Endogenous shifts of attention cause distortions in the perception of space: Reviewing and examining the attentional repulsion effect

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Accepted Manuscript (AM)
Author(s)
Lawrence, Rebecca K
Kulzhabayeva, Dana
Pratt, Jay
Griffith University Author(s)
Year published
2020
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Show full item recordAbstract
The functioning of spatial attention and its effects on visual processing are typically studied using chronometric and accuracy measures of behaviour. However, a growing body of literature has studied the attentional repulsion effect (ARE). Simply put, when attention is focused on one location in the visual field, stimuli appearing nearby the attended location are perceived as being located further away from the attended location than they physically are. The ARE is particularly compelling, as it is best explained by considering the receptive field properties of visual cells, thus allowing for more direct comparisons between ...
View more >The functioning of spatial attention and its effects on visual processing are typically studied using chronometric and accuracy measures of behaviour. However, a growing body of literature has studied the attentional repulsion effect (ARE). Simply put, when attention is focused on one location in the visual field, stimuli appearing nearby the attended location are perceived as being located further away from the attended location than they physically are. The ARE is particularly compelling, as it is best explained by considering the receptive field properties of visual cells, thus allowing for more direct comparisons between behaviour and neural functioning. Nonetheless, most research testing the ARE has manipulated spatial attention exogenously. Furthermore, for studies that have explored endogenous attention and the ARE, empirical evidence is conflicting. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to address this inconsistency by testing the effect of voluntary attention on spatial repulsion using an optimal operationalization of endogenous attention. Centrally presented, highly informative double-cues were used to shift attention, and placeholders were included in the display to help anchor attention. Overall, we observed strong spatial repulsion effects when attention was shifted endogenously, providing compelling evidence that voluntary deployments of attention can cause perceptual distortions of space.
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View more >The functioning of spatial attention and its effects on visual processing are typically studied using chronometric and accuracy measures of behaviour. However, a growing body of literature has studied the attentional repulsion effect (ARE). Simply put, when attention is focused on one location in the visual field, stimuli appearing nearby the attended location are perceived as being located further away from the attended location than they physically are. The ARE is particularly compelling, as it is best explained by considering the receptive field properties of visual cells, thus allowing for more direct comparisons between behaviour and neural functioning. Nonetheless, most research testing the ARE has manipulated spatial attention exogenously. Furthermore, for studies that have explored endogenous attention and the ARE, empirical evidence is conflicting. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to address this inconsistency by testing the effect of voluntary attention on spatial repulsion using an optimal operationalization of endogenous attention. Centrally presented, highly informative double-cues were used to shift attention, and placeholders were included in the display to help anchor attention. Overall, we observed strong spatial repulsion effects when attention was shifted endogenously, providing compelling evidence that voluntary deployments of attention can cause perceptual distortions of space.
View less >
Journal Title
Visual Cognition
Volume
28
Issue
4
Copyright Statement
This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Visual Cognition, 28 (4), pp. 292-310, 22 Jul 2020, copyright Taylor & Francis, available online at: https://doi.org/10.1080/13506285.2020.1793438
Subject
Psychology
Cognitive and computational psychology