Unified Theories of Cognition: Encoding

Encoding occurs next, a process of perceptual parsing that produces a representation of the stimulus in task-independent terms. This is a comprehension function that is obligatory, given the structure of the architecture. It is composed of a sequence of production executions, whose duration is simply the sum of the serial chain of E-productions that fire. Duration will increase with the complexity of the stimulus. However, just detecting that a stimulus is there requires no encoding at all (with suitable preparation). The arrival of the stimulus elements from P can be enough for the system to trigger further responses.