Tünnermann Jan, Schubö Anna
Cognitive Neuroscience of Perception and Action, Department of Psychology, Philipps-University Marburg, Gutenbergstraße 18, 35032, Marburg, Germany.
Sci Rep. 2025 May 6;15(1):15788. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-97986-1.
Visual foraging tasks, where participants collect items by touching or clicking on them, have become popular for investigating visual search. They probe selective attention in multi-target contexts through naturalistic goal-directed actions, unlike the button presses used in many other paradigms. Despite their potential, such tasks had not been used to examine the interplay of attention and goal-directed actions until now, even though this topic has been extensively studied with other paradigms and has significant implications for understanding human visual behavior in the real world. In this study, we applied the visual foraging paradigm to address this gap. We found that attentional prioritization of one part in a two-part compound object is accompanied by a motor bias in the collecting action (stylus tap) toward the prioritized part. This bias combines with motor precision demands, such as aiming for stable contact points. Our findings show that action planning not only modulates the attentional landscape at large but also that attentional asymmetries (e.g., prioritizing one object part) feed back into the motor system, combining with motoric factors to refine goal-directed actions.
视觉觅食任务，即参与者通过触摸或点击物品来收集它们，已成为研究视觉搜索的常用方法。与许多其他范式中使用的按键操作不同，它们通过自然的目标导向行为在多目标情境中探究选择性注意。尽管具有潜力，但直到现在，此类任务尚未用于检验注意力与目标导向行为之间的相互作用，即便该主题已通过其他范式得到广泛研究，且对理解现实世界中的人类视觉行为具有重要意义。在本研究中，我们应用视觉觅食范式来填补这一空白。我们发现，在由两部分组成的复合物体中，对其中一部分的注意力优先级伴随着收集动作（触控笔点击）中朝向优先级部分的运动偏向。这种偏向与运动精度要求相结合，比如瞄准稳定的接触点。我们的研究结果表明，动作规划不仅在很大程度上调节注意力格局，而且注意力不对称（例如，优先考虑一个物体部分）会反馈到运动系统中，与运动因素相结合以优化目标导向行为。
