. Engaged by 5 tasksProspective Memory TaskReversal Learning TaskTask Switching TaskTrail Making TaskWisconsin Card Sorting Task. 3 aliasesCognitive flexibilitytask switchingtask-switching.

Strategy use ¶

Selection and implementation of a cognitive procedure chosen to improve performance on a task. Engaged by 6 tasksMulti-Armed Bandit TaskPrisoner’s Dilemma TaskProbabilistic Classification Learning TaskTower of London TaskVirtual Morris Water Maze TaskWisconsin Card Sorting Task. No aliases.

Emotion Perception and Regulation ¶

Recognition of emotional signals (face, voice, body), affective priming, cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression, emotion regulation strategies.

Affective priming ¶

Facilitation or interference in evaluating a target by a valence-related prime. Engaged by 1 taskAffective Priming Task. 1 aliasevaluative priming.

Cognitive reappraisal ¶

Reinterpretation of an emotional stimulus to change its affective impact. Engaged by 1 taskEmotion Regulation Task. 1 aliasreappraisal.

Emotion recognition ¶

Identification of emotional states from cues such as facial expression or vocal prosody. Engaged by 7 tasksAffective Picture Viewing TaskAffective Priming TaskDot-Probe TaskEmotion Regulation TaskEmotional Stroop TaskFacial Emotion Recognition TaskReading the Mind in the Eyes Task. 1 aliasEmotion perception.

Emotion regulation ¶

Processes by which individuals influence which emotions they have, when, and how they experience and express them. Engaged by 5 tasksAffective Picture Viewing TaskEmotion Regulation TaskIowa Gambling TaskPavlovian Fear Conditioning TaskUltimatum Game Task. No aliases.

Expressive suppression ¶

Inhibition of outward behavioral expression of emotion. Engaged by 1 taskEmotion Regulation Task. No aliases.

Face and Object Perception ¶

Processes that recover identity, category, or structure from sensory form: face identity, face perception, visual object recognition, visual form recognition, visual perception, pattern recognition, motion perception (including biological motion), depth perception; plus the non-visual object-perception rows (somatosensory, gustatory, olfactory, proprioceptive) that have no better home.

Biological motion perception ¶

Recognition of animate motion from sparse kinematic cues, such as point-light displays. Engaged by 1 taskBiological Motion Perception Task. 1 aliasbiological motion.

Depth perception ¶

Perception of distance and three-dimensional structure from monocular and binocular cues. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Face identity recognition ¶

Identification of an individual from face-specific features. Engaged by 1 taskCambridge Face Memory Task. 1 aliasface recognition.

Face perception ¶

Recognition and processing of faces as a specialized perceptual category; N170-sensitive, FFA-dependent. Engaged by 5 tasksCambridge Face Memory TaskFace Processing TaskFacial Emotion Recognition TaskReading the Mind in the Eyes TaskWeapons Identification Task. 1 aliasface processing.

Gustatory perception ¶

Perception of taste qualities (sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami). Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. 1 aliasGustation.

Motion perception ¶

Detection and interpretation of moving stimuli; includes global motion and optic flow. Engaged by 2 tasksBiological Motion Perception TaskRandom Dot Kinematogram Task. No aliases.

Olfactory perception ¶

Perception of odor via the olfactory system. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. 1 aliasolfaction.

Pattern recognition ¶

Categorization of sensory input according to its structure. Engaged by 3 tasksArtificial Grammar Learning TaskBiological Motion Perception TaskRaven’s Progressive Matrices Task. No aliases.

Somatosensory perception ¶

Perception of bodily sensations, including touch, proprioception, temperature, and pain. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. 1 aliasSomatosensation.

Visual form recognition ¶

Assignment of visual input to a shape category prior to semantic identification. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. 1 aliasshape recognition.

Visual object recognition ¶

Identification of objects from visual input, invariant over viewpoint, size, and lighting. Engaged by 3 tasksFace Processing TaskPicture Naming TaskWeapons Identification Task. 1 aliasobject recognition.

Visual perception ¶

Perception of visual information; includes form, motion, depth, color, and spatial layout. Engaged by 12 tasksAffective Picture Viewing TaskBiological Motion Perception TaskCambridge Face Memory TaskDigit Symbol Substitution TaskFace Processing TaskMental Rotation TaskNavon TaskRandom Dot Kinematogram TaskRaven’s Progressive Matrices TaskUseful Field of View TaskVisual Masking TaskVisual Search Task. No aliases.

Implicit and Statistical Learning ¶

Acquisition of structure without explicit instruction: implicit memory, procedural memory. Paradigm-level coverage includes artificial grammar learning, serial reaction time, statistical word-segmentation, perceptual category learning — these live in task_details.json, not as separate process rows.

Implicit memory ¶

Memory expressed without conscious recollection, measurable by priming, skill learning, and conditioning. Engaged by 3 tasksArtificial Grammar Learning TaskContextual Cueing TaskSerial Reaction Time Task. No aliases.

Procedural memory ¶

Non-declarative memory for skills and procedures, expressed through improved performance rather than conscious recollection. Engaged by 5 tasksArtificial Grammar Learning TaskMirror Tracing TaskMotor Sequence Learning TaskProbabilistic Classification Learning TaskSerial Reaction Time Task. No aliases.

Inhibitory Control and Conflict Monitoring ¶

Response inhibition, response conflict, conflict monitoring, interference control, executive attention, proactive control, reactive control, error detection, error correction.

Conflict monitoring ¶

Detection of co-activation of incompatible response tendencies, proposed to recruit anterior cingulate cortex and trigger cognitive control. Engaged by 9 tasksAnti-Saccade TaskAttention Network TaskEmotional Stroop TaskEriksen Flanker TaskGo/No-Go TaskSentence Comprehension TaskSimon TaskStop-Signal TaskStroop Color-Word Task. No aliases.

Error correction ¶

Adjustment of behavior following an error, including post-error slowing and improvement on subsequent trials. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Error detection ¶

Recognition that a response was incorrect, indexed by the error-related negativity (ERN) and by error awareness. Engaged by 3 tasksMirror Tracing TaskSentence Comprehension TaskWisconsin Card Sorting Task. No aliases.

Executive attention ¶

Resolution of conflict among thoughts, feelings, and responses; one of Posner’s three attentional networks. Engaged by 3 tasksAnti-Saccade TaskAttention Network TaskEmotion Regulation Task. No aliases.

Interference control ¶

Resistance to interference from task-irrelevant stimuli or competing response representations, measured by Stroop, Flanker, and Simon effects. Engaged by 9 tasksAttention Network TaskEmotional Stroop TaskEriksen Flanker TaskImplicit Association TaskN-Back TaskNavon TaskOperation Span TaskSimon TaskStroop Color-Word Task. 1 aliasinterference resolution.

Proactive control ¶

Sustained, anticipatory maintenance of task goals that biases processing in preparation for an expected demand. Engaged by 1 taskTask Switching Task. No aliases.

Reactive control ¶

Transient, stimulus-triggered engagement of control after interference or conflict is detected. Engaged by 1 taskStop-Signal Task. No aliases.

Response conflict ¶

Competing activation of two or more response representations on a single trial, typically engaging cognitive control. Engaged by 7 tasksAffective Priming TaskEriksen Flanker TaskImplicit Association TaskNavon TaskSimon TaskStroop Color-Word TaskWeapons Identification Task. No aliases.

Response inhibition ¶

Suppression of a prepotent or already-initiated response when it becomes inappropriate, indexed behaviorally by stop-signal reaction time or commission errors. Engaged by 11 tasksAnti-Saccade TaskBalloon Analog Risk TaskContinuous Performance TaskDelay Discounting TaskDirected Forgetting TaskGo/No-Go TaskImitation-Inhibition TaskStop-Signal TaskStroop Color-Word TaskSustained Attention to Response TaskThink/No-Think Task. 2 aliasesinhibitory controlresponse suppression.

Language Comprehension and Production ¶

Mapping sound or text to meaning and meaning to articulation: lexical access, word recognition, reading, phonological processes, syntactic parsing, sentence comprehension, discourse processing, semantic processing, semantic knowledge, naming, verbal fluency, speech perception, speech production, language comprehension, language production.

Discourse processing ¶

Integration of sentences into coherent representations of extended text or conversation. Engaged by 1 taskSelf-Paced Reading Task. No aliases.

Language comprehension ¶

Extraction of meaning from linguistic input (spoken, written, or signed). Engaged by 2 tasksFalse Belief TaskSentence Comprehension Task. No aliases.

Language production ¶

Generation of spoken, written, or signed linguistic output, from message to articulation. Engaged by 2 tasksPicture Naming TaskVerb Generation Task. No aliases.

Lexical access ¶

Retrieval of word-level representations (form and meaning) from memory. Engaged by 7 tasksLexical Decision TaskPicture Naming TaskRemote Associates TaskSelf-Paced Reading TaskSemantic Priming TaskVerb Generation TaskVerbal Fluency Task. 1 aliaslexical retrieval.

Naming ¶

Production of a word label for a presented stimulus (e.g., picture naming). Engaged by 1 taskPicture Naming Task. No aliases.

Phonological awareness ¶

Explicit awareness of the sound structure of spoken words (onsets, rimes, phonemes). Engaged by 1 taskPhonological Awareness Task. No aliases.

Phonological encoding ¶

Assembly of phonological representations during language production. Engaged by 1 taskPhonological Awareness Task. No aliases.

Reading ¶

Visual processing of written text, integrating orthography, phonology, and meaning. Engaged by 3 tasksLexical Decision TaskSentence Comprehension TaskStroop Color-Word Task. No aliases.

Semantic knowledge ¶

Long-term store of facts, concepts, and word meanings. Engaged by 3 tasksRemote Associates TaskSemantic Priming TaskVerbal Fluency Task. No aliases.

Semantic processing ¶

Access and integration of word and phrase meaning, indexed by the N400. Engaged by 8 tasksAffective Priming TaskFree Recall TaskLexical Decision TaskPicture Naming TaskRemote Associates TaskSelf-Paced Reading TaskSemantic Priming TaskVerb Generation Task. No aliases.

Sentence comprehension ¶

Integration of lexical, syntactic, and semantic information to derive sentence meaning. Engaged by 1 taskSentence Comprehension Task. 1 aliassentence processing.

Speech perception ¶

Extraction of linguistic content from the acoustic speech signal, including phoneme categorization, word segmentation, and prosodic processing. Engaged by 1 taskPhonological Awareness Task. No aliases.

Speech production ¶

Planning and articulation of spoken output; the motor component of articulation is covered under vocal-motor control in Motor Preparation, Timing, and Execution. Engaged by 2 tasksPicture Naming TaskVerb Generation Task. No aliases.

Syntactic parsing ¶

Assignment of hierarchical grammatical structure to a linguistic input. Engaged by 1 taskSentence Comprehension Task. 1 aliassyntactic processing.

Verbal fluency ¶

Rapid generation of words under a semantic or phonemic constraint. Engaged by 1 taskVerbal Fluency Task. No aliases.

Word recognition ¶

Identification of a word as a lexical item from its perceptual input. Engaged by 3 tasksLexical Decision TaskSelf-Paced Reading TaskSemantic Priming Task. 1 aliasVisual word recognition.

Long-Term Memory ¶

Encoding, consolidation, retrieval; recall and recognition; recollection and familiarity; source memory; episodic, semantic, autobiographical, verbal memory; pattern completion and separation; proactive and retroactive interference; forgetting; directed forgetting; reconsolidation; prospective memory.

Autobiographical memory ¶

Memory for personally experienced events across the lifespan, integrating episodic and semantic components. Engaged by 1 taskAutobiographical Memory Task. No aliases.

Consolidation ¶

Post-encoding stabilization of memory traces, dependent on time and often on sleep; includes synaptic and systems consolidation. Engaged by 1 taskMotor Sequence Learning Task. 1 aliasmemory consolidation.

Declarative memory ¶

Consciously accessible memory for facts and events; encompasses semantic and episodic memory. Engaged by 1 taskPaired Associates Learning Task. 1 aliasexplicit memory.

Directed forgetting ¶

Reduced memory for items that have been cued to be forgotten, relative to items cued to be remembered. Engaged by 2 tasksDirected Forgetting TaskThink/No-Think Task. No aliases.

Encoding ¶

Processes by which perceptual input is transformed into a memory representation at acquisition. Engaged by 13 tasksCambridge Face Memory TaskChange Detection TaskDelayed Match-to-Sample TaskDirected Forgetting TaskFree Recall TaskJudgment-of-Learning TaskMnemonic Similarity TaskOld/New Recognition Memory TaskPaired Associates Learning TaskRey Auditory Verbal Learning TaskSelf-Referential Encoding TaskVirtual Morris Water Maze TaskVirtual Radial Arm Maze Task. 1 aliasmemory encoding.

Episodic memory ¶

Memory for specific events located in a particular place and time and accompanied by autonoetic consciousness. Engaged by 6 tasksFree Recall TaskMnemonic Similarity TaskOld/New Recognition Memory TaskPaired Associates Learning TaskRemember/Know TaskRey Auditory Verbal Learning Task. No aliases.

Familiarity ¶

Sense that a stimulus has been encountered before, in the absence of retrieval of contextual detail. Engaged by 5 tasksFeeling-of-Knowing TaskMnemonic Similarity TaskOld/New Recognition Memory TaskRemember/Know TaskSource Memory Task. No aliases.

Forgetting ¶

Loss of accessibility of previously encoded information, due to decay, interference, or retrieval failure. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Pattern completion ¶

Retrieval of a complete memory from a partial or degraded cue; CA3 function. Engaged by 1 taskMnemonic Similarity Task. No aliases.

Pattern separation ¶

Transformation of similar input patterns into distinct, non-overlapping memory representations; dentate gyrus function. Engaged by 1 taskMnemonic Similarity Task. No aliases.

Proactive interference ¶

Disruption of new learning by previously learned material. Engaged by 1 taskRey Auditory Verbal Learning Task. No aliases.

Prospective memory ¶

Memory for intentions to act at a future time or on a future event. Engaged by 1 taskProspective Memory Task. No aliases.

Recall ¶

Retrieval of items without an external cue provided at test (free or cued recall). Engaged by 3 tasksFree Recall TaskRey Auditory Verbal Learning TaskThink/No-Think Task. No aliases.

Recognition ¶

Judgment that a test item has been previously encountered; supported by familiarity and recollection. Engaged by 5 tasksCambridge Face Memory TaskDelayed Match-to-Sample TaskMnemonic Similarity TaskOld/New Recognition Memory TaskRemember/Know Task. 1 aliasrecognition memory.

Recollection ¶

Retrieval of contextual detail about a prior event, including source information. Engaged by 5 tasksAutobiographical Memory TaskOld/New Recognition Memory TaskRemember/Know TaskSelf-Referential Encoding TaskSource Memory Task. No aliases.

Reconsolidation ¶

Destabilization and re-stabilization of a memory upon retrieval, creating a window for modification. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. 1 aliasmemory reconsolidation.

Retrieval ¶

Reactivation of a stored memory representation; dissociable into cue-driven and strategic retrieval. Engaged by 14 tasksAutobiographical Memory TaskDirected Forgetting TaskFeeling-of-Knowing TaskFree Recall TaskOld/New Recognition Memory TaskPaired Associates Learning TaskProspective Memory TaskRey Auditory Verbal Learning TaskSelf-Referential Encoding TaskSource Memory TaskSternberg Item Recognition TaskThink/No-Think TaskVirtual Morris Water Maze TaskVirtual Radial Arm Maze Task. 1 aliasmemory retrieval.

Retroactive interference ¶

Disruption of older memories by newly learned material. Engaged by 1 taskRey Auditory Verbal Learning Task. No aliases.

Semantic memory ¶

Long-term store of general knowledge about the world — facts, concepts, and word meanings — dissociable from episodic memory and supported by distributed cortical representations. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Source memory ¶

Memory for the contextual origin of information (e.g., who said it, where it was seen). Engaged by 1 taskSource Memory Task. 1 aliassource monitoring.

Verbal memory ¶

Memory for linguistic material (words, sentences), tested via word lists, story recall, and RAVLT. Engaged by 1 taskRey Auditory Verbal Learning Task. No aliases.

Motor Preparation, Timing, and Execution ¶

Motor planning, response selection, motor preparation, action initiation, response execution, motor timing, motor sequence learning, motor memory, visuomotor adaptation, fine motor control, reaching, grasping, saccade, antisaccade, proprioception, vocal-motor control.

Action initiation ¶

Triggering of an action after planning is complete. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Antisaccade ¶

Voluntary eye movement away from a peripheral stimulus, requiring inhibition of a prepotent saccade. Engaged by 1 taskAnti-Saccade Task. 1 aliasanti-saccade.

Fine motor control ¶

Precise control of small-amplitude movements, typically of the hand and fingers. Engaged by 3 tasksFinger Tapping TaskMirror Tracing TaskMotor Sequence Learning Task. No aliases.

Grasping ¶

Shaping and closure of the hand around an object. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Motor memory ¶

Long-term retention of motor skills and procedures. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Motor planning ¶

Specification of movement parameters before execution. Engaged by 4 tasksIntentional Binding TaskMirror Tracing TaskMotor Sequence Learning TaskTrail Making Task. 1 aliasmovement planning.

Motor preparation ¶

Neural readiness state preceding movement, indexed by the readiness potential and LRP. Engaged by 5 tasksAnti-Saccade TaskFinger Tapping TaskPsychological Refractory Period TaskSerial Reaction Time TaskStop-Signal Task. 1 aliasmovement preparation.

Motor sequence learning ¶

Acquisition of a skilled sequence of movements through repetition. Engaged by 2 tasksMotor Sequence Learning TaskSerial Reaction Time Task. No aliases.

Motor timing ¶

Production or estimation of temporal intervals in motor output. Engaged by 1 taskFinger Tapping Task. No aliases.

Proprioception ¶

Perception of body position and movement from muscle, tendon, and joint receptors. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Reaching ¶

Goal-directed arm movement toward a spatial target. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Response execution ¶

Overt production of a selected response in accordance with task demands. Engaged by 8 tasksDigit Symbol Substitution TaskFinger Tapping TaskMonetary Incentive Delay TaskPsychological Refractory Period TaskPsychomotor Vigilance TaskSerial Reaction Time TaskStop-Signal TaskTrail Making Task. 1 aliasmovement execution.

Response selection ¶

Choice of an action from a set of alternatives. Engaged by 11 tasksAffective Priming TaskEriksen Flanker TaskGo/No-Go TaskMental Rotation TaskN-Back TaskPsychological Refractory Period TaskRandom Dot Kinematogram TaskSimon TaskSternberg Item Recognition TaskTask Switching TaskVerb Generation Task. 1 aliasaction selection.

Saccade ¶

Rapid ballistic eye movement between points of fixation. Engaged by 1 taskAnti-Saccade Task. 1 aliassaccadic.

Visuomotor adaptation ¶

Recalibration of movement in response to perturbations of the mapping between vision and action. Engaged by 1 taskMirror Tracing Task. 1 aliassensorimotor adaptation.

Vocal-motor control ¶

Control of the articulators for speech production and vocalization. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. 1 aliasspeech motor control.

Perceptual Decision-Making (Evidence Accumulation)¶

Integration of noisy sensory evidence to a decision criterion.

Perceptual decision making ¶

Integration of noisy sensory evidence toward a decision criterion, modeled by sequential-sampling frameworks (drift-diffusion, race models) and indexed by accuracy and response-time distributions. Engaged by 3 tasksAuditory Masking TaskRandom Dot Kinematogram TaskWeapons Identification Task. No aliases.

Reasoning and Problem-Solving ¶

Deductive, inductive, causal, analogical, mathematical reasoning; hypothesis testing; categorization; insight; means-ends analysis; planning; subgoaling.

Analogical reasoning ¶

Mapping of relational structure from a source domain to a target domain. Engaged by 1 taskRaven’s Progressive Matrices Task. No aliases.

Categorization ¶

Assignment of instances to categories according to their features. Engaged by 8 tasksArtificial Grammar Learning TaskFacial Emotion Recognition TaskImplicit Association TaskLexical Decision TaskPhonological Awareness TaskProbabilistic Classification Learning TaskRapid Serial Visual Presentation TaskWisconsin Card Sorting Task. No aliases.

Causal reasoning ¶

Inference about cause–effect relations from observation and intervention. Engaged by 1 taskCausal Learning Task. 1 aliascausal inference.

Deductive reasoning ¶

Inference in which the conclusion follows necessarily from the premises. Engaged by 1 taskWason Selection Task. 1 aliasLogical reasoning.

Hypothesis testing ¶

Generation and evaluation of alternative explanations against evidence. Engaged by 2 tasksWason Selection TaskWisconsin Card Sorting Task. No aliases.

Inductive reasoning ¶

Inference from specific instances to general principles; probabilistic rather than necessary. Engaged by 1 taskRaven’s Progressive Matrices Task. No aliases.

Insight ¶

Sudden restructuring of a problem representation yielding a solution that was previously unavailable, often accompanied by an “Aha!” experience distinct from incremental analytic search. Engaged by 1 taskRemote Associates Task. No aliases.

Mathematical reasoning ¶

Manipulation of numerical and algebraic quantities and relations. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Means-ends analysis ¶

Iterative problem-solving strategy in which the distance between the current state and the goal state is reduced by selecting operators that diminish the largest remaining difference. Engaged by 1 taskTower of London Task. No aliases.

Planning ¶

Mental formulation of a sequence of actions toward a goal before execution. Engaged by 1 taskTower of London Task. No aliases.

Subgoaling ¶

Decomposition of a goal into an ordered sequence of subgoals whose satisfaction advances the overall task; dissociable from means-ends search and often studied through hierarchical task analysis. Engaged by 1 taskTower of London Task. No aliases.

Reward Anticipation and Motivation ¶

Anticipation of reward, consumption of reward, incentive salience, effort allocation, approach motivation, avoidance motivation.

Approach motivation ¶

Tendency to engage with stimuli associated with positive outcomes. Engaged by 7 tasksAffective Picture Viewing TaskBalloon Analog Risk TaskEffort-Based Decision-Making TaskIowa Gambling TaskMonetary Incentive Delay TaskProbabilistic Selection TaskSocial Incentive Delay Task. No aliases.

Avoidance motivation ¶

Tendency to disengage from stimuli associated with negative outcomes. Engaged by 3 tasksAffective Picture Viewing TaskPavlovian Fear Conditioning TaskProbabilistic Selection Task. No aliases.

Effort allocation ¶

Decision to expend physical or cognitive effort as a function of expected reward and cost. Engaged by 1 taskEffort-Based Decision-Making Task. No aliases.

Incentive salience ¶

“Wanting” attributed to reward-predictive cues, distinct from “liking.” Engaged by 2 tasksMonetary Incentive Delay TaskSocial Incentive Delay Task. No aliases.

Reward anticipation ¶

Affective and neural response to cues predicting upcoming reward. Engaged by 4 tasksBalloon Analog Risk TaskEffort-Based Decision-Making TaskMonetary Incentive Delay TaskSocial Incentive Delay Task. No aliases.

Reward consumption ¶

Affective and neural response to receipt of reward. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Selective and Sustained Attention ¶

Attention networks (alerting, orienting, executive attention); selective attention; sustained attention; attention shifting; attentional capture; divided attention; feature-based attention; object-based attention; spatial attention; temporal attention.

Alerting ¶

Achieving and maintaining a state of readiness to respond, whether tonic or phasic; one of Posner’s three attentional networks. Engaged by 3 tasksAttention Network TaskContinuous Performance TaskPsychomotor Vigilance Task. No aliases.

Attention shifting ¶

Reorienting of attention from one location, feature, or object to another, indexed by cost in RT or accuracy. Engaged by 1 taskPosner Spatial Cueing Task. No aliases.

Attentional capture ¶

Involuntary shift of attention to a salient stimulus that is not the current target of task-directed attention. Engaged by 4 tasksDot-Probe TaskEmotional Stroop TaskOddball TaskPosner Spatial Cueing Task. No aliases.

Divided attention ¶

Concurrent processing of two or more streams of information or two tasks, typically yielding dual-task interference. Engaged by 4 tasksMultiple Object Tracking TaskOperation Span TaskPsychological Refractory Period TaskUseful Field of View Task. No aliases.

Feature-based attention ¶

Selection of a specific visual feature (e.g., a color, orientation, or motion direction) that enhances processing of that feature throughout the visual field. Engaged by 1 taskVisual Search Task. No aliases.

Object-based attention ¶

Selection of an object as a unit of attention such that the attended features belonging to the object are processed together. Engaged by 2 tasksMultiple Object Tracking TaskVisual Search Task. No aliases.

Orienting ¶

Selection of information from sensory input, typically in space, by covert or overt shifts of attention; one of Posner’s three attentional networks. Engaged by 3 tasksAttention Network TaskDot-Probe TaskPosner Spatial Cueing Task. No aliases.

Selective attention ¶

Prioritized processing of a task-relevant subset of stimuli (a location, feature, object, or modality) with suppression of irrelevant stimuli. Engaged by 22 tasksAffective Picture Viewing TaskAttention Network TaskAuditory Masking TaskChange Detection TaskContextual Cueing TaskContinuous Performance TaskDigit Symbol Substitution TaskDot-Probe TaskEmotional Stroop TaskEriksen Flanker TaskGo/No-Go TaskMultiple Object Tracking TaskNavon TaskOddball TaskPosner Spatial Cueing TaskRandom Dot Kinematogram TaskRapid Serial Visual Presentation TaskSimon TaskStroop Color-Word TaskTrail Making TaskUseful Field of View TaskVisual Search Task. No aliases.

Spatial attention ¶

Selection of a location in space for preferential sensory processing, measurable via cueing benefits and N2pc/P1 modulation. Engaged by 5 tasksContextual Cueing TaskDot-Probe TaskPosner Spatial Cueing TaskUseful Field of View TaskVisual Search Task. No aliases.

Sustained attention ¶

Maintenance of attentional engagement over extended intervals during which targets are rare or responses are repetitive; synonymous with vigilance. Engaged by 8 tasksContinuous Performance TaskGo/No-Go TaskMultiple Object Tracking TaskOddball TaskPsychomotor Vigilance TaskRapid Serial Visual Presentation TaskSustained Attention to Response TaskUseful Field of View Task. 2 aliasesVigilanceVigilant attention.

Temporal attention ¶

Selection of a point in time for preferential processing, measurable via cueing benefits in time and the attentional blink. Engaged by 2 tasksOddball TaskRapid Serial Visual Presentation Task. No aliases.

Short-Term and Working Memory ¶

Active maintenance, manipulation, working-memory updating, rehearsal, chunking; visual working memory; verbal working memory; spatial working memory; umbrella hed_working_memory.

Active maintenance ¶

Holding information active over a delay without manipulation, through volitional, attention-demanding processes; a core subprocess of working memory. Engaged by 7 tasksChange Detection TaskCorsi Block-Tapping TaskDelayed Match-to-Sample TaskDigit Span TaskN-Back TaskOperation Span TaskSternberg Item Recognition Task. No aliases.

Chunking ¶

Binding of multiple items into a single unit in memory to expand effective capacity. Engaged by 1 taskDigit Span Task. No aliases.

Manipulation ¶

Transformation of information held in working memory (reordering, reversing, combining) beyond simple maintenance. Engaged by 2 tasksCorsi Block-Tapping TaskDigit Span Task. No aliases.

Rehearsal ¶

Covert repetition of material to refresh its representation in short-term memory, especially for verbal material (articulatory rehearsal). Engaged by 2 tasksDigit Span TaskFree Recall Task. No aliases.

Spatial working memory ¶

Short-term storage of spatial locations and spatial relations. Engaged by 3 tasksCorsi Block-Tapping TaskVirtual Morris Water Maze TaskVirtual Radial Arm Maze Task. No aliases.

Verbal working memory ¶

Short-term storage of phonological/verbal information, historically “phonological loop”; supports digit span, Sternberg with letters. Engaged by 3 tasksDigit Span TaskOperation Span TaskSternberg Item Recognition Task. 1 aliasphonological loop.

Visual working memory ¶

Short-term storage and manipulation of visual information; capacity limited to ~3–4 items. Engaged by 3 tasksChange Detection TaskDelayed Match-to-Sample TaskMultiple Object Tracking Task. No aliases.

Working memory ¶

System for the short-term maintenance, updating, and manipulation of task-relevant information over delays of seconds. Engaged by 7 tasksDigit Symbol Substitution TaskN-Back TaskOperation Span TaskRaven’s Progressive Matrices TaskSternberg Item Recognition TaskTower of London TaskTrail Making Task. No aliases.

Working memory updating ¶

Replacement or revision of information currently held active in working memory with newly task-relevant content. One of three core executive functions in the Miyake et al. unity/diversity framework; decomposable into retrieval, transformation, and substitution subcomponents (Ecker et al.); implemented by a cortico-striatal gating mechanism that opens to admit new content and closes to protect maintenance. Distinct from long-term-memory reconsolidation (which occurs when retrieval triggers a prediction error and targets stored representations rather than the focus of attention). Indexed behaviorally by N-Back, running-span, and keep-track performance. Engaged by 3 tasksN-Back TaskOddball TaskRapid Serial Visual Presentation Task. 1 aliasMemory Updating.

Value-Based Decision-Making Under Risk and Uncertainty ¶

Choice among options that differ in subjective value: valuation, value-based decision making, choice commitment, delay discounting, intertemporal choice, probability judgment, risk processing.

Choice commitment ¶

The act of locking in a selected option once accumulated evidence or value crosses a decision boundary; measured by response-time distributions, drift-diffusion boundary parameters, and motor preparation signatures. Engaged by no task in the current Catalog. No aliases.

Assignment of a subjective value to a prospective option, integrating reward magnitude, probability, delay, and effort; indexed by willingness-to-pay, subjective ratings, and value-coded neural signals in vmPFC and striatum. Engaged by 4 tasksDelay Discounting TaskDictator Game TaskEffort-Based Decision-Making TaskUltimatum Game Task. No aliases.

Value-based decision making ¶

Choice among options that differ in subjective value, computed across attributes. Engaged by 6 tasksBalloon Analog Risk TaskDelay Discounting TaskEffort-Based Decision-Making TaskIowa Gambling TaskMulti-Armed Bandit TaskTwo-Stage Decision Task. 1 aliasvalue-based choice.