Motivationally significant stimuli show visual prior entry: Evidence for attentional capture.

West, Greg L.; Anderson, Adam; Pratt, Jay

doi:10.1037/a0014493

Cited by 74 publications

(111 citation statements)

References 67 publications

(137 reference statements)

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“…Very few studies have been able to provide evidence in support of rapid orienting to threat (Stein, Seymour, Hebart, & Sterzer, 2014;West, Anderson, & Pratt, 2009). Delays in attentional disengagement have been observed more readily, mainly in studies employing the dot-probe paradigm with a neutral baseline (Fox, Russo, & Dutton, 2002).…”

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confidence: 99%

“…An organism's odds of survival can be increased by focusing the limited-capacity processing resources of the visual system on potential threats in the environment (Öhman & Mineka, 2001;Tamietto & De Gelder, 2010;West, Anderson, & Pratt, 2009). For example, if a visual scene contained both a potentially poisonous spider and a harmless butterfly, orienting attention to the spider would facilitate its processing and allow us to take appropriate actions.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Threat captures attention, but not automatically: Top-down goals modulate attentional orienting to threat distractors

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Lipp

Remington

et al. 2016

Atten Percept Psychophys

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The rapid orienting of attention to potential threats has been proposed to proceed outside of top-down control. However, paradigms that have been used to investigate this have struggled to separate the rapid orienting of attention (i.e. capture) from the later disengagement of focal attention that may be subject to top-down control. Consequently, it remains unclear whether and to what extent orienting to threat is contingent on top-down goals. The current study manipulated the goal-relevance of threat distractors (spiders), whilst a strict top-down attentional set was encouraged by presenting the saliently colored target and the threat distracter simultaneously for a limited time. The goal-relevance of threatening distractors was manipulated by including a spider amongst the possible target stimuli (Experiment 1: spider/cat targets) or excluding it (Experiment 2: bird/fish targets). Orienting and disengagement were disentangled by cueing attention away from or towards the threat prior to its onset. The results indicated that the threatening spider distractors elicited rapid orienting of attention when spiders were potentially goalrelevant (Experiment 1) but did so much less when they were irrelevant to the task goal (Experiment 2). Delayed disengagement from the threat distractors was even more strongly contingent on the task goal and occurred only when a spider was a possible target. These results highlight the role of top-down goals in attentional orienting to and disengagement from threat.

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confidence: 99%

Threat captures attention, but not automatically: Top-down goals modulate attentional orienting to threat distractors

Vromen

Lipp

Remington

et al. 2016

Atten Percept Psychophys

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“…If faces are presented, those posing a threatening emotional expression have stronger effects on attentional capture or hold in non-clinical samples (e.g. Mogg & Bradley, 1999;Milders, et al, 2006;Li, et al, 2007;Carlson, Reinke, & Habib, 2009;West, Anderson, & Pratt, 2009). …”

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confidence: 99%

Attentional Effects of Masked Famous Faces (But Not Names) and Subjective Evaluations of a Target Person

Stone

2011

Percept Mot Skills

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Two experiments are reported using a 1986 version of the dot-probe paradigm of MacLeod, Mathews, and Tata, in which the masked subliminal faces of famous persons were differentially associated with attention depending on participants' attitudes toward the famous person. There was attentional avoidance of the faces of persons invoking high disgust (Exp. 1, n = 20) or dislike (Exp. 2) but attentional orientation toward the faces of persons invoking low disgust or liking. In Exp. 2 ( n = 28), this effect was apparent for the faces but not the names of famous persons, despite evidence that the famous names were recognised without awareness. The aversion of attention from faces, but not the names of famous persons who are regarded in a negative light but who are not particularly threatening, may suggest an automatic tendency to avoid making eye contact with an undesirable person thereby avoiding unwanted social interaction.

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“…Studies in cognitive psychology have shown that the deployment of attentional resources (Kahneman, 1973;Matthews & Desmond, 1998) is determined by various external factors, such as physically (Theeuwes, 2010) and socially (West, Anderson, & Pratt, 2009) distinctive items, as well as by endogenous factors, such as intention (Hommel, 2010). Moreover, the deployment of attention can also be affected by such internal factors as motivation (Della Libera & Chelazzi, 2006) and the current mood state (Fredrickson, 2004;Friedman & Forster, 2010), because the internal states of observers can influence executive function (Ashby, Isen, & Turken, 1999), which governs the major cognitive systems, thereby including the deployment of attention.…”

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confidence: 99%

The effect of fatigue on the attentional blink

Kawahara

Sato

2013

Atten Percept Psychophys

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It has been suggested that attention and emotional states are tightly linked, in that negative moods are associated with narrowed attentional focus, whereas positive moods are associated with broadened focus. However, recent studies on the effect of affective states, using the attentional blink deficit as a reflection of the temporary unavailability of attentional resources, have reported ambiguous results regarding the deployment of attention in the temporal domain. In the present study, we examined whether the effect of affective state on the attentional blink should be interpreted in terms of valence and arousal axes or in terms of the specificity of the connection between affect and attention. We chose to use fatigue to test these alternatives because, according to the two-axis view, fatigue would not be expected to increase the attentional blink. Participants identified two targets embedded in a stream of nontargets, and for half of the participants, a state of fatigue was induced using the Trier Social Stress Test. Those in the experimental group demonstrated a greater attentional blink relative to those in the control group, who did not receive the mood manipulation. The results suggest unique links between mood states and attention during a task involving temporal selection.Studies in cognitive psychology have shown that the deployment of attentional resources

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Motivationally significant stimuli show visual prior entry: Evidence for attentional capture.

Cited by 74 publications

References 67 publications

Threat captures attention, but not automatically: Top-down goals modulate attentional orienting to threat distractors

Threat captures attention, but not automatically: Top-down goals modulate attentional orienting to threat distractors

Attentional Effects of Masked Famous Faces (But Not Names) and Subjective Evaluations of a Target Person

The effect of fatigue on the attentional blink

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