Center for Information and Neural Networks (CiNet), National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, Osaka, Japan.
School of Life and Health Sciences, Aston University, Birmingham, United Kingdom.
PLoS One. 2018 Apr 17;13(4):e0195865. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0195865. eCollection 2018.
The study of visual perception has largely been completed without regard to the influence that an individual's emotional status may have on their performance in visual tasks. However, there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that mood may affect not only creative abilities and interpersonal skills but also the capacity to perform low-level cognitive tasks. Here, we sought to determine whether rudimentary visual search processes are similarly affected by emotion. Specifically, we examined whether an individual's perceived happiness level affects their ability to detect a target in noise. To do so, we employed pop-out and serial visual search paradigms, implemented using a novel smartphone application that allowed search times and self-rated levels of happiness to be recorded throughout each twenty-four-hour period for two weeks. This experience sampling protocol circumvented the need to alter mood artificially with laboratory-based induction methods. Using our smartphone application, we were able to replicate the classic visual search findings, whereby pop-out search times remained largely unaffected by the number of distractors whereas serial search times increased with increasing number of distractors. While pop-out search times were unaffected by happiness level, serial search times with the maximum numbers of distractors (n = 30) were significantly faster for high happiness levels than low happiness levels (p = 0.02). Our results demonstrate the utility of smartphone applications in assessing ecologically valid measures of human visual performance. We discuss the significance of our findings for the assessment of basic visual functions using search time measures, and for our ability to search effectively for targets in real world settings.
这项研究主要关注的是视觉感知，而没有考虑个体的情绪状态可能对他们在视觉任务中的表现产生的影响。然而，越来越多的证据表明，情绪不仅会影响创造力和人际交往能力，还会影响执行低水平认知任务的能力。在这里，我们试图确定情绪是否会对基本的视觉搜索过程产生类似的影响。具体来说，我们研究了个体的幸福感是否会影响他们在噪声中检测目标的能力。为此，我们采用了弹出和序列视觉搜索范式，使用一种新颖的智能手机应用程序来实现，该应用程序允许在两周内记录每个二十四小时的搜索时间和自我评估的幸福感水平。这种体验采样方案避免了使用基于实验室的诱导方法人为地改变情绪的需要。使用我们的智能手机应用程序，我们能够复制经典的视觉搜索发现，即弹出搜索时间在很大程度上不受干扰者数量的影响，而序列搜索时间随着干扰者数量的增加而增加。虽然弹出搜索时间不受幸福感水平的影响，但在最高干扰者数量（n=30）的情况下，高幸福感水平的序列搜索时间明显快于低幸福感水平（p=0.02）。我们的研究结果展示了智能手机应用程序在评估人类视觉表现的生态有效性方面的效用。我们讨论了使用搜索时间测量评估基本视觉功能以及在现实世界环境中有效搜索目标的能力的重要性。
