Contributions of distinct attention mechanisms to saccadic choices in a gamified, dynamic environment

Abstract

Visuospatial attention is key for parsing visual information and selecting targets to look at. Based on regimented laboratory tasks, it is now well established that three types of mechanism determine when and where attention is deployed; these are stimulus-driven (exogenous), goal-driven (endogenous), and history-driven (reflecting recent experience). It is unclear, however, how these distinct attentional signals interact and contribute in visual environments that are more akin to natural scanning, when stimuli may change rapidly and no fixation requirements are imposed. Here, we investigate this via a gamified task in which participants (male and female) make continuous saccadic choices at a rapid pace -- and yet, perceptual performance can be accurately tracked over time as the choice process unfolds. The results reveal unequivocal markers of exogenous capture toward salient stimuli; endogenous guidance toward valuable targets and relevant locations; and history-driven effects, which produce large, involuntary modulations in processing capacity. Under dynamic conditions, success probability is dictated by temporally precise interplay between different forms of spatial attention, with recent history making a particularly prominent contribution. Significance StatementVisuospatial attention comprises a collection of mental mechanisms that allow us to focus on (or look at) specific objects or parts of space and ignore others. The next target to be inspected is generally selected based on how much it stands out (salience), its relevance to current goals, and recent experience. We designed a gamified visual scanning task in which all such forms of attentional control interact rapidly, more akin to real life situations (e.g., driving through traffic). Each mechanism affected in characteristic ways the probability that participants would look to the correct target at each moment in time. Most notably, we found that the history of recently seen stimuli determines visual processing capacity much more strongly than previously thought.