Parallel Distractor Rejection as a Binding Mechanism in Search

Parallel Distractor Rejection as a Binding Mechanism in Search

The relatively common experimental visual search task of finding a red X amongst red O's and green X's (conjunction search) presents the visual system with a binding problem. Illusory conjunctions (ICs) of features across objects must be avoided and only features present in the same object bound together. Correct binding into unique objects by the visual system may be promoted, and ICs minimize...

Distractor rejection in visual search breaks down with more than a single distractor feature.

Previous research has established that interference from irrelevant-but-salient color distractors occurs when observers search for variable-shape singletons among uniform shapes (singleton detection), but not when they look for a specific shape among mixed shapes (feature search). In the current study, we replicated this finding, and additionally, we introduced a random variation of color. Inst...

Dent, Kevin and Allen, Harriet A. and Braithwaite, Jason J. and Humphreys, Glyn W. (2012) Parallel distractor rejection as a binding mechanism in search. Frontiers in Psychology, 3 (278). ISSN 1664-1078

A common mechanism behind distractor-response and response-effect binding?

Short-term bindings between responses and events in the environment ensure efficient behavioral control. This notion holds true for two particular types of binding: bindings between responses and response-irrelevant distractor stimuli that are present at the time of responding, and also for bindings between responses and the effects they cause. Although both types of binding have been extensive...

Experience-dependent attentional tuning of distractor rejection.

Irrelevant salient distractors often capture attention, but given a sufficiently specific search template, these salient items no longer capture attention. In the present experiments, we investigated whether specific target templates are sufficient to resist capture, or whether experience with the salient distractors is also necessary. To test this hypothesis, observers completed four blocks of...