Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

High-Level and Low-Level Awareness

High-Level and Low-Level Awareness

Controlled processes in human consciousness represent high-alert mental states where individuals deliberately focus their attention on achieving specific goals. Controlled processes can be seen in situations like mastering new technology, where a person might become so absorbed that they ignore surrounding distractions. Such processes involve selective attention, requiring one to concentrate on particular elements of experience while disregarding others. These are governed by executive...

The Availability Heuristic

The Availability Heuristic

A heuristic is a general problem-solving framework (Tversky & Kahneman, 1974). You can think of these as mental shortcuts that are used to solve problems. Different types of heuristics are used in different types of situations, and the impulse to use a heuristic occurs when one of five conditions is met (Pratkanis, 1989):

Framing Effects

Framing Effects

Information is everywhere and its presentation—such as how and when items are presented—can impact our perceptions and decisions surrounding the info. This broad concept umbrellas framing effects—influences that occur due to the way information is framed in its appearance, whether it’s purely the order or the specific wording of a message. Let’s take a look at numerous ways in which two versions of something can objectively say the same thing, yet we respond in...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Deep learning and eye tracking: Convolutional neural networks provide converging evidence for experience-driven attention within visual search.

Behavior research methods·2026

Same author

Luminance Matching in Cognitive Pupillometry Is Not Enough: The Curious Case of Orientation.

eNeuro·2025

Same author

A protocol for measuring sleep at home in children with autism using EEG headbands.

Research square·2025

Same author

A preliminary investigation of the interaction between expectation and the reflexive allocation of covert spatial attention.

Scientific reports·2025

Same author

Individual differences in information demand have a low dimensional structure predicted by some curiosity traits.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·2024

Same author

Manipulating the reliability of target-color information modulates value-driven attentional capture.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2024

Same journal

Low prevalence targets are primarily missed due to mind wandering.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2026

Same journal

An introduction to the special issue celebrating Mary A. Peterson.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2026

Same journal

Properties of the threshold stimulus exposure duration (TSED) measure of visual search efficiency.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2026

Same journal

Auditory selective attention in depth: Investigating directional dependency across front, lateral, and rear spaces.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2026

Same journal

Dissociations between stereoacuity and visual acuity with binocular night vision goggles.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2026

Same journal

Reward-based prioritization and perceptual feature effects on attentional flexibility in working memory.

Attention, perception & psychophysics·2026

See all related articles

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 27, 2025

Using Rapid Serial Visual Presentation to Measure Set-Specific Capture, a Consequence of Distraction While Multitasking

Using Rapid Serial Visual Presentation to Measure Set-Specific Capture, a Consequence of Distraction While Multitasking

Published on: August 29, 2018

Information-driven attentional capture.

Alenka Doyle¹, Kamilla Volkova¹, Nicholas Crotty¹

¹Trinity College, Hartford, CT, USA.

Attention, Perception & Psychophysics

|February 19, 2025

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

New research suggests that attention is captured by information associated with instrumental goals, not just reward history. This finding challenges existing models and offers insights into experience-driven attention mechanisms.

Keywords:

Attention Attention in learning Attentional capture

More Related Videos

Measurement of Neurophysiological Signals of Ignoring and Attending Processes in Attention Control

Measurement of Neurophysiological Signals of Ignoring and Attending Processes in Attention Control

Published on: July 5, 2015

Measuring Attention and Visual Processing Speed by Model-based Analysis of Temporal-order Judgments

Measuring Attention and Visual Processing Speed by Model-based Analysis of Temporal-order Judgments

Published on: January 23, 2017

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: May 27, 2025

Using Rapid Serial Visual Presentation to Measure Set-Specific Capture, a Consequence of Distraction While Multitasking

Using Rapid Serial Visual Presentation to Measure Set-Specific Capture, a Consequence of Distraction While Multitasking

Published on: August 29, 2018

Measurement of Neurophysiological Signals of Ignoring and Attending Processes in Attention Control

Measurement of Neurophysiological Signals of Ignoring and Attending Processes in Attention Control

Published on: July 5, 2015

Measuring Attention and Visual Processing Speed by Model-based Analysis of Temporal-order Judgments

Measuring Attention and Visual Processing Speed by Model-based Analysis of Temporal-order Judgments

Published on: January 23, 2017

Area of Science:

Cognitive Neuroscience
Psychology

Background:

Visual attention prioritizes sensory information, influenced by goals and salience.
Experience-driven attention captures attention via non-salient stimuli linked to past associations.
Reward-prediction errors explain some experience-driven attention, but alternative mechanisms are needed.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate if instrumental information, rather than target-seeking or reward, drives attentional capture.
To propose and test the information history hypothesis for attentional capture.

Main Methods:

Participants were presented with pre-cues to make search target information either instrumental or redundant.
Eye movements to task-irrelevant, non-salient distractors were recorded.
Behavioral costs (response times) were measured after distractor encounters.

Main Results:

Distractors associated with instrumental information elicited more eye movements than those with redundant information.
Attending to instrumental-information-associated distractors resulted in greater response time costs.
These effects occurred despite distractors having equivalent histories as sought targets.

Conclusions:

Findings support the information history hypothesis, demonstrating that instrumental information drives attentional capture.
This provides a novel mechanistic account for experience-driven attention beyond reward associations.
The study offers a framework for investigating the neural basis of information-driven attention.