One thing that separates human beings from the rest of the animal world is our ability to control behavior by referencing internal plans, goals, and rules. This ability, which is crucial to our success in a complex social environment, depends on the purposeful generation of "task sets"--states of mental readiness that allow each of us to engage with the world in a particular way or achieve a particular aim. This book reports the latest research regarding the activation, maintenance, and suppression of task sets. Chapters from many of the world's leading researchers in task switching and cognitive control investigate key issues in the field, from how we select the most relevant task when presented with distracting alternatives, to how we maintain focus on a task ("eyes on the prize") and switch to a new one when our goals or external circumstances change. Chapters also explore the brain structures responsible for these abilities, how they develop during childhood, and whether they decline due to normal aging or neurological disorders. Of interest especially to scholars and students of cognitive psychology, the volume offers thorough, multi-disciplinary coverage of contemporary research and theories concerning this fundamental yet mysterious aspect of human brain function and behavior.

Applicable to educators across all disciplines and grade levels, this book provides the tools to analyze, design, and refine cognitively engaging tasks of learning.

This volume addresses an important gap in the literature on task design and second language use. Building on insights from over 50 years of research on the relationship between task demands and language use, it examines how referent similarity relates to developmentally-relevant variation in the use of nominal structures, comparative structures and abstract lexis among first and second language speakers of English. In addition to providing an empirical basis for future research on tasks, it shares both theoretical and practical information on task design, which will greatly benefit curriculum and material developers.

"This will become the go-to resource for intranet projects" - Robert MillsCreate content that makes it faster for people to find what they need on the intranet than from a colleague. Learn user-centred design as you progress through this practical, stage by stage guide.Generally, people want information about a specific thing, fast, when they visit an intranet. They need it in as little time as possible, so they can get to a meeting, or enjoy their lunch break.This book outlines processes that put into practice these 3 essential principles for user-centred intranet content:1. Content reflects a staff need for it.2. Information is easy to find.3. Style, tone and language is optimised for users with little time to read and absorb content.Lizzie Bruce pours her experience of designing intranet content around staff needs for UK government into 100 pages of advice and techniques for creating usable, readable content.Includes: list of universal intranet tasks, glossary of user-centred design terms, project "shopping list", timeline planner, tips for stakeholder buy-in, and links to case studies and blogs.Every organisation planning an intranet redesign needs this book.

Essence of Top Tasks is a prioritized list of what matters most to customers. You then continuously improve these top tasks based on evidence of customers trying to complete them. Developed as a result of 15 years of research and practice. Implemented by some of the world's largest organizations: Cisco, Microsoft, NetApp, IBM, Google, European Union, Toyota, Tetra Pak, and hundreds more. More than 300,000 customers have participated in Top Tasks studies in over 40 countries and 30 languages.

Multitasking refers to performance of multiple tasks. The most prominent types of multitasking are situations including either temporal overlap of the execution of multiple tasks (i.e., dual tasking) or executing multiple tasks in varying sequences (i.e., task switching). In the literature, numerous attempts have aimed at theorizing about the specific characteristics of executive functions that control interference between simultaneously and/or sequentially active component of task-sets in these situations. However, these approaches have been rather vague regarding explanatory concepts (e.g., task-set inhibition, preparation, shielding, capacity limitation), widely lacking theories on detailed mechanisms and/ or empirical evidence for specific subcomponents. The present research topic aims at providing a selection of contributions on the details of executive functioning in dual-task and task switching situations. The contributions specify these executive functions by focusing on (1) fractionating assumed mechanisms into constituent subcomponents, (2) their variations by age or in clinical subpopulations, and/ or (3) their plasticity as a response to practice and training.