Correa Angel, Nobre Anna C
Departamento de Psicología Experimental y Fisiología del Comportamiento, Universidad de Granada, Campus Universitario de Cartuja s/n, 18011 Granada, Spain.
Exp Brain Res. 2008 Aug;189(3):339-44. doi: 10.1007/s00221-008-1429-2. Epub 2008 May 28.
The aim of this research was to study the relationship between perceptual judgments about space and time. If spatial and temporal judgments were dissociable, they should be modulated selectively by attention. We compared the effect of the attentional set upon fine-grained spatial versus temporal discrimination of visual perception in two experiments. Using identical sensory stimulation, we measured perceptual judgments on either the size of a small spatial gap or the duration of a brief temporal gap. The attentional set was manipulated by cuing the task that was most likely to be performed. In one experiment, a neutral cue was also used, to measure relative benefits and costs of spatial and temporal task sets. If the attentional set could be directed selectively to spatial and temporal task-relevant dimensions, performance on both spatial and temporal acuity tasks should be specifically modulated by task cuing. The results showed that the attentional set enhanced the speed and accuracy of perceptual judgments similarly on both spatial and temporal tasks. Moreover, accuracy in one task was selectively enhanced by attending to that task while remaining unaffected by attending to the alternative task. This finding suggests multiple mechanisms, by which visual processing of spatial and temporal features can be selectively prepared without interfering with one another.
本研究的目的是探究关于空间和时间的感知判断之间的关系。如果空间和时间判断是可分离的，那么它们应该会受到注意力的选择性调节。我们在两个实验中比较了注意力设定对视觉感知中细粒度空间辨别与时间辨别的影响。使用相同的感官刺激，我们测量了对小空间间隙大小或短暂时间间隙持续时间的感知判断。通过提示最有可能执行的任务来操纵注意力设定。在一个实验中，还使用了中性提示，以测量空间和时间任务集的相对收益和成本。如果注意力设定可以选择性地指向与空间和时间任务相关的维度，那么空间和时间敏锐度任务的表现都应该受到任务提示的特异性调节。结果表明，注意力设定在空间和时间任务上同样提高了感知判断的速度和准确性。此外，专注于一项任务会选择性地提高该任务的准确性，而专注于另一项任务则不会对其产生影响。这一发现表明存在多种机制，通过这些机制可以选择性地准备空间和时间特征的视觉处理，而不会相互干扰。
