1
|
Fan C, Zinchenko A, Chen L, Wu J, Qian Y, Zang X. Invariant contexts reduce response time variability in visual search in an age-specific way: A comparison of children, teenagers, and adults. Atten Percept Psychophys 2024:10.3758/s13414-024-02926-2. [PMID: 38992319 DOI: 10.3758/s13414-024-02926-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 06/15/2024] [Indexed: 07/13/2024]
Abstract
Contextual cueing is a phenomenon in which repeatedly encountered arrays of items can enhance the visual search for a target item. This is widely attributed to attentional guidance driven by contextual memory acquired during visual search. Some studies suggest that children may have an immature ability to use contextual cues compared to adults, while others argue that contextual learning capacity is similar across ages. To test the development of context-guided attention, this study compared contextual cueing effects among three age groups: adults (aged 18-33 years, N = 32), teenagers (aged 15-17 years, N = 41), and younger children (aged 8-9 years, N = 43). Moreover, this study introduced a measure of response time variability that tracks fluctuations in response time throughout the experiment, in addition to the conventional analysis of response times. The results showed that all age groups demonstrated significantly faster responses in repeated than non-repeated search contexts. Notably, adults and teenagers exhibited smaller response time variability in repeated contexts than in non-repeated ones, while younger children did not. This implies that children are less efficient at consolidating contextual information into a stable memory representation, which may lead to less stable attentional guidance during visual search.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Chengyu Fan
- Center for Cognition and Brain Disorders, Affiliated Hospital of Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, 310015, China
- Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou, 310015, China
- Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, 311121, China
- Department Psychologie, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, 80802, Munich, Germany
| | - Artyom Zinchenko
- Department Psychologie, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, 80802, Munich, Germany
| | - Lihan Chen
- School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences and Beijing Key Laboratory of Behavior and Mental Health, Peking University, Beijing, 100871, China
- National Engineering Laboratory for Big Data Analysis and Applications, Peking University, Beijing, 100871, China
| | - Jiao Wu
- Department Psychologie, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, 80802, Munich, Germany
| | - Yeke Qian
- Center for Cognition and Brain Disorders, Affiliated Hospital of Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, 310015, China
- Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou, 310015, China
- Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, 311121, China
| | - Xuelian Zang
- Center for Cognition and Brain Disorders, Affiliated Hospital of Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, 310015, China.
- Zhejiang Key Laboratory for Research in Assessment of Cognitive Impairments, Hangzhou, 310015, China.
- Zhejiang Philosophy and Social Science Laboratory for Research in Early Development and Childcare, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, 311121, China.
| |
Collapse
|
2
|
Nagy B, Kojouharova P, Protzner AB, Gaál ZA. Investigating the Effect of Contextual Cueing with Face Stimuli on Electrophysiological Measures in Younger and Older Adults. J Cogn Neurosci 2024; 36:776-799. [PMID: 38437174 DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_02135] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/06/2024]
Abstract
Extracting repeated patterns from our surroundings plays a crucial role in contextualizing information, making predictions, and guiding our behavior implicitly. Previous research showed that contextual cueing enhances visual search performance in younger adults. In this study, we investigated whether contextual cueing could also improve older adults' performance and whether age-related differences in the neural processes underlying implicit contextual learning could be detected. Twenty-four younger and 25 older participants performed a visual search task with contextual cueing. Contextual information was generated using repeated face configurations alongside random new configurations. We measured RT difference between new and repeated configurations; ERPs to uncover the neural processes underlying contextual cueing for early (N2pc), intermediate (P3b), and late (r-LRP) processes; and multiscale entropy and spectral power density analyses to examine neural dynamics. Both younger and older adults showed similar contextual cueing benefits in their visual search efficiency at the behavioral level. In addition, they showed similar patterns regarding contextual information processing: Repeated face configurations evoked decreased finer timescale entropy (1-20 msec) and higher frequency band power (13-30 Hz) compared with new configurations. However, we detected age-related differences in ERPs: Younger, but not older adults, had larger N2pc and P3b components for repeated compared with new configurations. These results suggest that contextual cueing remains intact with aging. Although attention- and target-evaluation-related ERPs differed between the age groups, the neural dynamics of contextual learning were preserved with aging, as both age groups increasingly utilized more globally grouped representations for repeated face configurations during the learning process.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Boglárka Nagy
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, HUN-REN Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
- Department of Cognitive Science, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Petia Kojouharova
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, HUN-REN Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| | - Andrea B Protzner
- Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada
| | - Zsófia Anna Gaál
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, HUN-REN Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
| |
Collapse
|
3
|
Serino G, Mareschal D, Scerif G, Kirkham N. Playing hide and seek: Contextual regularity learning develops between 3 and 5 years of age. J Exp Child Psychol 2024; 238:105795. [PMID: 37862788 DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2023.105795] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/25/2023] [Revised: 09/20/2023] [Accepted: 09/21/2023] [Indexed: 10/22/2023]
Abstract
The ability to acquire contextual regularities is fundamental in everyday life because it helps us to navigate the environment, directing our attention where relevant events are more likely to occur. Sensitivity to spatial regularities has been largely reported from infancy. Nevertheless, it is currently unclear when children can use this rapidly acquired contextual knowledge to guide their behavior. Evidence of this ability is indeed mixed in school-aged children and, to date, it has never been explored in younger children and toddlers. The current study investigated the development of contextual regularity learning in children aged 3 to 5 years. To this aim, we designed a new contextual learning paradigm in which young children were presented with recurring configurations of bushes and were asked to guess behind which bush a cartoon monkey was hiding. In a series of two experiments, we manipulated the relevance of color and visuospatial cues for the underlying task goal and tested how this affected young children's behavior. Our results bridge the gap between the infant and adult literatures, showing that sensitivity to spatial configurations persists from infancy to childhood, but it is only around the fifth year of life that children naturally start to integrate multiple cues to guide their behavior.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Giulia Serino
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, London WC1E 7HX, UK.
| | - Denis Mareschal
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, London WC1E 7HX, UK
| | - Gaia Scerif
- Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX2 6GG, UK
| | - Natasha Kirkham
- Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, London WC1E 7HX, UK
| |
Collapse
|
4
|
Lee DYH, Shanks DR. Conscious and unconscious memory and eye movements in context-guided visual search: A computational and experimental reassessment of Ramey, Yonelinas, and Henderson (2019). Cognition 2023; 240:105539. [PMID: 37579672 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2023.105539] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/30/2022] [Revised: 06/20/2023] [Accepted: 06/26/2023] [Indexed: 08/16/2023]
Abstract
Are eye movements unconsciously guided towards target locations in familiar scenes? In a recent eyetracking study, Ramey, Yonelinas, and Henderson (2019) measured eye-movement efficiency (scanpath ratio) and memory judgments when participants searched for targets in repeated and novel scenes. When trials judged new with high confidence were selected, scanpath ratio was lower for old scenes (misses) than for new scenes (correct rejections). In addition, familiarity as measured by recognition confidence did not significantly predict scanpath ratio. Ramey et al. attributed these results to unconscious learning guiding eye movements. In a re-assessment of Ramey et al.'s data, we show that their findings can be accounted for by a single-system computational model in which eye movements and memory judgments are driven by a common latent memory representation. In particular, (a) the scanpath ratio difference between high-confidence misses and correct rejections is a consequence of regression to the mean, while (b) the null correlation between familiarity and scanpath ratio, partly a natural consequence of the low reliability of the scanpath ratio measure, is also reproduced by the model. Two pre-registered experiments confirm a novel prediction of the alternative single-system model. This work offers a parsimonious account of Ramey et al.'s findings without recourse to unconscious guidance of eye movements.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Daryl Y H Lee
- Department of Experimental Psychology, University College London, UK.
| | - David R Shanks
- Department of Experimental Psychology, University College London, UK
| |
Collapse
|
5
|
Sakata C, Ueda Y, Moriguchi Y. The contextual cueing effect disappears during joint search in preschool children. J Exp Child Psychol 2023; 227:105592. [PMID: 36442326 DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2022.105592] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/27/2022] [Revised: 11/04/2022] [Accepted: 11/07/2022] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
During preschool years, children's interacting with others increases. One of the involved developmental skills is task co-representation, through which children aged 5 years and older represent a partner's task in a similar way to their own task. In adults, task co-representation makes participants attend to and form memories of objects relevant to both their own task and their partner's task; however, it is unclear whether children can also form such memories. In Experiment 1, we examined the memory facilitation of joint search using a contextual cueing effect paradigm. Children were presented with search displays repeatedly with the same or random layouts and searched and responded to the target either alone (the single group; n = 32; Mage = 73.6 months, range = 61-80) or with their parent (the joint group; n = 32; Mage = 74.3 months, range = 64-81). Results showed that the search with the same layouts was faster than that with the random layouts for the single group, indicating that children form associative memories of target and distractors relevant to their own task. For the joint group, this effect was not statistically different from that of the single group, with exploratory analysis suggesting that it was disrupted. In Experiment 2, children performed the search with a peer (n = 32; Mage = 72.7 months, range = 67-79) and the effect was also not found. Our findings suggest that the self's and partner's tasks are represented but might not be incorporated into associative memory in 5- and 6-year-old children.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Chifumi Sakata
- Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan.
| | - Yoshiyuki Ueda
- Institute for the Future of Human Society, Kyoto University, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan
| | - Yusuke Moriguchi
- Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan
| |
Collapse
|
6
|
Contextual cueing in co-active visual search: Joint action allows acquisition of task-irrelevant context. Atten Percept Psychophys 2022; 84:1114-1129. [PMID: 35437702 DOI: 10.3758/s13414-022-02470-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 02/26/2022] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Repeatedly presenting a target within a stable search array facilitates visual search, an effect termed contextual cueing. Previous solo-performance studies have shown that successful acquisition of contextual memories requires explicit allocation of attentional resources to the task-relevant repeated contexts. By contrast, repeated but task-irrelevant contexts could not be learned when presented together with repeated task-relevant contexts due to a blocking effect. Here we investigated if such blocking of context learning could be diminished in a social context, when the task-irrelevant context is task-relevant for a co-actor in a joint action search mode. We adopted the contextual cueing paradigm and extended this to the co-active search mode. Participants learned a context-cued subset of the search displays (color-defined) in the training phase, and their search performance was tested in the transfer phase, where previously irrelevant and relevant subsets were swapped. The experiments were conducted either in a solo search mode (Experiments 1 and 3) or in a co-active search mode (Experiment 2). Consistent with the classical contextual cueing studies, contextual cueing was observed in the training phase of all three experiments. Importantly, however, in the "swapped" test session, a significant contextual cueing effect was manifested only in the co-active search mode, not in the solo search mode. Our findings suggest that social context may widen the scope of attention, thus facilitating the acquisition of task-irrelevant contexts.
Collapse
|
7
|
Krieber-Tomantschger M, Pokorny FB, Krieber-Tomantschger I, Langmann L, Poustka L, Zhang D, Treue S, Tanzer NK, Einspieler C, Marschik PB, Körner C. The development of visual attention in early infancy: Insights from a free-viewing paradigm. INFANCY 2022; 27:433-458. [PMID: 34981647 DOI: 10.1111/infa.12449] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/03/2021] [Revised: 11/19/2021] [Accepted: 12/07/2021] [Indexed: 12/30/2022]
Abstract
Theories of visual attention suggest a cascading development of subfunctions such as alertness, spatial orientation, attention to object features, and endogenous control. Here, we aimed to track infants' visual developmental steps from a primarily exogenously to more endogenously controlled processing style during their first months of life. In this repeated measures study, 51 infants participated in seven fortnightly assessments at postterm ages of 4-16 weeks. Infants were presented with the same set of static and dynamic paired comparison stimuli in each assessment. Visual behavior was evaluated by a newly introduced scoring scheme. Our results confirmed the suggested visual developmental hierarchy and clearly demonstrated the suitability of our scoring scheme for documenting developmental changes in visual attention during early infancy. Besides the general ontogenetic course of development, we also discuss intra- and interindividual differences which may affect single assessments, and highlight the importance of repeated measurements for reliable evaluation of developmental changes.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Magdalena Krieber-Tomantschger
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
| | - Florian B Pokorny
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
| | - Iris Krieber-Tomantschger
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
| | - Laura Langmann
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
| | - Luise Poustka
- Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Georg-August University Goettingen, University Medical Center Goettingen, Goettingen, Germany
| | - Dajie Zhang
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
- Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Georg-August University Goettingen, University Medical Center Goettingen, Goettingen, Germany
- Leibniz-ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, Goettingen, Germany
| | - Stefan Treue
- Leibniz-ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, Goettingen, Germany
- Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, German Primate Center - Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, Goettingen, Germany
- Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience, Goettingen, Germany
- Faculty for Biology and Psychology, University of Goettingen, Goettingen, Germany
| | | | - Christa Einspieler
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
| | - Peter B Marschik
- Research Unit iDN - interdisciplinary Developmental Neuroscience, Division of Phoniatrics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
- Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Georg-August University Goettingen, University Medical Center Goettingen, Goettingen, Germany
- Leibniz-ScienceCampus Primate Cognition, Goettingen, Germany
- Department of Women's and Children's Health, Center of Neurodevelopmental Disorders (KIND), Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Christof Körner
- Cognitive Psychology & Neuroscience, Institute of Psychology, University of Graz, Graz, Austria
| |
Collapse
|
8
|
King J, Markant J. Selective attention to lesson‐relevant contextual information promotes 3‐ to 5‐year‐old children's learning. Dev Sci 2022; 25:e13237. [DOI: 10.1111/desc.13237] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/31/2021] [Revised: 01/07/2022] [Accepted: 01/19/2022] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Jill King
- Neuroscience Program Tulane University New Orleans Louisiana 70118
- Tulane Brain Institute Tulane University New Orleans Louisiana 70118
| | - Julie Markant
- Department of Psychology Tulane University New Orleans Louisiana 70118
- Tulane Brain Institute Tulane University New Orleans Louisiana 70118
| |
Collapse
|
9
|
Addleman DA, Legge GE, Jiang YV. Simulated central vision loss impairs implicit location probability learning. Cortex 2021; 138:241-252. [PMID: 33735796 DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2021.02.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/12/2020] [Revised: 12/24/2020] [Accepted: 02/07/2021] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Some eye diseases, especially macular degeneration, can cause central vision loss (CVL), impairing goal-driven guidance of attention. Does CVL also affect implicit, experience-driven attention? We investigated how simulated central scotomas affected young adults' ability to prioritize locations frequently containing visual search targets (location probability learning). Participants searched among distractor letter 'L's for a target 'T' that appeared more often in one screen quadrant than others. To dissociate potential impairments to statistical learning of target locations and attentional guidance, two experiments each included search with and without simulated scotomas. Experiment 1 successfully induced probability learning in a no-scotoma phase. When participants later searched both with and without simulated scotomas, they showed persistent, statistically equivalent spatial biases in both no-scotoma and scotoma search. Experiment 2 trained participants with a central scotoma. While Experiment 1's participants acquired probability learning regardless of their self-reported awareness of the target's location probability, in Experiment 2 only aware participants learned to bias attention to the high probability region. Similarly, learning with a scotoma affected search with no scotoma in aware but not unaware participants. Together, these results show that simulated central vision loss interferes with the acquisition of implicitly learned location probability learning, supporting a role of central vision in implicit spatial attentional biases.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Douglas A Addleman
- Dartmouth College, United States; University of Minnesota, United States.
| | | | | |
Collapse
|
10
|
Fischer M, Moscovitch M, Alain C. A systematic review and meta‐analysis of memory‐guided attention: Frontal and parietal activation suggests involvement of fronto‐parietal networks. WILEY INTERDISCIPLINARY REVIEWS. COGNITIVE SCIENCE 2020; 12:e1546. [DOI: 10.1002/wcs.1546] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/13/2020] [Revised: 08/19/2020] [Accepted: 09/03/2020] [Indexed: 11/06/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Manda Fischer
- Department of Psychology Rotman Research Institute, University of Toronto Toronto ON Canada
| | - Morris Moscovitch
- Department of Psychology Rotman Research Institute, University of Toronto Toronto ON Canada
| | - Claude Alain
- Department of Psychology Rotman Research Institute, University of Toronto Toronto ON Canada
| |
Collapse
|
11
|
|