The inability to ignore auditory distractors as a function of visual task perceptual load

Abstract

Using a response competition paradigm, we investigated the ability to ignore target responsecompatible, target response-incompatible, and neutral visual and auditory distractors presented during a visual search task. The perceptual load model of attention (e.g., Lavie & Tsal, 1994) states that task-relevant processing load determines irrelevant distractor processing in such a way that increasing processing load prevents distractor processing. In three experiments, participants searched sets of one (easy search) or six (hard search) similar items. In Experiment 1, visual distractors influenced reaction time (RT) and accuracy only for easy searches, following the perceptual load model. Surprisingly, auditory distractors yielded larger distractor compatibility effects (median RT for incompatible trials minus median RT for compatible trials) for hard searches than for easy searches. In Experiments 2 and 3, during hard searches, consistent RT benefits with response-compatible and RT costs with response-incompatible auditory distractors occurred only for hard searches. We suggest that auditory distractors are processed regardlessof visual perceptual load but that the ability to inhibit cross-modal influence from auditory distractors is reduced under high visual load.

A crossmodal crossover: Opposite effects of visual and auditory perceptual load on steady-state evoked potentials to irrelevant visual stimuli

“…The selective enhancement of crossmodal distractor processing with increasing perceptual load observed here and by Tellinghuisen and Nowak (2003) stands in contrast to other studies in which increasing perceptual load in one modality either reduced distractor processing in another modality (Berman and Colby, 2002;Houghton et al, 2003;Klemen et al, 2009), or had no measurable effect (Parks et al, 2011;Rees et al, 2001). One factor that might have contributed to these different patterns of results is the nature of the load manipulations employed in each study.…”

“…A similar positive relationship between perceptual load in one modality and distractor processing in another was reported by Tellinghuisen and Nowak (2003). They found that increasing visual perceptual load eliminated the flanker compatibility effect evoked by irrelevant visual flanker letters, but enhanced the flanker compatibility effects evoked by auditory distractors.…”

“…Our findings go beyond the behavioural results of Tellinghuisen and Nowak (2003) by providing a direct neural marker for the crossmodal disinhibition effect, and permit us to rule out a number of caveats to the generality of their theory. First, whereas Tellinghuisen and Nowak measured the effect of visual perceptual load on auditory distractor processing, we measured the effect of auditory perceptual load on visual distractor processing.…”

Modulation of Olfactory Perception by Visual Cortex Stimulation

“…Indeed, there is some evidence that our rTMS protocol is inhibitory (Huang et al, 2005), and competition across modalities is a well known phenomenon (Tellinghuisen and Nowak, 2003;Lavie, 2005). We consider this account to be unlikely for two reasons.…”

Subjective Quality Evaluation of Foveated Video Coding Using Audio-Visual Focus of Attention

“…Even when people are performing a visual task, a novel audio stimulus tends to capture their visual attention [15]. In [16], it was shown that such cross-modal orienting occurs even when the detailed information about the visual target is provided in order to prevent uninformative audio cues from orienting attention.…”