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Reward delays quitting in visual search.

Guanlan Kang1, Xiaoxiao Luo2,3, Lihan Chen4

  • 1School of Psychology, Laboratory of Sports Stress and Adaptation of General Administration of Sport, Beijing Sport University, Beijing, China.

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Summary

Reward can hinder visual search performance, especially when a target is absent. This study found that while reward speeds up target detection, it paradoxically increases errors when no target is present, suggesting a bias towards saying "yes".

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Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Visual Perception
  • Decision Making

Background:

  • Reward typically enhances goal-directed behaviors, improving reaction time and accuracy in tasks like target discrimination.
  • The specific impact of reward on target detection, where participants must distinguish between target presence and absence, remains less understood.
  • Previous research suggests reward facilitates performance, but its influence on tasks requiring a 'no-go' decision is unclear.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate how reward availability influences performance in a visual target-detection search task.
  • To determine if reward's facilitatory effects extend to situations where the target is absent.
  • To examine the underlying mechanisms, specifically response bias, affected by reward in visual search.

Main Methods:

  • Participants completed a visual search task where trial-by-trial reward availability was signaled by the color of the search array.
  • Experiments involved varying target presence probabilities (50%, 80%, 20%) and response baselines.
  • Signal detection analysis was employed to assess changes in response criteria.

Main Results:

  • Participants responded faster and made fewer errors when the target was present under reward conditions compared to no-reward conditions.
  • A reversed effect was observed when the target was absent, with reward leading to slower responses and more errors (interference).
  • Signal detection analysis indicated that reward biased participants towards a 'yes' response, increasing reluctance to terminate the search negatively.

Conclusions:

  • Reward's influence on goal-directed behavior is not universally facilitatory and can be detrimental in specific contexts like target detection.
  • Reward prolongs the visual search process by creating a bias against 'no' responses, leading to interference when the target is absent.
  • The findings highlight the complex interplay between reward motivation and decision-making processes in visual search termination.