Top-down search strategies determine attentional capture in visual search: Behavioral and electrophysiological evidence

Eimer, Martin; Kiss, Mónika · 2010 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.3758/app.72.4.951

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Summary

This study investigates the mechanisms governing attentional capture in visual search, specifically addressing the debate between bottom-up salience-driven capture and top-down task-set contingent capture. The authors examine whether generalized search strategies—specifically "singleton search" (detecting any feature discontinuity) versus "feature search" (detecting specific target features)—modulate the ability of irrelevant stimuli to capture attention. The research aims to determine if the choice between these strategies is driven by cognitive efficiency or fixed stimulus properties. The researchers conducted two experiments using behavioral measures (reaction times and accuracy) and event-related potentials (ERPs), focusing on the N2pc component as an electrophysiological marker of attentional selection. In Experiment 1, participants searched for color singleton targets that could be one of two colors, allowing for either singleton or feature search strategies. Spatially nonpredictive color singleton cues preceded the search arrays. In Experiment 2, the task was modified to require responses to only one specific target color, forcing participants to adopt a feature-specific search strategy and rendering the other color singleton irrelevant. In Experiment 1, where a singleton search mode was available, participants exhibited behavioral attentional capture and elicited N2pc components in response to both target-color and irrelevant-color singleton cues. This indicates that under a singleton search strategy, attention is captured by any salient discontinuity regardless of specific feature value. In contrast, Experiment 2 demonstrated that when participants were forced to use a feature-specific search strategy, irrelevant-color singleton cues no longer produced behavioral spatial cuing effects, and the N2pc response to these cues was attenuated and delayed. Target-color cues continued to capture attention in both experiments. The findings demonstrate that attentional capture by visual singletons is not solely determined by bottom-up salience but is strongly modulated by top-down task sets and the adopted search strategy. The results support the hypothesis that observers strategically choose between singleton and feature search modes based on cognitive demands; singleton search is adopted when it minimizes working memory load, leading to broader capture, while feature search restricts capture to task-relevant features. This provides convergent behavioral and electrophysiological evidence that generalized search strategies determine the scope of involuntary attentional orienting.

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Topics

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• attention selective divided
• visual search
• inattentional change blindness