When similarity leads to sparing: probing mechanisms underlying the attentional blink.
When two targets are embedded in a temporal stream of distractors, second-target identification is initially impaired and then gradually improves as inter-target interval lengthens (attentional blink; AB). Notably, in about half of the published studies, this deficit is partially ameliorated when the targets follow one another directly, a condition known as "lag-1 sparing". Here, we probe the impact of target-distractor similarity on lag-1 sparing, with the surprising finding that while high similarity impairs second-target accuracy at all subsequent lags, it actually improves accuracy when the targets follow one another directly. We suggest that this improvement reflects the positive influence of over-committing resources to target processing in the AB.
Visser
Troy A W
TA
Psychology Department, University of British Columbia, Okanagan, 3333 University Way, Kelowna, BC, V1Y 1V7, Canada. troy.visser@ubc.ca
Davis
Corinne
C
Ohan
Jeneva L
JL
D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001288:Attention; D054518:Attentional Blink; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D013997:Time Factors