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Entirely irrelevant distractors can capture and captivate attention

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journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-08, 15:21 authored by Sophie ForsterSophie Forster, Nilli Lavie
The question of whether a stimulus onset may capture attention when it is entirely irrelevant to the task and even in the absence of any attentional settings for abrupt onset or any dynamic changes has been highly controversial. In the present study, we designed a novel irrelevant capture task to address this question. Participants engaged in a continuous task making sequential forced choice (letter or digit) responses to each item in an alphanumeric matrix that remained on screen throughout many responses. This task therefore involved no attentional settings for onset or indeed any dynamic changes, yet the brief onset of an entirely irrelevant distractor (a cartoon picture) resulted in significant slowing of the two (Experiment 1) or three (Experiment 2) responses immediately following distractor appearance These findings provide a clear demonstration of attention being captured and captivated by a distractor that is entirely irrelevant to any attentional settings of the task.

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Published version

Journal

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review

ISSN

1531-5320

Publisher

Springer Verlag

Issue

6

Volume

18

Page range

1064-1070

Department affiliated with

  • Psychology Publications

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2013-07-09

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2013-07-16

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2013-07-15

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