title: Pupil diameter reflects uncertainty in attentional selection during visual search.
abstract: Pupil diameter has long been used as a metric of cognitive processing. However, recent advances suggest that the cognitive sources of change in pupil size may reflect LC-NE function and the calculation of unexpected uncertainty in decision processes (Aston-Jones and Cohen, 2005; Yu and Dayan, 2005). In the current experiments, we explored the role of uncertainty in attentional selection on task-evoked changes in pupil diameter during visual search. We found that task-evoked changes in pupil diameter were related to uncertainty during attentional selection as measured by reaction time (RT) and performance accuracy (Experiments 1-2). Control analyses demonstrated that the results are unlikely to be due to error monitoring or response uncertainty. Our results suggest that pupil diameter can be used as an implicit metric of uncertainty in ongoing attentional selection requiring effortful control processes.
authors: Center for Mind and Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis Davis, CA, USA ; Department of Psychology, University of California Davis Davis, CA, USA.
authors: Joy J
authors: JJ
authors: Geng
authors: Center for Mind and Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis Davis, CA, USA.
authors: Zachary
authors: Z
authors: Blumenfeld
authors: Center for Mind and Brain and Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis Davis, CA, USA.
authors: Terence L
authors: TL
authors: Tyson
authors: Department of Psychiatry, University of California San Francisco School of Medicine San Francisco, CA, USA.
authors: Michael J
authors: MJ
authors: Minzenberg
keywords: LC-NE system; attentional selection; cognitive control; pupillometry; uncertainty; visual search