title: Cardiac cycle time effects on selection efficiency in vision.
abstract: The effect of cardiac cycle time on attentional selection was investigated in an experiment in which participants classified target letters in a visual selection task. Stimulus onsets were aligned to the R wave of the electrocardiogram and stimuli presented either during the ventricular systole or diastole. Selection efficiency was operationalized as difference in target selection performance under conditions of homogeneous and heterogeneous distractors. Differences in performance (i.e., the impact selection difficulty had on the ability to select the target) were attenuated for stimuli presented during the ventricular systole compared to the diastole. Increased baroafferent signal transmission during the systole appears to reduce interference of highly distracting stimuli on visual selection efficiency.
authors.affiliation: Cognitive Psychology, Trier University, Trier, Germany. s1lipram@uni-trier.de.
authors.forename: Lisa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pramme
authors.affiliation: Clinical Psychophysiology, Trier University, Trier, Germany.
authors.forename: Mauro F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Larra
authors.affiliation: Clinical Psychophysiology, Trier University, Trier, Germany.
authors.forename: Hartmut
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Schächinger
authors.affiliation: Cognitive Psychology, Trier University, Trier, Germany.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Frings
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D004562:Electrocardiography; D005260:Female; D006321:Heart / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011930:Reaction Time; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Baroreceptor activity; Cardiac cycle; Distractor processing; Selective attention