Einhäuser, Wolfgang and Rutishauser, Ueli and Koch, Christof (2008) Task-demands can immediately reverse the effects of sensory-driven saliency in complex visual stimuli. Journal of Vision, 8 (2). Art. No. 2. ISSN 1534-7362. https://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechAUTHORS:EINjov08
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Abstract
In natural vision both stimulus features and task-demands affect an observer's attention. However, the relationship between sensory-driven (“bottom-up”) and task-dependent (“top-down”) factors remains controversial: Can task-demands counteract strong sensory signals fully, quickly, and irrespective of bottom-up features? To measure attention under naturalistic conditions, we recorded eye-movements in human observers, while they viewed photographs of outdoor scenes. In the first experiment, smooth modulations of contrast biased the stimuli's sensory-driven saliency towards one side. In free-viewing, observers' eye-positions were immediately biased toward the high-contrast, i.e., high-saliency, side. However, this sensory-driven bias disappeared entirely when observers searched for a bull's-eye target embedded with equal probability to either side of the stimulus. When the target always occurred in the low-contrast side, observers' eye-positions were immediately biased towards this low-saliency side, i.e., the sensory-driven bias reversed. Hence, task-demands do not only override sensory-driven saliency but also actively countermand it. In a second experiment, a 5-Hz flicker replaced the contrast gradient. Whereas the bias was less persistent in free viewing, the overriding and reversal took longer to deploy. Hence, insufficient sensory-driven saliency cannot account for the bias reversal. In a third experiment, subjects searched for a spot of locally increased contrast (“oddity”) instead of the bull's-eye (“template”). In contrast to the other conditions, a slight sensory-driven free-viewing bias prevails in this condition. In a fourth experiment, we demonstrate that at known locations template targets are detected faster than oddity targets, suggesting that the former induce a stronger top-down drive when used as search targets. Taken together, task-demands can override sensory-driven saliency in complex visual stimuli almost immediately, and the extent of overriding depends on the search target and the overridden feature, but not on the latter's free-viewing saliency.
Item Type: | Article | ||||||||||||
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Additional Information: | © ARVO 2008. Received February 8, 2007; published February 15, 2008. This work was financially supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (WE, PA00A-111447), the National Institutes of Health USA, the National Science Foundation, and by the DARPA/NGA. The authors thank F. Moradi for discussion and J. Wolfe for comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. Commercial relationships: none. | ||||||||||||
Group: | Koch Laboratory (KLAB) | ||||||||||||
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Subject Keywords: | attention, eye-movements, human, top-down, bottom-up, salience | ||||||||||||
Issue or Number: | 2 | ||||||||||||
Record Number: | CaltechAUTHORS:EINjov08 | ||||||||||||
Persistent URL: | https://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechAUTHORS:EINjov08 | ||||||||||||
Official Citation: | Einhäuser, W., Rutishauser, U., & Koch, C. (2008). Task-demands can immediately reverse the effects of sensory-driven saliency in complex visual stimuli. Journal of Vision, 8(2):2, 1-19, http://journalofvision.org/8/2/2/, doi:10.1167/8.2.2. | ||||||||||||
Usage Policy: | No commercial reproduction, distribution, display or performance rights in this work are provided. | ||||||||||||
ID Code: | 10776 | ||||||||||||
Collection: | CaltechAUTHORS | ||||||||||||
Deposited By: | Archive Administrator | ||||||||||||
Deposited On: | 09 Jun 2008 | ||||||||||||
Last Modified: | 01 Apr 2020 23:02 |
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