Object-based attention and cognitive tunneling

A Video-Based, Eye-Tracking Study to Investigate the Effect of eHMI Modalities and Locations on Pedestrian–Automated Vehicle Interaction

Numerous studies have emerged on the external human–machine interface (eHMI) to facilitate the communication between automated vehicles (AVs) and other road users. However, it remains to be determined which eHMI modality and location are proper for the pedestrian–AV interaction. Therefore, a video-based, eye-tracking study was performed to investigate how pedestrians responded to AVs with eHMIs in different modalities (flashing text, smiley, light band, sweeping pedestrian icon, arrow, and light bar) and locations (grill, windshield, and roof). Moreover, the effects of pedestrian-related factors (e.g., gender, sensation-seeking level, and traffic accident involvement) were also included and evaluated. The dependent variables included pedestrians’ clarity-rating scores towards these eHMI concepts, road-crossing decision time, and gaze-based metrics (e.g., fixation counts, dwell time, and first fixation duration). The results showed that the text, icon, and arrow-based eHMIs resulted in the shortest decision time, highest clarity scores, and centralized visual attention. The light strip-based eHMIs yielded no significant decrease in decision time yet longer fixation time, indicating difficulties in comprehension of their meaning without learning. The eHMI location had no effect on pedestrians’ decision time but a substantial influence on their visual searching strategy, with a roof eHMI contradicting pedestrians’ inherent scanning pattern. These findings provide implications for the standardized design of future eHMIs.

What Does Creativity Mean in Safety-Critical Environments?

Safety in high-risk and time-pressured situations relies on people's ability to generate new and appropriate solutions to solve unforeseen problems for which no procedures or rules are available. This type of ability is regularly associated with the concept of creativity. While psychology researchers have studied, for decades, how creative ideas and solutions are generated, this basic research has not made it into the more applied fields of human factors and neuroergonomics. Building on the research on the psychology and the neuropsychology of creativity, this paper will (1) address the question of what creativity means and what are its ties with problem solving and decision-making; (2) focus on the evidence of the creative processes, the underlying mechanisms, and the multiple psychological dimensions of the creative behavior involved in unexpected events in extreme environments such as Apollo 13 mission, United Airline Flight 232, and Mann Gulch wildfire; and (3) explore the implications for future research in the domains of neuroergonomics and differential psychology.

fMRI correlates of object-based attentional facilitation vs. suppression of irrelevant stimuli, dependent on global grouping and endogenous cueing

Theories of object-based attention often make two assumptions: that attentional resources are facilitatory, and that they spread automatically within grouped objects. Consistent with this, ignored visual stimuli can be easier to process, or more distracting, when perceptually grouped with an attended target stimulus. But in past studies, the ignored stimuli often shared potentially relevant features or locations with the target. In this fMRI study, we measured the effects of attention and grouping on Blood Oxygenation Level Dependent (BOLD) responses in the human brain to entirely task-irrelevant events. Two checkerboards were displayed each in opposite hemifields, while participants responded to check-size changes in one pre-cued hemifield, which varied between blocks. Grouping (or segmentation) between hemifields was manipulated between blocks, using common (vs. distinct) motion cues. Task-irrelevant transient events were introduced by randomly changing the color of either checkerboard, attended or ignored, at unpredictable intervals. The above assumptions predict heightened BOLD signals for irrelevant events in attended vs. ignored hemifields for ungrouped contexts, but less such attentional modulation under grouping, due to automatic spreading of facilitation across hemifields. We found the opposite pattern, in primary visual cortex. For ungrouped stimuli, BOLD signals associated with task-irrelevant changes were lower, not higher, in the attended vs. ignored hemifield; furthermore, attentional modulation was not reduced but actually inverted under grouping, with higher signals for events in the attended vs. ignored hemifield. These results challenge two popular assumptions underlying object-based attention. We consider a broader biased-competition framework: task-irrelevant stimuli are suppressed according to how strongly they compete with task-relevant stimuli, with intensified competition when the irrelevant features or locations comprise the same object.