Matsukura Michi, Brockmole James R, Boot Walter R, Henderson John M
University of Iowa, Department of Psychology, 11 Seashore Hall E, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA.
Vision Res. 2011 Mar 25;51(6):546-52. doi: 10.1016/j.visres.2011.01.014. Epub 2011 Feb 15.
It has been claimed that gaze control during scene viewing is largely governed by stimulus-driven, bottom-up selection mechanisms. Recent research, however, has strongly suggested that observers' top-down control plays a dominant role in attentional prioritization in scenes. A notable exception to this strong top-down control is oculomotor capture, where visual transients in a scene draw the eyes. One way to test whether oculomotor capture during scene viewing is independent of an observer's top-down goal setting is to reduce observers' cognitive resource availability. In the present study, we examined whether increasing observers' cognitive load influences the frequency and speed of oculomotor capture during scene viewing. In Experiment 1, we tested whether increasing observers' cognitive load modulates the degree of oculomotor capture by a new object suddenly appeared in a scene. Similarly, in Experiment 2, we tested whether increasing observers' cognitive load modulates the degree of oculomotor capture by an object's color change. In both experiments, the degree of oculomotor capture decreased as observers' cognitive resources were reduced. These results suggest that oculomotor capture during scene viewing is dependent on observers' top-down selection mechanisms.
有人认为，在场景观看过程中的注视控制很大程度上受刺激驱动的自下而上的选择机制支配。然而，最近的研究强烈表明，观察者的自上而下的控制在场景中的注意力优先级方面起着主导作用。这种强大的自上而下控制的一个显著例外是眼动捕捉，即场景中的视觉瞬变吸引眼睛。测试场景观看过程中的眼动捕捉是否独立于观察者的自上而下目标设定的一种方法是减少观察者的认知资源可用性。在本研究中，我们研究了增加观察者的认知负荷是否会影响场景观看过程中眼动捕捉的频率和速度。在实验1中，我们测试了增加观察者的认知负荷是否会调节突然出现在场景中的新物体引起的眼动捕捉程度。同样，在实验2中，我们测试了增加观察者的认知负荷是否会调节物体颜色变化引起的眼动捕捉程度。在两个实验中，随着观察者认知资源的减少，眼动捕捉程度降低。这些结果表明，场景观看过程中的眼动捕捉依赖于观察者的自上而下的选择机制。
