Delayed Attentional Engagement in the Attentional Blink.

Nieuwenstein, Mark; Chun, Marvin M.; Lubbe, Robert Henricus Johannes van der; Hooge, Ignace T. C.

doi:10.1037/0096-1523.31.6.1463

Cited by 135 publications

(207 citation statements)

References 62 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

181

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…However, color by itself does not influence AB. When both targets are defined by color (e.g., subjects are asked to report two white target letters presented among black distractor letters), AB still occurs (18). In the current study, however, color is used to make T2 salient, not to define the features of both targets.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resetting capacity limitations revealed by long-lasting elimination of attentional blink through training

Choi

Chang

Shibata

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

As with other cognitive phenomena that are based upon the capacity limitations of visual processing, it is thought that attentional blink (AB) cannot be eliminated, even after extensive training. We report in this paper that just 1 h of specific attentional training can completely eliminate AB, and that this effect is robust enough to persist for a few months after training. Results of subsequent behavioral and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiments indicate that this learning effect is associated with improvements in temporal resolution, which are mainly due to processing in the prefrontal areas. Contrary to prior wisdom, we conclude that capacity limitations can be overcome by short-term training.learning in temporal attention | color-salient training | plasticity V isual information processing progresses hierarchically. In its early stages, the bulk of "raw" signals are processed in parallel. However, as signals are processed in higher stages, they become more abstract and cognitively meaningful, whereas the capacity of information processing becomes more limited in many respects, including visual short-term memory (1) and temporal attention (2). One of the best known phenomena that reflects the limited capacity of visual processing is attentional blink (AB), in which the identification of a second visual target (T2) is impaired in rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) when that target is presented within 500 ms of the appearance of the first target (T1) (3-5). It is thought that AB occurs because the processing of T1 requires the full capacity of this portion of the visual system and does not allow for the processing of T2.If capacity limits could be increased, processing efficiency may be greatly improved in some cognitive tasks. There have been a number of attempts to eliminate AB through repetitive practice (2, 6, 7). However, so far none of these attempts have been successful in eliminating AB. These failures have led to the belief that it is impossible to eliminate the capacity limit associated with AB. In the current study, however, we developed a simple, short-term training method with which the AB capacity limitation can be entirely overcome. We also found that this learning effect lasts for a few months after training. Further results from behavioral and fMRI studies suggest that this elimination of AB is associated with an improvement in temporal resolution correlated with processing in the prefrontal areas. Overall, these results suggest that capacity limitations can be overcome by simple, short-term training. ResultsTo eliminate AB, we drew attention to T2 during training with a salient color. That is, T2 had a different color from all of the other items of the RSVP task. T2 thus captured the subjects' attention, such that it was easily identified and no longer subject to AB. We addressed the question as to whether repeating this task would bring about an improvement in the capacity of temporal attention.Experiment 1: Color-Salient Training Effect. Experiment 1 explores whethe...

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resetting capacity limitations revealed by long-lasting elimination of attentional blink through training

Choi

Chang

Shibata

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Consequently, there is no chance for attention to disengage, and thus no need to rapidly re-engage attention when a second target appears. Thus, in this view, the main source of selection delays for targets presented during an attentional blink lies in the time needed to initiate a second episode of attentional engagement shortly after a first (e.g., Weichselgartner & Sperling, 1987; for evidence that selection is delayed during the AB, see the studies by Nieuwenstein, 2006;Nieuwenstein, Chun, Hooge, & Van der Lubbe, 2005;and Vul, Nieuwenstein, & Kanwisher, in press). …”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Whole report versus partial report in RSVP sentences

Potter

Nieuwenstein

Strohminger

2008

Journal of Memory and Language

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A sentence is readily understood and recalled when presented 1 word at a time using rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) at 10 words/s (Potter, 1984). In contrast, selecting just 2 colored letters at 10 letters/s results in easy detection of the first target but poor recall for the second when it appears 200-500 ms later. This attentional blink disappears when all letters must be reported; instead, performance drops more gradually over serial position (Nieuwenstein & Potter, 2006). Would target words in sentences escape an attentional blink? Subjects either reported 2 target words (in red or uppercase) or the whole 10-word sentence. There was a blink for Target 2 in partial report, but that target was easily remembered in whole report. With scrambled sentences whole report dropped but partial report was unaffected, again showing a blink. The attentional blink is not due to memory processing of Target 1, but to target selection, which is incompatible with sentence processing.

show abstract

“…Such sufficient evidence may be present when two targets immediately follow each other, leading to a recovery from the blink for the second of the two. It may also be provided by a preceding distractor if the distractor is sufficiently similar to the target (Nieuwenstein et al 2005). In any case, we see the attentional blink as merely a special case of the selection process that is going on during the entire stream, namely the active monitoring for targets while attempting to reject distractors.…”

Section: An Alternative Account: the Overinvestment Hypothesismentioning

confidence: 99%

Spreading the sparing: against a limited-capacity account of the attentional blink

Olivers

Stigchel

Hulleman

2005

Psychological Research

180

317

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The identification of the second of two targets presented in close succession is often impaired-a phenomenon referred to as the attentional blink. Extending earlier work (Di Lollo, Kawahara, Ghorashi, and Enns, in Psychological Research 69:191-200, 2005), the present study shows that increasing the number of targets in the stream can lead to remarkable improvements as long as there are no intervening distractors. In addition, items may even recover from an already induced blink whenever they are preceded by another target. It is shown that limited memory resources contribute to overall performance, but independent of the attentional blink. The findings argue against a limited-capacity account of the blink and suggest a strong role for attentional control processes that may be overzealously applied.

show abstract

Delayed Attentional Engagement in the Attentional Blink.

Cited by 135 publications

References 62 publications

Resetting capacity limitations revealed by long-lasting elimination of attentional blink through training

Resetting capacity limitations revealed by long-lasting elimination of attentional blink through training

Whole report versus partial report in RSVP sentences

Spreading the sparing: against a limited-capacity account of the attentional blink

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About