Contingent capture effects in temporal order judgments.

Born, Sabine; Kerzel, Dirk; Pratt, Jay · 2015 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.1037/xhp0000058

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Summary

This study investigates whether contingent attentional capture, typically measured via reaction times (RTs), also influences temporal order judgments (TOJs). The contingent capture hypothesis posits that attention is involuntarily drawn only to stimuli matching current task goals, regardless of bottom-up saliency. Because RTs may reflect multiple overlapping mechanisms, the authors utilized TOJs to isolate the "prior entry" effect, where attended stimuli are perceived as occurring earlier than unattended ones. The research aimed to determine if color singleton cues produce prior entry effects contingent on attentional control sets and to rule out alternative sensory interaction accounts. The researchers conducted three experiments using a dynamic display with multiple heterogeneous distractors. In Experiment 1, participants judged the order of target discs while a color singleton cue (always matching the target color) appeared at a random location. Results showed a significant shift in the point of subjective simultaneity (PSS) when the cue appeared at a target location, indicating prior entry, but no shift when the cue appeared at a distractor location. This confirmed that color singletons produce spatially specific cuing effects in TOJs even amidst clutter. Experiment 2 manipulated cue color to be either matching or non-matching the target color. A significant interaction revealed that PSS shifts occurred only when the cue color matched the target’s color, consistent with contingent capture. Experiment 3 tested a sensory interaction hypothesis by having participants monitor two target colors. If sensory fusion drove the effect, cues matching the exact target color should produce larger shifts than cues matching the other task-relevant color. The findings from Experiment 3 showed no significant difference in PSS shifts between cues that exactly matched the target color and those that matched the alternative task-relevant color. This result ruled out low-level sensory interactions as the primary cause of the contingent effects observed in Experiment 2. Instead, the data supported the attentional account: capture occurred because the cue matched the broader attentional control set, not because of specific sensory overlap. These results demonstrate that contingent attentional capture affects the perceived timing of stimuli, not just motor response speed. By showing that prior entry is contingent on task sets, the study clarifies that attentional capture influences perceptual processing stages distinct from those reflected in RTs. This provides valuable insight into the mechanisms of attention, suggesting that while RTs are influenced by a multitude of factors, TOJs offer a cleaner measure of how top-down control sets modulate the temporal perception of visual events.

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• attention selective divided