TY - JOUR
T1 - Splitting the beam
T2 - Distribution of Attention Over Noncontiguous Regions of the Visual Field
AU - Kramer, Arthur F.
AU - Hahn, Sowon
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by a grant from the Office of Naval Research (N00014-92-J-1792) We wish to thank Marie Banich and Gordon Logan for helpful comments on a previous version of this manuscipt
PY - 1995/11
Y1 - 1995/11
N2 - In an effort to examine the flexibility with which attention can be allocated in visual space, we investigated whether subjects could selectively attend to multiple noncontiguous locations in the visual field We examined this issue by precuing two separate areas of the visual field and requiring subjects to decide whether the letters that appeared in these locations matched or mismatched while distractors that primed either the match or mismatch response were presented between the cued locations If the distractors had no effect on performance, it would provide evidence that subjects can divide attention over noncontiguous areas of space Subjects were able to ignore the distractors when the targets and distractors were presented as nononset stimuli (i e, when premasks were changed into the targets and distractors) In contrast, when the targets and distractors were presented as sudden-onset stimuli, subjects were unable to ignore the distractors These results begin to define the conditions under which attention can be flexibly deployed to multiple noncontiguous locations in the visual field.
AB - In an effort to examine the flexibility with which attention can be allocated in visual space, we investigated whether subjects could selectively attend to multiple noncontiguous locations in the visual field We examined this issue by precuing two separate areas of the visual field and requiring subjects to decide whether the letters that appeared in these locations matched or mismatched while distractors that primed either the match or mismatch response were presented between the cued locations If the distractors had no effect on performance, it would provide evidence that subjects can divide attention over noncontiguous areas of space Subjects were able to ignore the distractors when the targets and distractors were presented as nononset stimuli (i e, when premasks were changed into the targets and distractors) In contrast, when the targets and distractors were presented as sudden-onset stimuli, subjects were unable to ignore the distractors These results begin to define the conditions under which attention can be flexibly deployed to multiple noncontiguous locations in the visual field.
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U2 - 10.1111/j.1467-9280.1995.tb00530.x
DO - 10.1111/j.1467-9280.1995.tb00530.x
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84970389827
SN - 0956-7976
VL - 6
SP - 381
EP - 386
JO - Psychological Science
JF - Psychological Science
IS - 6
ER -