No Need to Execute: Omitted Responses Still Yield Response-Response Binding Effects

In the literature on human action control, the binding and retrieval of responses are assumed to shape the coordination of more complex actions. Specifically, the consecutive execution of two responses is assumed to result in their integration into cognitive representations (so-called event files) and can be retrieved from that upon later response repetition, thereby influencing behavior. Against the background of ideomotor theory and more recent theorizing in the binding and retrieval in action control framework (Frings et al., 2020), we investigated whether response execution is necessary for binding and retrieval of responses. We manipulated whether the retrieving response (Experiment 1), as well as the to-be-bound response (Experiment 2), is executed or omitted. The results showed that responses do not need to be executed to retrieve other responses or to be bound to other responses. Apparently, activating the cognitive representation of a response sufficed for this response to trigger event file binding and retrieval. Our results are the first to show that response-response binding is not dependent on executing responses. Together, the results support the core assumptions of ideomotor theory and the binding and retrieval in action control framework, namely a common coding of action and perception. Public Significance Statement In the literature on action control, it is assumed that human action control relies on the close interconnection of perception and action. According to action control theories, actions are represented by their perceptual effects. Thus, any activation of the effect representation is assumed to trigger the corresponding action representation. Here, we bring together predictions from ideomotor theory with binding approaches in action control. We present first evidence indicating that actions can be represented and retrieved from cognitive representations without necessarily being executed.