Figure 2. Behavioral and multivariate decoding results of experiment 1.

(A, B) All results depicted here are from the merged data of both experimental sessions. The left column of plots shows the results for content discrimination task I, where auditory stimuli and conflicting features were task-relevant. The right column of plots shows the results for the vertical random dot-motion (RDM), where neither the auditory stimulus nor its conflicting features were task-relevant. (A) The behavioral results are plotted as conflict effects (incongruent – congruent). Effects of conflict were present in content discrimination task I, with longer reaction times (RTs) (left bar) and increased error rates (ERs) (right bar) for incongruent compared to congruent trials. For the vertical RDM task, no significant effects of conflict were found in behavior. Dots represent individual participants. The behavioral data that is shown here can be found in Figure 2—source data 1. (B) Multivariate classifier accuracies for different stimulus features. We trained classifiers on three stimulus features: auditory congruency, auditory content, and auditory location. Classifier accuracies (area under the curve [AUC]) are plotted across a time-frequency window of −100 ms to 1000 ms and 2–30 Hz. Classifier accuracies are thresholded (cluster-based corrected, one-sided: ${\displaystyle \overline{X}}$>0.5, p<0.05), and significant clusters are outlined with a solid black line. The dotted box shows the predefined ROI on which we performed a hypothesis-driven analysis. The classifier accuracies within this ROI were not significantly greater than chance for the vertical RDM task. Note that conflicting features of the auditory stimulus, content and location, could be decoded from neural data regardless of attention to the auditory stimulus. Information related to auditory congruency was present in a theta-band cluster, but only when the auditory stimulus was attended. *** p<0.001, n.s.: p>0.05.

Figure 2—figure supplement 1. Effects of behavioral training on behavioral effects of conflict and decoding performance in experiment 1.

(A, B) We performed 2 × 2 repeated measures (rm)-ANOVAs on (A) reaction times (RTs) and (B) error rates (ERs) in content discrimination task I, with the factors being session and congruency of the auditory stimulus. In (A, B), data are plotted as conflict effects (incongruent – congruent) and for separate sessions. The top horizontal line shows significance of the interaction between session and congruency, and markers above the bars indicate significance of paired sample t-tests comparing incongruent and congruent for each run (shown data and results of t-tests can be found in Figure 2—figure supplement 1—source data 1). Effects of conflict on RTs (A) and ERs (B) significantly decreased after behavioral training on this task, suggesting more efficient processing of conflict. Effects of conflict on RTs and ERs were nonetheless present during both sessions. (C) There were no clusters for which the difference in congruency decoding between the two sessions in content discrimination task I was significant (left panel), although decoding accuracies within the preselected ROI did decrease with training for content discrimination task I, suggesting more efficient conflict resolution, in line with the behavioral results plotted in (A, B). Classifier accuracies for sound content (middle panel) were higher in a delta-theta band cluster after behavioral training, showing that the task-relevant feature was processed better. Location decoding accuracy was not affected by behavioral training as we observed no clusters where the differences between sessions and classifier accuracies within the ROI were also not different between sessions. (D) Behavioral training on the content discrimination task did not affect neural processing of auditory features in the vertical random dot-motion (no significant clusters and none of the results were significant when tested for the predefined ROI). Thresholded (cluster-based corrected, p<0.05) accuracies are depicted across the frequency range (2–30 Hz), and significant clusters are outlined with a solid black line. ***p<0.001, **p<0.01, n.s.: p>0.05.