The spatially global control of attentional target selection in visual search

Berggren, Nick; Jenkins, Michael; McCants, Cody W.; Eimer, Martin · 2017 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.1080/13506285.2017.1287806

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Summary

This study investigates whether attentional templates for visual search can guide target selection independently for different regions of visual space, or if feature-based attention operates in a spatially global manner. Motivated by debates regarding the spatial specificity of top-down control, the authors tested whether observers could restrict attentional capture to specific color/location combinations. Previous research suggested that while behavioral performance might reflect location-specific strategies, early neural markers of attention might reveal global biases. The authors aimed to provide conclusive evidence by designing tasks where participants were strongly motivated to adopt spatially selective task sets, using both behavioral reaction times and event-related potentials (ERPs). The research employed two experiments using spatial cueing paradigms. In Experiment 1, participants searched for target pairs defined by specific color and location configurations (e.g., blue top, green bottom) while ignoring distractors. Target displays were preceded by non-informative cues containing target-color items at either matching or mismatching locations. The study measured behavioral reaction times and the N2pc component, an ERP marker of rapid attentional capture. Experiment 2 involved searching for single color-defined targets at specific locations. The design ensured that participants could not rely on feature-unspecific singleton search modes, forcing them to attend to specific color/location conjunctions. The results demonstrated a dissociation between behavioral control and early neural attentional capture. Behaviorally, contingent attentional capture occurred only for cues matching the target color/location configuration; mismatching cues did not speed up reaction times. However, electrophysiologically, both matching and mismatching cues elicited identical N2pc components, indicating that rapid attentional capture by template-matching features was spatially non-selective. This global capture occurred even when the cue location was task-irrelevant. Furthermore, in search displays containing target-color distractors at non-matching locations, spatial biases toward the target emerged late and were attenuated compared to displays without such distractors. These findings conclude that attentional templates for target-defining features operate in a spatially global fashion. While observers can achieve location-specific selection behaviorally, this control occurs at later post-perceptual stages rather than during the initial rapid deployment of attention. Feature-based guidance of visual search cannot be restricted to particular locations, even when task demands require it. This implies that activating an attentional template for a specific feature creates a global bias across the entire visual field, challenging models that assume early, spatially localized feature-based attentional control.

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Topics

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• visual search
• attention selective divided