Attentional blink

About: Attentional blink is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 1346 publications have been published within this topic receiving 53064 citations. The topic is also known as: Attentional blinks.

Training and the attentional blink: Raising the ceiling does not remove the limits

Abstract: The attentional blink (AB) is a widely studied deficit in reporting the second of two sequentially presented targets when they occur within 500 milliseconds. The AB often is interpreted to index a structural limit in sequential visual processing. However, this interpretation is challenged by reports that the deficit can be reduced with several hundred trials of specific training (Braun in Nature, 393(6684), 424–425, 1998; Choi et al. in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 109(30), 12242–12247, 2012; Taatgen et al. in Cognitive Psychology, 59(1), 1–29, 2009) and other reports that some individuals experience very little or no deficit, even without specific training (Martens et al. in Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 18(9), 1423-1438, 2006). Yet neither of these claims has been studied when the artifact of ceiling effects has been removed. We sent a small number of participants (n = 5) home to practice an AB task on their mobile phones for 3,000-6,000 trials (Experiment 1) and trained a much larger number of participants (n = 48) in a similar way for 1,200-1,800 trials (Experiment 2). Both experiments used adaptive procedures to equate task difficulty throughout training to keep second-target accuracy below ceiling levels. The results showed strong training effects on the rate of processing sequential information. Despite this, there were (a) robust AB effects after training for most participants, (b) no benefit for training on difficult versus easy target tasks, and (c) substantial correlations between the magnitude of the AB before and after extensive training. These findings support the interpretation that the AB is an index of a structural limit in the ability to consciously process rapid visual sequences.

Sparing and impairing: Emotion modulation of the attentional blink and the spread of sparing in a 3-target RSVP task

Abstract: The performance impairment (attentional blink, AB) on a second target (T2) when it is presented within 200-500 ms after a first target (T1) during rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) is typically attributed to resource depletion. The AB does not occur when targets appear in immediate sequence (sparing). Recently, this account has been challenged by findings that the lag 1 sparing can spread to later lags when using a 3-target RSVP. Two experiments using the 3-targets RSVP investigated the relative contribution of resource depletion and attentional enhancement and/or inhibition on the AB and the sparing when T1 (Exp. 1) or T3 (Exp. 2) are emotionally salient. Findings showed a greater sparing for neutral T3s when preceded by negative compared with neutral T1s (Exp. 1) and for negative T3s (Exp. 2). In contrast, the AB on neutral T3s was greater after negative than after neutral T1s (Exp. 1), but it was reduced when T3 was negative (Exp. 2). The AB and the sparing also depended on how many targets before T3 were correctly reported. These findings indicate that although there is a cost for processing multiple targets, the emotional modulations of the AB and the sparing are better explained by an interplay between emotion-enhancement and capacity limitations on temporal selective attention.

Perceptual integration without conscious access

Abstract: The visual system has the remarkable ability to integrate fragmentary and degraded visual input into a perceptually organized collection of surfaces, shapes and objects. Here we test the long-standing maxim that such integrative functions must be attributed to attentional selection and conscious access. Employing a full-factorial design of masking and the attentional blink, we show that behaviorally, both masking and the withdrawal of attention affect perceptual decisions about the presence of integrated surface structure from fragmented input. However, when using a multivariate classifier on electroencephalogram data, we are able to decode the presence of integrated percepts equally well regardless of the availability of attention. In contrast, masking destroys any evidence for integrated percepts, while leaving feedforward processing intact. Thus, there is a fundamental difference in the way masking and attention impact perceptual integration, despite having a similar impact on behavioral decisions. Whereas masking disrupts perceptual integration, the brain is able to organize fragmented visual input into perceptually meaningful wholes in the absence of conscious access.

Attentional Blink: An Internal Traffic Jam

Abstract: In cognitive models, cognitive control can be measured in terms of the number of control states that are used to do the task. In most cases more control leads to better performance. Attentional Blink is an example in which the opposite is true: more control leads to poorer performance. A hybrid ACTR/Leabra model is used to model both highand low-control participants using two and one control states, respectively.

The Effect of Positive Affect Induction via Metta Meditation on the Attentional Blink

Abstract: The attentional blink (AB) is a reduced ability to detect a stimulus presented too quickly (~500ms) after a previously detected stimulus. Mindfulness meditation reduces the AB, and has been explained in terms of the altered attentional resource allocation skills of meditators (Slagter et al., 2007). However, mindfulness meditation also increases positive affect (Davidson et al., 2003), and positive affect has been shown to reduce the AB (Olivers & Nieuwenhuis, 2006). Thus, a positive-affect focused meditation (Metta) may also reduce the AB. While brief practice of Metta meditation prior to engaging in an AB task failed to significantly reduce the AB, these results are useful in determining an approximate effect threshold, currently unknown with respect to meditation (Carmody & Baer, 2009).