Institute of Psychology, RWTH Aachen University, Jägerstrasse 17-19, 52066 Aachen, Germany.
Exp Brain Res. 2010 Apr;201(4):631-40. doi: 10.1007/s00221-009-2080-2.
Temporal gaps between the offset of a central fixation stimulus and the onset of an eccentric target typically reduce saccade latencies (saccadic gap effect). Here, we test whether temporal gaps also affect perceptual performance in peripheral vision. In Experiment 1, subjects executed saccades to briefly presented peripheral target letters and reported letter identity afterwards. A central fixation stimulus either remained visible throughout the trial (overlap) or disappeared 200 ms before letter onset (gap). Experiment 2 tested perceptual performance without saccade execution, whereas Experiment 3 tested saccade execution without perceptual demands. Peripheral letter perception performance was enhanced in gap as compared to overlap conditions (perceptual gap effect) irrespective of concurrent oculomotor demands. Furthermore, the saccadic gap effect was modulated by concurrent perceptual demands. Experiment 4 ruled out a general warning explanation of the perceptual gap effect. These findings extend recent theories assuming a strong coupling between the preparation of goal-directed saccades and shifts of visual attention from the spatial to the temporal domain.
中央注视刺激的起始与偏心目标的起始之间的时间间隔通常会缩短眼跳潜伏期（眼跳缺口效应）。在这里，我们测试时间间隔是否也会影响周边视觉的知觉表现。在实验 1 中，被试执行短暂呈现的周边目标字母的眼跳，并在之后报告字母的身份。中央注视刺激要么在整个试验中保持可见（重叠），要么在字母起始前 200 毫秒消失（缺口）。实验 2 测试了没有眼跳执行的知觉表现，而实验 3 则测试了没有知觉要求的眼跳执行。与重叠条件相比，缺口条件下周边字母的知觉表现得到了增强（知觉缺口效应），而与同时的眼球运动需求无关。此外，眼跳缺口效应受到同时的知觉需求的调节。实验 4 排除了知觉缺口效应的一般警告解释。这些发现扩展了最近的理论，该理论假设目标导向的眼跳准备与视觉注意力从空间域到时间域的转移之间存在强烈的耦合。
