Conflict adaptation effects in the absence of executive control.

According to the 'conflict-monitoring' model, a leading theory of cognitive control, information-processing conflict registered in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) triggers the prefrontal cortex to reduce conflict susceptibility. Here we show that the existing empirical support for an online modulation of susceptibility to conflict through immediately preceding conflict, the 'conflict-adaptation effect', needs to be reevaluated. In a human cognitive control task, we found that it was not the stimulus-independent level of conflict that was responsible for the conflict-adaptation effect but rather an episodic memory phenomenon: stimulus-specific priming. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]