Koenig Sebastian, Wolf Reinhard, Heisenberg Martin
Rudolf-Virchow-Center, Joseph-Schneider-Strasse 2, 97080 Würzburg, Germany.
PLoS One. 2016 Feb 5;11(2):e0148208. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0148208. eCollection 2016.
A visual stimulus at a particular location of the visual field may elicit a behavior while at the same time equally salient stimuli in other parts do not. This property of visual systems is known as selective visual attention (SVA). The animal is said to have a focus of attention (FoA) which it has shifted to a particular location. Visual attention normally involves an attention span at the location to which the FoA has been shifted. Here the attention span is measured in Drosophila. The fly is tethered and hence has its eyes fixed in space. It can shift its FoA internally. This shift is revealed using two simultaneous test stimuli with characteristic responses at their particular locations. In tethered flight a wild type fly keeps its FoA at a certain location for up to 4s. Flies with a mutation in the radish gene, that has been suggested to be involved in attention-like mechanisms, display a reduced attention span of only 1s.
视野中特定位置的视觉刺激可能引发一种行为，而与此同时，其他部位同样显著的刺激却不会。视觉系统的这一特性被称为选择性视觉注意（SVA）。据说动物具有一个注意力焦点（FoA），它已转移到特定位置。视觉注意通常涉及FoA所转移到的位置的注意力持续时间。这里在果蝇中测量注意力持续时间。果蝇被拴住，因此其眼睛在空间中固定。它可以在内部转移其FoA。使用两个同时出现的测试刺激来揭示这种转移，这两个刺激在其特定位置具有特征性反应。在拴系飞行中，野生型果蝇会将其FoA保持在某个位置长达4秒。萝卜基因发生突变的果蝇，有人认为该基因参与类似注意力的机制，其注意力持续时间缩短，仅为1秒。
