Visual distraction: a behavioral and event-related brain potential study in humans.
Recent studies reported that the detection of changes in the visual stimulation results in distraction of cognitive processing. From event-related brain potentials it was argued that distraction is triggered by the automatic detection of deviants. We tested whether distraction effects are confined to the detection of a deviation or can be triggered by changes per se, namely by rare stimuli that were not deviant with respect to the stimulation. The results obtained comparable early event-related brain potential effects for rare and deviant stimuli, suggesting an automatic detection of these changes. In contrast, behavioral distraction and attention-related event-related brain potential components were confined to deviant stimuli. This finding suggests that deviancy from a given standard adds a genuine contribution to distraction.
Berti
Stefan
S
Psychological Institute, Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz, Mainz, Germany. berti@uni-mainz.de
Schröger
Erich
E
D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D004569:Electroencephalography / Q000379:methods; D005074:Evoked Potentials, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D013997:Time Factors