Visual Attention by Audiovisual Signal-Level Synchrony

Current approaches to artificial attention are largely limited to the visual domain. Only some consider audition as a source of information at the same time. Yet, attention is not necessarily limited to a single modality or a mere agglomeration of several modalities in human perception. Cross-modal attention, and its manipulation by cross-modal cues, seems to play a vital role in asymmetric interactions such as a parent tutoring a child. We discuss previous efforts [23] to reflect such perceptual processes with an artificial attention system that considers signal-level synchrony between vision and audition to guide visual attention. Results show that the system is receptive to infant directed cues from parents.