Dataset Information

More capture, more suppression: Distractor suppression due to statistical regularities is determined by the magnitude of attentional capture.

ABSTRACT: Salient yet irrelevant objects often interfere with daily tasks by capturing attention against our best interests and intentions. Recent research has shown that through implicit learning, distraction by a salient object can be reduced by suppressing the location where this distractor is likely to appear. Here, we investigated whether suppression of such high-probability distractor locations is an all-or-none phenomenon or specifically tuned to the degree of interference caused by the distractor. In two experiments, we varied the salience of two task-irrelevant singleton distractors each of which was more likely to appear in one specific location in the visual field. We show that the magnitude of interference by a distractor determines the magnitude of suppression for its high-probability location: The more salient a distractor, the more it becomes suppressed when appearing in its high-probability location. We conclude that distractor suppression emerges as a consequence of the spatial regularities regarding the location of a distractor as well as its potency to interfere with attentional selection.

SUBMITTER: Failing M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7000503 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

More capture, more suppression: Distractor suppression due to statistical regularities is determined by the magnitude of attentional capture.

Failing Michel M Theeuwes Jan J

Psychonomic bulletin & review 20200201 1

Salient yet irrelevant objects often interfere with daily tasks by capturing attention against our best interests and intentions. Recent research has shown that through implicit learning, distraction by a salient object can be reduced by suppressing the location where this distractor is likely to appear. Here, we investigated whether suppression of such high-probability distractor locations is an all-or-none phenomenon or specifically tuned to the degree of interference caused by the distractor. ...[more]

PMID: 31848910

Similar Datasets

Project description:Pedophilic disorder, a subtype of paraphilia, is defined as a recurrent sexual interest in prepubescent children, which is characterized by persistent thoughts, fantasies, urges, sexual arousal, or behavior. Besides a deviant sexual preference, sexual preoccupation was found to be a dynamic risk factor for reoffending. Thus, it is conceivable that sex offenders and especially sex offenders against children have difficulties to control their responses to sexual stimuli. In the current study pedophiles, forensic and non-forensic control subjects had to solve a cognitive task, while sexual distractors were presented simultaneously. This kind of task also requires control functions. Therefore, data were analyzed with respect to attentional control while comparing eye movements toward sexual distractors and toward the cognitive task. We were mainly interested in how early (fixation latency) and late (relative fixation time) attentional processes were allocated to both, the cognitive target stimuli and the sexual distractors. Pedophiles demonstrated significantly lower attentional control in the sexual distractor task than both control groups (non-pedophiles). They showed a shorter fixation latency and longer fixation time for sexual distractors than non-pedophiles. Furthermore, pedophiles demonstrated a longer fixation latency and shorter fixation time for cognitive target stimuli. For classification analyses, an attentional control index (ACI) was built, i.e., the difference between eye movements on cognitive target stimuli and sexual distractors. For the ACI of early attentional processes, i.e., fixation latency, a good classification between pedophiles and non-pedophiles was found. We assumed that the measured attentional control represents inhibitory executive functions, specifically interference control. Further studies should examine if low attentional control in pedophiles is due to low motivation to solve the task or rather to a lack of ability to control attention with respect to sexual and/or neutral distractors. Prospectively, this design could be useful to generate hypotheses about clinical important aspects of controllability, the capacity of self-control, and the severity of a paraphilic disorder.

Dataset Information

More capture, more suppression: Distractor suppression due to statistical regularities is determined by the magnitude of attentional capture.

Publications

More capture, more suppression: Distractor suppression due to statistical regularities is determined by the magnitude of attentional capture.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets