Is object-based attention mandatory? Strategic control over mode of attention

Menahem Yeari, Morris Goldsmith

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

27 Scopus citations

Abstract

Is object-based attention mandatory or under strategic control? In an adapted spatial cuing paradigm, participants focused initially on a central arrow cue that was part of a perceptual group (Experiment 1) or a uniformly connected object (Experiment 2), encompassing one of the potential target locations. The cue always pointed to an opposite, different-object location. By varying cue validity, the strategic incentive to prevent the spread of attention to the entire cue object, and consequently to the same-object location, was manipulated: With invalid cuing and (consequently) equal probability of targets at same-object and different-object locations, a same-object target identification advantage was observed. With highly valid cuing and targets much more probable at the different-object location than at the same-object location, the same-object advantage disappeared. Object-based attention appears to be a default mode that may be ecologically adaptive but can be overridden by strategic control when there is a strong immediate benefit in doing so.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)565-579
Number of pages15
JournalJournal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance
Volume36
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 2010
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • Default mode
  • Object based versus space based
  • Perceptual organization
  • Strategic control
  • Visual attention

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