title: Do sudden onsets need to be perceived as new objects to capture attention? The interplay between sensory transients and display configuration.
abstract: Yantis and Jonides (1984) and Jonides and Yantis (1988) reported robust involuntary attentional capture by sudden-onsets, the origin of which has been debated. Prominent accounts have highlighted aspects that include the "new object" status of a sudden-onset (Yantis & Hillstrom, 1994) and the substantial luminance changes accompanying their appearance (Gellatly, Cole & Blurton, 1999; Franconeri, Hollingworth & Simons, 2005), including relative differences in the amount of sensory change between target and nontarget items (Pinto, Olivers & Theeuwes, 2008). In this research we dissociate the amount of sensory change accompanying sudden onsets from the extent to which they appear as newly created objects in search displays. We attempted to determine the relative contribution of local sensory changes and display configuration to attentional capture by sudden-onsets. We showed that the display configuration of old objects modulates the impact of capture caused by sudden-onsets.
authors: University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia. caleb.owens@sydney.edu.au.
authors: Caleb
authors: C
authors: Owens
authors: University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
authors: Branka
authors: B
authors: Spehar
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D006801:Humans; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time; D014796:Visual Perception
keywords: Attentional capture; Grouping and Segmentation; Object-based attention