Temporal limitations in the effective binding of attended target attributes in the mutual masking of visual objects

The problem of feature binding has been examined under conditions of distributed attention or with spatially dispersed stimuli. We studied binding by asking whether selective attention to a feature of a masked object enables perceptual access to the other features of that object using conditions in which spatial attention was directed at a single location where all objects appeared. In an identification condition, the task required reporting the same property of each object. High rates of identification showed good perceptual availability. In a search condition, the task required reporting the property (e.g., shape) that was associated with a specific value of the searched property (e.g., surface texture) of the same object. Focusing of attention on a target's searched property value did not result in a high rate of identifying the target's other property, and strong object masking was found. Backward masking between spatially superimposed visual objects appears to be primarily due to a difficulty in feature binding of a target object rather than to a substitution of an integrated object by the following stimulus.