Abstract
Action slips are often harmless (like putting milk in the cupboard), but can sometimes lead to grave consequences. A Slip Induction Task was developed in which participants followed a series of arrow cues to complete a sequence of movements. Following learning, some arrow cues were altered in an attempt to induce action slips. Cues were unaltered or altered either in spatial location (Positional alteration), movement goal (Directional alteration) or both (Combined alteration). It was found that Directional alterations produced more errors than Positional or Combined alterations, which did not differ from each other. These findings revealed that when the arrow cue appeared at the expected target location but required a movement to a different target location (Directional alteration) the greatest number of slips occurred. Perhaps such slip errors arose because the expected (but no longer correct) target captured the participants' attention. Some support may come from the observation that participants were quicker to initiate erroneous responses to altered trials than correct responses. Further insight can be seen as when participants correctly responded to an altered trial, they required significantly longer movement times to the target than when they responded erroneously to an altered trial. These longer movement times may reflect a microslip where the participant begins a movement to the expected target but then makes a correction on line to the newly designated target.Acknowledgments: NSERC