Reward Does Not Modulate the Preview Benefit in Visual Search

Abstract

Preview benefit refers to faster search for a target when a subset of distractors is seen prior to the search display. We investigated whether reward modulates this effect. Participants identified a target among non-targets on each trial. On “preview” trials, placeholders occupied half the search array positions prior to the onset of the full array. On “non-preview” trials, no placeholders preceded the full search array. On preview trials, the target could appear at either a placeholder position (old-target-location condition) or a position where no placeholder had been (new-target-location condition). Critically, the color of the stimulus array indicated whether participants would earn reward for a correct response. We found a typical preview benefit, but no evidence that reward modulated this effect, despite a manipulation check showing that stimuli in the reward-signaling color tended to capture attention on catch trials. The results suggest that reward learning does not modulate the preview benefit.