Often one must depart from an intended course of events to react to sudden situational demands before resuming his or her original action retained in working memory. Retaining an action plan in working memory (WM) can delay or facilitate the execution of an intervening action when the action features of the two action plans partly overlap (partial repetition) compared to when they do not overlap. We investigated whether partial repetition costs (PRCs) or benefits (PRBs) occur when the intervening event is an ideomotor-compatible stimulus that is a biological representation of the response required by the participant. Participants viewed two visual events and retained an action plan to the first event (A) while executing a speeded response to the second, intervening event (B). In Experiment 1A, the two visual events were ideomotor compatible, non-ideomotor compatible (abstract), or one was ideomotor compatible, and the other abstract. Results showed PRCs for all event A–B stimulus combinations with reduced PRCs for intervening, ideomotor compatible events. In contrast to previous research, there was no evidence that ideomotor-compatible actions were automatic and bypassed the selection bottleneck. Experiment 1B confirmed PRCs for ideomotor compatible stimuli that more accurately mimicked the required response. Findings suggest that mechanisms for activating, selecting, and retaining action plans are similar between ideomotor compatible and abstract visual events. We conclude that PRCs occur in response to intervening events when action plans are generated offline and rely on WM, including those for ideomotor-compatible stimuli; but PRBs may be restricted to actions generated online. This conclusion is consistent with the perceptual-motor framework by Goodale and Milner (Trends in Neuroscience 15:22–25, 1992).

通常，在恢复他或她保留在工作记忆中的原始动作之前，人们必须离开预定的事件进程以应对突然的情境需求。当两个行动计划的行动特征部分重叠（部分重复）时，与不重叠时相比，将行动计划保留在工作记忆 (WM) 中可以延迟或促进干预行动的执行。我们调查了当干预事件是一种与意念运动相容的刺激，它是参与者所需反应的生物学表现时，是否会发生部分重复成本 (PRC) 或收益 (PRB)。参与者查看了两个视觉事件并保留了对第一个事件 (A) 的行动计划，同时对第二个介入事件 (B) 执行了快速响应。在实验 1A 中，两个视觉事件是意念运动相容的，非思想运动兼容（抽象），或者一个是思想运动兼容的，另一个是抽象的。结果显示，所有事件 A-B 刺激组合的 PRCs 与干预的、意念运动相容事件的 PRCs 减少。与之前的研究相比，没有证据表明与意念运动兼容的动作是自动的并且绕过了选择瓶颈。实验 1B 证实了用于更准确地模拟所需反应的意念运动相容刺激的 PRC。研究结果表明，激活、选择和保留行动计划的机制在意念运动兼容和抽象视觉事件之间是相似的。我们得出结论，当行动计划离线生成并依赖于 WM 时，PRC 会响应干预事件而发生，包括那些与思想运动兼容的刺激；但 PRB 可能仅限于在线生成的操作。