Spatial attention and object-based attention: a comparison within a single task.
There is now much experimental evidence supporting the idea that visual attention can be deployed in at least two ways: one space-based and other object-based. However, it is not clear whether space- and object-based attention work in an integrated way within the visual system. In this article, we present two experiments in which we compare both components of attention within a cueing paradigm. Participants had to discriminate the orientation of a line that appeared within one of four moving circles, differing in colour. A cue appearing close to one of the four circles indicated the location or circle where the target stimulus was likely to appear. Spatial and object cueing effects were observed: responses were faster when target appeared either at the precued location or within the precued object. In addition, the object-cueing effect occurred only when the cue was spatially invalid and not when it was spatially valid. These results suggest that object- and space-based attention interact, with selection by location being primary over object-based selection.
Soto
David
D
Departamento de Psicología Social y Básica, Facultad de Psicología, University of Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Compostela 15706, Spain. psmblanc@usc.es
Blanco
Manuel J
MJ
D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D003463:Cues; D005260:Female; D005403:Fixation, Ocular / Q000502:physiology; D005556:Form Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009039:Motion Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*