Attentional capture triggers an attentional blink

Abstract

Two experiments examined the possibility that attention directed to a distractor during rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) can produce an attentional blink (AB). A to-be-ignored distractor (D1) preceded a target word (T2) by a variable lag in RSVP streams of black false-font distractors. D1 was highlighted by color and was a word, a string of consonants, a string of digits, or a string of false-font characters. Recall of T2 was significantly suppressed at short D1-T2 lags (the AB) but only when D1 contained letters; the AB was completely absent when D1 was composed of digits or false-font characters. Thus, the AB can be triggered by a highlighted distractor if the distractor shares features with a target.

Temporal attentional capture: Effects of irrelevant singletons on rapid serial visual search

“…In all previous examinations of potential capture of attention in temporal search, performance costs were produced by singletons that served as targets (producing an AB; e.g., Raymond et al, 1992) or were presented in a different spatial position (e.g., Folk et al, 2002;Wee & Chua, 2004) or were defined on the target dimension (e.g., Chun, 1997;Folk et al, 2001;Maki & Mebane, 2006). The present results, therefore, provide the first demonstrations of pure temporal attentional capture by singletons defined on a task-irrelevant dimension.…”

“…However, since participants respond primarily to the first target and only later to the second target, the AB is likely to involve both response-and memory-related effects (e.g., Jolicoeur, 1998). Moreover, most of the AB research assesses the consequences of attending deliberately to target stimuli and, as such, does not provide information about the involuntary capture of attention.Recent findings from the AB paradigm that an ignored first target or additional singleton (e.g., a colored box around a nontarget letter) can interfere with recall of the second target are more informative about the possibility of involuntary temporal attentional capture (e.g., Chun, 1997;Folk, Leber, & Egeth, 2001;Maki & Mebane, 2006; The presence of a unique yet irrelevant singleton in visual search or spatial-cuing tasks is typically associated with performance costs, suggesting that singletons tend to capture attention. However, since singletons have always been spatially separated from targets in previous experiments, it remains unclear whether an irrelevant visual singleton that occurs at the same spatial location as the target but at a different point in time can produce temporal capture of attention.…”

“…Recent findings from the AB paradigm that an ignored first target or additional singleton (e.g., a colored box around a nontarget letter) can interfere with recall of the second target are more informative about the possibility of involuntary temporal attentional capture (e.g., Chun, 1997;Folk, Leber, & Egeth, 2001;Maki & Mebane, 2006;881 Copyright 2006 Psychonomic Society, Inc. Wee & Chua, 2004). However, in all these studies, reliable performance costs were produced only by items that were defined on the same dimension as the targets (e.g., they were both color singletons; see also Ghorashi, Zuvic, Visser, & Di Lollo, 2003).…”

Contingent attentional capture occurs by activated target congruence

“…This means that contingent attentional capture occurs not only in relation to the perceptual properties of stimuli (e.g., color; Folk et al, 2002, in press;Folk et al, 1992;Spalek et al, 2006), but also for higher representations activated by stimuli. Third, the degree of attentional capture by a distractor depends profoundly on the features it shares with the target (Barnard et al, 2004;Maki & Mebane, 2006;Spalek et al, 2006). A distractor that substantially matches the observers' attentional set may capture attention considerably, and also may elicit a greater cost in performance.…”

“…We defined a target in the color Egeth, in press; Ghorashi, Zuvic, Visser, & Di Lollo, 2003;Maki & Mebane, 2006;Visser, Bischof, & Di Lollo, 2004). For example, Barnard et al demonstrated contingent attentional capture within a single RSVP stream of words by manipulating the words' meanings.…”