Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 26, 2026
Investigating the Deployment of Visual Attention Before Accurate and Averaging Saccades via Eye Tracking and Assessment of Visual Sensitivity
Published on: March 18, 2019
Pro- and antisaccades in children elicited by visual and acoustic targets - does modality matter?
Johanna Goepel1, Stefanie C Biehl, Johanna Kissler
1Department of Clinical Psychology, University of Konstanz, Germany. hanna@wolkenkind.de
Insights
Children
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Psychology
- Ophthalmology
Background:
- Children's ability to inhibit responses to visual stimuli is developing.
- Inhibitory mechanisms for acoustic stimuli in children are understudied.
Purpose of the Study:
- Investigate inhibitory control in children using visual and acoustic cues.
- Examine differences in reaction times and error rates between visual and acoustic tasks.
- Understand the development of inhibitory functions in children.
Main Methods:
- Used an eye-tracker system to record reflexive (prosaccade) and inhibitory (antisaccade) responses.
- Tested 31 children aged 7-12 years with a gap-overlap task and two target eccentricities.
- Compared responses to visual and acoustic targets.
Main Results:
- Acoustically cued saccades showed longer reaction times than visually cued saccades.
- Eccentricity effects were observed only for acoustic targets, while gap effects were only for visual targets.
- Antisaccade errors decreased with age, indicating developing inhibitory control.
Conclusions:
- Findings provide a basis for studying acoustically triggered saccades in children.
- Results may inform the development of enhanced physiological diagnostic tools for children.
Background:
Children are able to inhibit a prepotent reaction to suddenly arising visual stimuli, although this skill is not yet as pronounced as it is in adulthood. However, up to now the inhibition mechanism to acoustic stimuli has been scarcely investigated
Methods:
Reflexive (prosaccade) and inhibitory (antisaccade) responses to visual and acoustic targets were examined with an eye tracker system in 31 children between seven and twelve years of age using a gap-overlap task and two target eccentricities.
Results:
Acoustically cued saccades had longer reaction times than visually cued saccades. A gap effect (i.e., shorter reaction time in the gap than the overlap condition) was only found for visually elicited saccades, whereas an eccentricity effect (i.e., faster saccades to more laterally presented targets - 12° vs. 6° or rather 90° vs. 45°) was only present in the acoustic condition. Longer reaction times of antisaccades compared to prosaccades were found only in the visual task. Across both tasks the typical pattern of elevated error rates in the antisaccade condition was found. Antisaccade errors declined with age, indicating an ongoing development of inhibitory functions.
Conclusions:
The present results lay the ground for further studies of acoustically triggered saccades in typically as well as atypically developing children and it might thus be possible to upgrade physiological diagnostic tools.
