P300 event-related brain potential (ERP) measures are affected
by target stimulus probability, the number of nontargets preceding
the target in the stimulus sequence structure, and interstimulus
interval (ISI). Each of these factors contributes to the
target-to-target interval (TTI), which also has been found to
affect P300. The present study employed a variant of the oddball
paradigm and manipulated the number of preceding nontarget stimuli
(0, 1, 2, 3) and ISI (1, 2, 4 s) in order to systematically
assess TTI effects on P300 values from auditory and visual stimuli.
Number of preceding nontargets generally produced stronger effects
than ISI in a manner suggesting that TTI determined P300 measures:
Amplitude increased as TTI increased for both auditory and visual
stimulus conditions, whereas latency tended to decrease with
increased TTI. The finding that TTI is a critical determinant
of P300 responsivity is discussed within a resource allocation
theoretical framework.