GoNoGoAufgaben

GoNoGoAufgaben, or Go/No-Go tasks, are a class of experiments used to study response inhibition and selective attention. In a Go/No-Go task, participants make a rapid response to Go stimuli and withhold responding to No-Go stimuli. The Go stimulus is typically more frequent, creating a prepotent response tendency that must be suppressed on No-Go trials.

Procedure: Each trial presents a stimulus; a button press is required for Go and withheld for No-Go. Stimulus duration and the response window vary by protocol, but responses are usually expected within a few hundred milliseconds. Trials are organized into blocks, and researchers record accuracy and speed.

Measures: Primary metrics are commission errors (responses to No-Go) and omission errors (missed Go). Reaction time on Go trials and the proportion of correct No-Go trials are common. Signal-detection theory indices such as d' and criterion are sometimes reported to separate sensitivity from response bias. In neuroimaging and electrophysiology, Go/No-Go tasks evoke neural activity in frontal networks and event-related potentials such as N2 and P3, linked to conflict monitoring and inhibition.

Variations and stimuli: Go/No-Go tasks can use visual, auditory, or tactile stimuli and vary the Go:No-Go ratio, often around 3:1. Some designs include more complex stimulus sets or adaptive timing. A related paradigm is the Stop-Signal Task, which uses a separate stop cue to halt an ongoing response.

Applications and interpretation: GoNoGoAufgaben are widely used to assess inhibitory control in healthy individuals and clinical groups (ADHD, substance use disorders, OCD). They are simple to administer and informative about frontal cognitive control, but results can be influenced by strategy, attention, and perceptual demands.