Top-down attentional control for distractor locations: The benefit of precuing distractor locations on target localization and discrimination.

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273

Observers find a target item more quickly when they have foreknowledge of target-defining attributes, such as identity, color, or location. However, it is less clear whether foreknowledge of nontarget attributes can also speed search. Munneke, Van der Stigchel, and Theeuwes Acta Psychologica 129:101-107, (2008) found that observers found the target more quickly when they were cued to ignore a region of space where a target would not appear. Using a similar paradigm, we explored the effects of cueing nontarget features on search. We found that when we cued observers to ignore nontarget features, search was slowed. The results from a probe-dot detection task revealed that this slowing occurred because, paradoxically, observers initially selected an item appearing in the to-be-ignored color. Finally, we found that cueing nontarget features sped search when placeholders matching the location of the to-beignored color preceded presentation of the search display by at least 800 ms; thus, it appears that some limited inhibition of to-be-ignored items occurs following selection. Taken together, these results suggest that observers are unable to explicitly avoid selection of items matching known nontarget features. Instead, when nontarget features are cued, observers select the to-be-ignored feature or the locations of objects matching that feature early in search, and only inhibit them after this selection process.

Section: Inhibition Of Features and Locationssupporting

confidence: 81%

mentioning

confidence: 92%

The ignoring paradox: Cueing distractor features leads first to selection, then to inhibition of to-be-ignored items

Moher

Egeth

2012

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273

“…In a number of studies, researchers have examined what happens to distractors when participants are informed of their locations prior to the appearance of the display, showing that such preknowledge actually produces perceptual inhibition at the distractor locations (e.g., Chao, 2010;Munneke, Van der Stigchel, & Theeuwes, 2008;Ruff & Driver, 2006). These studies have shown that target processing is improved when distractor locations are known in advance, leading to the conclusion that distractor locations are inhibited.…”

Section: Resilience Of the Awb Effectmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In fact, studies that did not permit the omitting of a cued distractor location from the search array have not shown any indication of inhibition. In Chao (2010), as well as in Buckolz, Guy, Khan, and Lawrence (2006), participants were cued with one of four display locations as the location of the distractor with 67% validity. The target could still appear in any of the four display locations with equal probability.…”

Section: Resilience Of the Awb Effectmentioning

confidence: 99%

White bear everywhere: Exploring the boundaries of the attentional white bear phenomenon

Lahav

Makovski

Tsal

2012

Some failures of selective attention may be explained by the attentional white bear (AWB) phenomenon Tsal & Makovski (Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance 32: [351][352][353][354][355][356][357][358][359][360][361][362][363] 2006), which indicates that prior knowledge of a distractor location causes attention to be actively allocated to it. The AWB effect is demonstrated in a task that includes infrequent trials that involve two simultaneous dots embedded among flanker trials. The dot positioned at an expected distractor location is perceived as appearing before the dot at an expected empty location, indicating that attentional resources have initially been allocated to the expected distractor locations. The main goal of this study was to explore the boundaries of the AWB phenomenon by imposing perceptual, memory, and sensory constraints on the flanker task. The results showed that the AWB effect was obtained even when additional constraints severely taxed the information-processing system. We propose that a mandatory mechanism guides a fixed minimal amount of attention to expected distractor locations in a topdown manner.

“…A number of studies have demonstrated top-down inhibitory effects in central cueing tasks where targets are presented with distractor stimuli (Chao, 2010;Lahav, Makovski, & Tsal, 2012;Moher & Egeth, 2012;Munneke, van der Stigchel, & Theeuwes, 2008;Tsal & Makovski, 2006). In these studies, cues that signal the location of a distractor facilitate the processing of a target presented elsewhere.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Expect the unexpected: a paradoxical effect of cue validity on the orienting of attention

Jollie

Ivanoff

Webb

et al. 2016

Predictive central cues generate location-based expectancies, voluntary shifts of attention, and facilitate target processing. Often, location-based expectancies and voluntary attention are confounded in cueing tasks. Here we vary the predictability of central cues to determine whether they can evoke the inhibition of target processing in three go/no-go experiments. In the first experiment, the central cue was uninformative and did not predict the target's location. Importantly, these cues did not seem to affect target processing. In the second experiment, the central cue indicated the most or the least likely location of the target. Surprisingly, both types of cues facilitated target processing at the cued location. In the third experiment, the central cue predicted the most likely location of a no-go target, but it did not provide relevant information pertaining to the location of the go target. Again, the central cue facilitated processing of the go target. These results suggest that efforts to strategically allocate inhibition may be thwarted by the paradoxical monitoring of the cued location. The current findings highlight the need to further explore the relationship between location-based expectancies and spatial attention in cueing tasks.