1Center for Brain Disorders and Cognitive Neuroscience Shenzhen, Shenzhen, China.
Department of Biomedical Sciences of Cells and Systems, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
Psychol Res. 2022 Sep;86(6):1980-1995. doi: 10.1007/s00426-021-01603-5. Epub 2021 Oct 21.
The attentional blink (AB) reflects a temporal restriction of selective attention and is generally regarded as a very robust phenomenon. However, previous studies have found large individual differences in AB performance, and under some training conditions the AB can be reduced significantly. One factor that may account for individual differences in AB magnitude is the ability to accurately time attention. In the current study, we focus on the sensitivity for temporal information on the ability to control attention. Following a visual AB task, a time estimation task was presented in either the visual or auditory modality, followed by another visual AB task. It was found that the time estimation training in both the auditory and visual modality reduced AB magnitude. Although a reduction in AB magnitude was also observed when individuals were trained on a control task (either an auditory frequency or visual line length estimation task), the effect was significantly larger following the time estimation tasks. In addition, it was found that individuals who showed most improvement on the visual time estimation task, also showed the largest reduction in AB magnitude, which was not the case for individuals who were trained on the control tasks. Finally, a negative correlation was observed between depression scores (tested by Beck Depression Inventory-Short Form (BDI-SF) scores and the improvement in the AB and time estimation tasks. Our findings demonstrate clear links between timing ability and mechanisms to control attention and emotion.
注意瞬脱（AB）反映了选择性注意的时间限制，通常被认为是一种非常稳健的现象。然而，先前的研究发现 AB 表现存在很大的个体差异，并且在某些训练条件下，AB 可以显著减少。可能导致 AB 幅度个体差异的一个因素是准确计时注意力的能力。在当前的研究中，我们专注于控制注意力能力的时间信息敏感性。在进行视觉 AB 任务后，在视觉或听觉模态中呈现时间估计任务，然后再进行另一个视觉 AB 任务。结果发现，听觉和视觉模态中的时间估计训练都减少了 AB 幅度。尽管当个体接受控制任务（听觉频率或视觉线长度估计任务）训练时，也观察到 AB 幅度的减小，但在时间估计任务之后，效果明显更大。此外，还发现，在视觉时间估计任务中表现出最大改进的个体，AB 幅度的减少也最大，而接受控制任务训练的个体则不是这样。最后，观察到抑郁评分（贝克抑郁量表短表（BDI-SF）评分和 AB 和时间估计任务的改善）与计时能力之间存在负相关。我们的研究结果表明，定时能力和控制注意力和情绪的机制之间存在明确的联系。
