Magnocellular involvement in flanked-letter identification relates to the allocation of attention.
To verify the hypothesis that the magnocellular system is important to flanked-letter identification [Neuropsychologia 40 (2002) 1881] because it subserves attention allocation, we conducted three letter-naming experiments in which we manipulated magnocellular involvement (colour vs. luminance contrast) and prior information regarding target-letter location. Location information was provided through constant presentation at the same location (Experiment 1) or through auditory precueing (Experiments 2 and 3). In control conditions, either no (Experiments 1 and 3) or invalid (Experiment 2) location information was given. In line with the hypothesis, magnocellular input helped flanked-letter identification only when no prior location information was given.
Omtzigt
David
D
Nijmegen Institute for Cognition and Information, University of Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9104, HE 6500 Nijmegen, The Netherlands. d.omtzigt@nici.kun.nl
Hendriks
Angélique W
AW
D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D003118:Color Perception / Q000502:physiology; D015350:Contrast Sensitivity / Q000502:physiology; D003463:Cues; D005133:Eye Movements / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010296:Parietal Lobe / Q000502:physiology*; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D011601:Psychophysics; D011897:Random Allocation; D011930:Reaction Time