Related Experiment Videos
Stimulus-driven attentional capture is contingent on attentional set for displaywide visual features
1Department of Psychology, University of Notre Dame, Indiana 46556, USA. bradley.gibson.16@nd.edu
Summary
Goal-directed processes, not just stimulus-driven factors, influence attentional capture. Research shows that learned associations between visual cues and target displays can drive attention, challenging existing criteria for stimulus-driven attentional capture.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Neuroscience
- Visual Perception
Background:
- Attentional capture describes how salient stimuli can involuntarily draw our attention.
- Current research often distinguishes between stimulus-driven (exogenous) and goal-directed (endogenous) attentional control.
- The criteria for identifying purely stimulus-driven attentional capture are debated, particularly regarding the influence of learned associations.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether goal-directed processes, specifically learned contingencies, contribute to attentional capture previously attributed to stimulus-driven mechanisms.
- To test the sufficiency of the current criterion for stimulus-driven attentional capture.
- To differentiate the roles of color and onset visual features in attentional capture under varying contingency conditions.
Main Methods:
- Two experiments were conducted manipulating the relationship between display-wide visual features and the appearance of a task-relevant target display.
- Experiment 1 established a contingency where both color and onset signaled the target display.
- Experiment 2 used only onset to signal the target display, breaking the color-target contingency.
Main Results:
- In Experiment 1, both color and onset distractors captured attention, indicating a potential goal-directed influence.
- In Experiment 2, only onset distractors captured attention, suggesting that the color-based capture in Experiment 1 was contingent on learned associations.
- These findings demonstrate that previously observed stimulus-driven attentional capture may be influenced by goal-directed learning.
Conclusions:
- The current criterion for stimulus-driven attentional capture is insufficient to exclude the influence of goal-directed processes.
- Learned contingencies between display-wide visual features and target appearance can lead to attentional capture.
- The strongest evidence for stimulus-driven attentional capture may be mediated by goal-directed mechanisms, necessitating a re-evaluation of existing models.