An Investigation of Reaction Time and

the Effect of Task Complexity and the

Effect of Relaxed and Heavy Audio on
Task Performance.

Alan Cummins Student No: 1165236 Course: PSY283 Lecturer: Dr. Garry Prentice
Abstract

This experiment seeks to determine whether reaction time is affected by task complexity. In

addition audio in the form of relaxed and heavy music is used to determine if reaction time can

be affected positively or negatively in terms of reaction time on a given task. Participants were

asked to take part in a card-sorting experiment. Two different tasks were tested: Simple card

shuffling into two equal piles and a complex task involving sorting cars by their suits into four

equal piles. While carrying out the two tasks differing relaxed and heavy music was played so

that in all each participant carried out four independent tasks of card sorting. This is an

extension of work carried out by Bellamy, 1993 which focused on task complexity as the

independent variable. Fifteen participants took part in repeated measures within subjects

designed experiment in order to test the hypotheses. The independent variables of music and

task difficulty were varied and the dependent variable of reaction time to complete the various

tasks was measured. It was found that reaction time is affected by task complexity with a

significant result of z=-3.408, p < 0.05, 2-tailed when comparing simple versus complex tasks.

However the null hypothesis was not rejected with regard to audio having an effect on reaction

time across the simple and complex tasks with z = -1.392, p > 0.05, 2-tailed for comparison of

the simple task under varying audio and z = -0.57, p > 0.05, 2-tailed for comparison of the

complex task under varying audio conditions. This experiment did not take account of what

constituted as relaxing or heavy audio but can be extended in the future to incorporate other

factors such as sleep deprivation, Childs, 2008 or audio cues could be learned and practised as

in Yingling, 1962.

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Contents
Abstract ......................................................................................................................................................... 2
Introduction .................................................................................................................................................. 4
Method ......................................................................................................................................................... 9
Materials: .................................................................................................................................................. 9
Participants: ............................................................................................................................................ 10
Design: .................................................................................................................................................... 10
Procedure:............................................................................................................................................... 10
Results ......................................................................................................................................................... 13
Discussion.................................................................................................................................................... 19
References .................................................................................................................................................. 22
Appendix A – Record Sheet......................................................................................................................... 25
Appendix B – SPSS Output .......................................................................................................................... 26

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Introduction

The brain has two major roles, namely that of physiological functions such as heart beat and

body movement. Body movement involves brain activity. The brain must take in sensory

information, process and interpret that information and coordinate muscle movement output

in response to that sensory input if required. This series of steps takes time. Body reaction time

is the amount of time required for the nervous system to receive and integrate these incoming

sensory details and then cause the body to respond. Most actions, excluding reflex reactions,

monosynaptic responses, and knee-jerk, involve a large amount of brain activity. This receiving

and processing of information, integrating and interpreting of such and control of muscle

activity use many neuron to neuron interactions. As Carlson, 2004 describes neurons (See Figure

1) communicate by sending an action potential from the cell body of one neuron via the axon to

the terminal buttons.

Presynaptic Neuron

Dendrites
Synaptic Gap, transmitter
substance

Axon

Hundreds of millions of neurons

Terminal Button Postsynaptic Neuron

A: Human Brain B: Neuron C: Neuron Synaptic

Communication

Figure 1 - Brain, Neuron and Synaptic Gap

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The terminal buttons of the pre-synaptic neuron release a neurotransmitter that crosses the

synaptic gap causing either excitatory or inhibitory effects in the post-synaptic neuron. Guyton,

1991 details that it takes 0.5 milliseconds for these signals to cross a synapse. Thousands of

neurons are involved in the mechanism and combined cause the body to move in response to a

sensory input. While travelling through the network of neurons signals are either convergent or

divergent. Convergence requires that many neurons incorporate their action potentials and

pass this to a single neuron. Divergence requires that a single neuron passes its action potential

through to several other neurons. The more convergence that is required the more time it

takes to process the sensory input. Neurons must await all signals both inhibitory and

excitatory in order to sum their effects and continue on to form further potentials for the

subsequent neuron and so on. This discrimination time increases with increased complexity of a

task. A complicated task involves more decision making which in turn requires more neuron to

neuron communication.

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 Pile A

Input Processing Output

Pile B

A: Simple Task: Sorting Cards into Two Equal Piles

Spades Spades Pile

Clubs Clubs Pile

Processing
requiring
many
neurons Diamonds
Diamonds Pile

Hearts Hearts Pile

B: Complex Task: Sorting Cards into Piles of Suits

Figure 2 - Diagram of Schematic Neural Processes Simple and Complex Task

This experiment seeks to investigate the reaction time of the brain and its correlation with task

complexity. Building on work by Bellamy, 1993 two sets of tasks, simple and complex are

carried out by participants. Figure 2 illustrates the basic processes involved in each of the tasks.

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Task A is the most simplistic and asks the participants to deal cards into two equal piles,

whereas Task B asks the participants to deal cards into 4 piles according to their suits. This more

complicated task involves more processing where visual information must be incorporated with

a sorting task in order to correctly carry out the experiment. Experimentation by Schweizer,

(1998) has already indicated that the reaction time increases with task complexity. This

experiment is then extended out to consider what effect other factors may have in influencing

discrimination time. Factors such as distraction, attention, learning, stress, competition, gender,

sleep deprivation and substance use can effect this discrimination time. Audio is played at both

a relaxed (Classical music) and heavy pace (Dance music) in order to determine if discrimination

time is affected. Audio at differing tempos has been shown to affect the performance of

participants in a repetitive task as indicated in Smoll, 1975. Nelson, 1963 also carried out work

tying the type of music to athletic performance but failed to find any relationship. This

experiment will look solely at reaction time as compared to task complexity to determine if any

relationships exist. Equally music may effect mood and as a consequence performance.

Hayakawa, 2000 has carried out tests in order to determine how music affects mood. Hunter,

2008 gives indication of how mood and type of music are tied. Ernst, 1996 has linked mood to

cognitive appraisal. Jones, 2006 has investigated classical music, namely that of Mozart and its

effect on spatial reasoning. The investigated experiment takes a combination of these varying

effects of music and links them into task complexity and reaction time. The audio chosen does

not have any lyrics as this has been shown by Stratton, 1994 to have an effect on mood.

This experiment seeks to investigate specifically the following two hypotheses.

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Alternate Hypothesis One: There will be a significant difference between the average task

completion times of a simple card shuffling task as compared to the average task completion

times of a complex card shuffling task.

Alternate Hypothesis Two: There will be a significant difference between the average

completion times of a task when carried out while relaxed audio is played as compared to when

the identical task is carried out while heavy audio is played.

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Method

Materials:

The materials used for the experiment were as follows:

• Playing Cards: Six sets of playing cards were used. With four used for each of the

differing tasks for each participant.

• Music: Two sets of music were used, heavy audio in the form of dance music and

relaxed audio in the form of classical music. Neither type of music had any lyrics and was

purely instrumental.

• Shuffler: An automatic shuffler was used to shuffle each deck of cards.

• Record Sheet: A basic Record Sheet was used to record completion times per task. See

Figure 7.

• Stop-watch: With ability to record number of milliseconds.

• Office Equipment: Chair and table to lay the cards into bundles.

• Pen: To note the time recorded.

• Bag and Named Slips: Participants were randomly chosen by being drawn from a bag.

• Instruction Sheet: Containing exact instructions to be read out to each participant.

• Laboratory: As sound was being used and concentration required on behalf of the

participants a quiet laboratory was used.

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Participants:

The total sample size was fifteen participants taken randomly from Psychology students from

Dublin Business School (n=15). The order in which these participants took part was randomly

chosen by drawing names from a hat.

Design:

The design method used for this experiment was a ‘repeated measures within subjects’ design.

This consisted of one group of participants who carried out an experiment of sorting cards in a

simple and complex manner under differing circumstances of quiet or heavy audio. The

dependent variable was that of the reaction time, the time that was required by each

participant to complete each of the individual tasks. The independent variables were that of the

type of audio being played and the task difficulty. Audio played was classical relaxed music and

heavy dance music. The tasks were simple, sort four piles randomly from a deck of cards and

complex, sort a deck of cards into 4 bundles of suits correctly. Each task was carried out under

relaxed and heavy audio and each participant carried out four tasks in total.

Procedure:

The following procedure was used to carry out the experiment:

1. The experimenter took note of all the participants in the experiment.

2. From this list names were randomly drawn out of a bag to determine the order in which

the participants would carry out the experiment.

3. Once random allocation was decided the participants and experimenter went to the

laboratory.

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 4. Each participant was called in turn to carry out the experiment in isolation in the

laboratory.

5. Before carrying out the tasks each deck of cards was shuffled in the automatic shuffler

to ensure random card allocation.

6. Instructions were read out as follows: “You will be required to carry out several tasks

involving placing decks of cards into piles on the table in front of you. You must carry

out these tasks as quickly as possible without any error. In between each task we shall

pause and reshuffle the decks as required. Please do not start each task until indicated

to do so.”

7. As there were two differing tasks instructions were read out just prior to the participant

carrying out the individual tasks. Instructions for the simple task were read as follows:

“There is a deck of cards in front of you. Please place the cards into equal piles so that

you have four piles in total. If you have any questions about the task please ask. Do not

start until the audio has begun and you are indicated to start.” Instructions for the

complex task were read as follows: “There is a shuffled deck in front of you. Please sort

the cards into four piles, with each pile containing only the individual suits spades,

hearts, diamonds and clubs. If you have any questions about the task please ask. Do not

start until the audio has begun and you are indicated to start.”

8. Each participant upon entering the room was given the general instructions about the

experiment and also for each of the simple and complex tasks as they were carried out.

9. Alternate participants were started with either relaxed or heavy music playing in the

background.

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 10. Each participant carried out the tasks in one of two orders:

a. Simple with Relaxed, Simple with Heavy, Complex with Relaxed, Complex with

Heavy

b. Simple with Heavy, Simple with Relaxed, Complex with Heavy, Complex with

Relaxed

11. Each participant therefore carried out 4 individual tasks of sorting cards into piles.

12. After each task was carried out the time required to complete the task was noted on the

record sheet. See Figure 7.

13. Upon completion of the four tasks each participant was asked not to inform their fellow

participants about the nature of the tasks or any of the other details of the experiment,

procedures and instructions. The participants were then thanked for their participation.

14. Once all participants had carried out the experiment the data record sheet was input

into SPSS and the data analysed.

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Results

The following are the results of analysis of time taken by each of the fifteen participants to

carry out the card shuffling tasks under varying conditions.

Figure 3 shows the average number of seconds it took each participant to carry out the simple

shuffling task under relaxed and heavy audio. There is a difference in the completion time with

(See Figure 8):

Difference: Simple Relax – Simple Heavy = 30.3533 – 30.1160 = 0.2373 seconds

This indicates that the simple task was carried out at a quicker rate when heavy audio was

played.

Average Completion Time for Simple Task By

Music Type
30.4
Task Time in Seconds

30.2

30

29.8
Simple Task Relax Audio Simple Task Heavy Audio
Music Type

Figure 3 - Average Completion Time for Simple Task By Music Type

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However, looking at the Wilcoxon result (See Figure 9):

Wilcoxon Signed Rank Result: z = -1.392, p = 0.164, p > 0.05, 2-tailed

This indicates that there was no significant difference between the completion time of the

simple task under relaxed or heavy audio. It should be noted that there was a greater variation

in the standard deviation of completion time under heavy versus relaxed audio for the simple

task.

Std Dev Simple Relaxed: 4.5297 versus Std Dev Simple Heavy: 6.71585

Figure 4 shows the average number of seconds it took each participant to carry out the complex

shuffling task under relaxed and heavy audio. There is a difference in the completion time with

(See Figure 8):

Difference: Complex Relax – Complex Heavy = 47.2060 – 46.1027 = 1.1033 seconds

This indicates that the complex task was carried out at a quicker rate when heavy audio was
played.

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 Average Completion Time For Complex Task By
Music Type
47.4
47.2
47
Task Time in Seconds

46.8
46.6
46.4
46.2
46
45.8
45.6
45.4
Complex Task Relax Audio Complex Task Heavy Audio
Music Type

Figure 4 - Average Completion Time for Complex Task By Music Type

However, looking at the Wilcoxon result (See Figure 9):

Wilcoxon Signed Rank Result: z = -0.57, p = 0.955, p > 0.05, 2-tailed

This indicates that there was no significant difference between the completion time of the

complex task under relaxed or heavy audio. It should be noted that there was a greater

variation in the standard deviation of completion time under heavy versus relaxed audio for the

complex task.

Std Dev Complex Relaxed: 13.72268 versus Std Dev Complex Heavy: 9.78983

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Comparing the simple task under both music conditions against the complex task under both

music conditions, Figure 5, it can be seen that the complex task took a greater amount of time

under both relaxed and heavy audio in comparison to the simple task.

Average Completion Time for Simple and

Complex Tasks By Music Type
50
45
40
Task time in Seconds

35
30
25 Simple Task Relax Audio
20 Complex Task Relax Audio
15
Simple Task Heavy Audio
10
Complex Task Heavy Audio
5
0
Simple Task Complex Task Simple Task Complex Task
Relax Audio Relax Audio Heavy Audio Heavy Audio
Tasks

Figure 5 - Average Completion Time for Simple and Complex Tasks By Music Type

It should be noted also that the spread in standard deviation comparing task complexity under

the various audio conditions was much greater for the complex task.

Std Dev Spread Simple Task: Heavy – Relaxed Audio = 6.71585 – 4.597 = 2.11885 seconds

Std Dev Spread Complex Task: Heavy – Relaxed Audio = 9.78983 – 13.72268 = -3.93285 seconds

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Also the standard deviation in task completion time was reversed when comparing simple and

complex tasks under the varying audio conditions. For the simple task the standard deviation

was greater under the heavy audio task whereas for the complex task the standard deviation

was greater under the relaxed audio task (See Figure 8).

A comparison was finally made of the average completion time across both audio conditions,

purely comparing simple versus complex tasks, see Figure 6. This indicates that there is a larger

average completion time for the complex task versus the simple task.

Average Completion Time Across Task

Complexity for Relaxed and Heavy Music
50
45
40
Task Time in Seconds

35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Simple Complex
Task

Figure 6 - Average Completion Time across Task Complexity for Relaxed and Heavy Music

Looking at the Wilcoxon signed ranks test result:

Wilcoxon Signed Rank Result: z = -3.408, p = 0.001, p < 0.05, 2-tailed

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This indicates that there is a significant difference between the average completion times for

simple versus complex tasks. Furthermore it can be noted that there is a much larger standard

deviation in the average completion time of the complex task under both audio conditions than

for the simple task under both audio conditions.

Std Dev: Simple Task (both audio conditions): 4.86566

Std Dev: Complex Task (both audio conditions): 11.40808

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Discussion

It was found that there was support added to the work carried out by Bellamy, 1993.

The hypothesis that there would be a significant difference between the completion times of a

simple task as compared to a complex task was experimentally. This was found to be the case.

This mirrored the results found by Bellamy indicating that higher order complex tasks do indeed

take longer to process, interpret and react to. However with regard to the second hypothesis

that there would be a significant difference between the completion times of those carrying out

a task with relax audio as compared to those carrying out the same task with heavy audio the

null hypothesis was failed to be rejected. This suggests that the experiment as designed does

not give weight to audio having a positive or negative effect on carrying out tasks, either of

simple or complex in nature.

The hypothesis regarding task complexity and speed of reaction time falls within

expected results. There is a discernible and quantifiable difference in the complexity of task

carried out and as such a clear and quantifiable set of tasks were easily measured and

evaluated. The second hypothesis regarding audio and its affect on task performance, however,

is much more difficult to quantify. Classification of the audio as relaxing or heavy is subjective in

nature. Rubin-Rabson, 1940 has suggested that age plays an important factor on participants

reaction to particular types of music. It gives credence to the criticism of what constitutes

relaxed and heavy audio as it relates to the age of participant. The reaction-time experiment

does not give any weight to age or familiarisation with the audio in use. This may have an affect

on the results obtained. Chen, 2008 suggests that musicians use differing parts of their brain from

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non-musicians when carrying out tasks involving music so this could be a factor in differing

completion times on the various tasks. The experiment could be extended out to incorporate

level of experience with music as a whole. Work carried out by Martin, 2008 suggests that

motivation and engagement of musical and sporting participants is similar having affect on

adaptive cognitions, adaptive behaviours, impeding/maladaptive cognitions, and maladaptive

behaviours. The experiment could be enhanced to determine if the participants were from a

sporting or musical background and how this may affect reaction time and also how much

audio may cause a beneficial or aversive effect. Childs, 2008 investigated sleep deprivation in

collaboration with the effect of caffeine energy tablets on task performance. The reaction time

experiment could be modified to determine if relaxed or heavy audio will have a greater effect

on sleep-deprived participants in carrying out simple and complex tasks. Prolonged exposure to

audio cues may have an affect on the reaction-time experiment results. Yingling, 1962 suggests

that prolonged exposure and training in music appreciation causes increased intellectual

response over and above emotional response. These findings could be extended into reaction-

time measurement to determine if music appreciation can cause participants to use different

cognitive abilities as compared to a control group of untrained participants. Rockstroh, 2004

has linked test practise to increased performance. This finding should be considered in relation

to the reaction-time experiment. Participants should be questioned on their pre-test abilities

with card shuffling. The experiment could be further extended to include forcing the

participant to carry out a mental arithmetic task while carrying out a more physical task. Other

factors such as practice, attention/distraction, learning, age, stress, competition, visual acuity,

gender, length of arms, sleep deprivation, caffeine, day-of-week and drugs could be varied and

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compared to a control group carrying out the simple and complex tasks without any other

distraction or performance aid.

Despite failing to reject the null hypothesis with regard to audio and its affect on task

completion the experiment has merit in terms of extension into further more specific and

tightly controlled experimentation in an effort to link audio cues to increased reaction time.

This could have benefit for many areas including but not limited to sports and education.

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References

Bellamy, M.L. (1993). Reaction time and neural circuitry. Neuroscience Laboratory and

Classroom Activities, The Society for Neuroscience and the National Association of

Biology Teachers.

Carlson, N.R. (2004) Physiology of Behavior, 8th Ed, Pearson Education Inc.

Chen, J.L., Penhune, V.B., Zatorre, R.J. (2008). Moving on time: Brain network for auditory-

motor synchronization is modulated by rhythm complexity and musical training.

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 20(2), Feb 2008. 226-239, MIT Press.

Childs, E., de Wit, H. (2008). Enhanced mood and psychomotor performance by a caffeine-

containing energy capsule in fatigued individuals. Experimental and Clinical

Psychopharmacology, 16(1), Feb 2008. 13-21, American Psychological Association.

Ernst, J.M. (1996). The effect of mood on cognitive appraisal. Dissertation Abstracts

International: Section B: The Sciences and Engineering, 56(10-B), Apr 1996. 5832,

ProQuest Information & Learning.

Guyton, A.C. (1991). Textbook of medical physiology. 8th ed. Philadelphia, PA: W.B. Saunders

Company; Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.

Hayakawa, Y., Miki, H., Takada, K., Tanaka, K. (2000). Effects of music on mood during bench

stepping exercise. Perceptual and Motor Skills, Vol 90(1), Feb 2000. 307-314,

Perceptual & Motor Skills.

Hunter, P.G., Schellenberg, E.G., Schimmack, U. (2008). Mixed affective responses to music

with conflicting cues. Cognition & Emotion, 22(2), Feb 2008. 327-352.

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Jones, M.H., West, S.D., Estell, D.B. (2006). The Mozart Effect: Arousal, Preference, and Spatial

Performance. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, S(1), Aug 2006, 26-32,

American Psychological Association.

Martin, A.J. (2008). Motivation and engagement in music and sport: Testing a multidimensional

framework in diverse performance settings., Journal of Personality, 76(1), Feb 2008.

135-170, Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd..

Nelson, D.O. (1963). Effect of selected rhythms and sound intensity on human performance as

measured by the bicycle ergometer. Research Quarterly, 34(4), 484-488.

Rockstroh, S., Schweizer, K. (2004). The Effect of Retest Practice on the Speed-Ability

Relationship. European Psychologist, Vol 9(1), Mar 2004. 24-31., Hogrefe & Huber

Publishers.

Rubin-Rabson, G. (1940). The influence of age, intelligence, and training on reactions to classic

and modern music. Journal of General Psychology, 22, 413-429, Heldref Publications.

Salloway, S.P., Blitz, A. (2002). Introduction to functional neural circuitry., Brain circuitry and

signaling in psychiatry: Basic science and clinical implications. Kaplan, Gary B. (Ed);

Hammer, Ronald P. Jr. (Ed); 1-29, American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc.

Schweizer, K. (1998). Complexity of information processing and the speed-ability relationship,

Journal of General Psychology, 125(1), Jan 1998. 89-102., Heldref Publications.

Smoll, F. L. (1975). Preferred tempo in performance of repetitive movements., Perceptual and

Motor Skills, 40(2), Apr 1975. 439-442, Perceptual & Motor Skills.

Stratton, V.N., Zalanowski, A.H. (1991). The effects of music and cognition on mood.

Psychology of Music, Vol 19(2), 121-127, Sage Publications.

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Stratton, V.N., Zalanowski, A.H. (1994). Affective impact of music vs. lyrics. Empirical Studies of

the Arts, 12(2) 173-184, Baywood Publishing.

Yingling, R.W. (1962). Classification of reaction patterns in listening to music. Journal of

Research in Music Education, 10(2), 105-120, National Assn of Music Education.

Laboratories II PSY283 Alan Cummins 1165236 Page 24 of 26

Appendix A – Record Sheet

Participant No. Simple Task Simple Task Complex Task Complex Task
Relaxed Audio Heavy Audio Relaxed Audio Heavy Audio
Completion Time Completion Time Completion Time Completion Time
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20

Figure 7 - Record Sheet

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Appendix B – SPSS Output

Descriptive Statistics

N Mean Std. Deviation

simple task with relax audio 15 30.3533 4.52970

complex task with relax
15 47.2060 13.72268
audio
simple task with heavy
15 30.1160 6.71585
audio
complex task with heavy
15 46.1027 9.78983
audio
simple 15 30.2347 4.86566
complex 15 46.6543 11.40808
Valid N (listwise) 15
Figure 8 - Descriptive Statistics for Card Shuffling Task

Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test

simple task with complex task with

heavy audio - heavy audio -
simple task with complex task with complex -
relax audio relax audio simple
Z -1.392(a) -.057(b) -3.408(b)

Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) .164 .955 .001

a Based on positive ranks.

b Based on negative ranks.
c Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test
Figure 9 - Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test for Card Shuffling Tasks

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