Disrupting the Mind’s Motion: How Motor Perturbations Shape Voluntary Task Switching Behavior

Research on voluntary task switching examines factors that influence individuals’ willingness to switch between tasks. Prior work shows that task switching behavior is affected by internal performance-related costs and external factors, such as perceptual disruptions. The present study tested whether such effects extend to the motor domain. Therefore, we developed a voluntary task-switching paradigm in which participants indicated task choices using a joystick and a double-registration procedure, separating task choice and execution. In two preregistered experiments conducted in 2022 and 2023 (N = 41 and N = 74), we applied brief motor perturbations during the task choice phase. Consistent with our preregistered hypotheses, incongruent perturbations produced a small but reliable decrease in task switch rates in both experiments; however, no effects were observed for congruent or neutral perturbations. Additionally, we observed task switch costs in both experiments and a task repetition bias in the second experiment. Exploratory analyses of continuous joystick movements provided evidence for substantial preplanning of task choices. These findings demonstrate that motor perturbations can bias voluntary task choice, supporting embodied cognition accounts of decision-making, and highlight task choice preplanning as an important methodological consideration for future research.