Externally cued and internally generated selection: differences in distractor analysis and inhibition

In most studies of selective attention, the experimenter informs the participant what the target is and what action is required. For example, participants may be told to name the red drawing. The present study shows that under such conditions of external selection, distractor inhibition is used to e...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of experimental psychology. Human perception and performance Vol. 23; no. 6; p. 1617
Main Authors Baylis, G C, Tipper, S P, Houghton, G
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States 01.12.1997
Subjects
Analysis of Variance
Attention
Cues
Female
Humans
Inhibition (Psychology)
Male
Reaction Time
Visual Perception
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Summary:In most studies of selective attention, the experimenter informs the participant what the target is and what action is required. For example, participants may be told to name the red drawing. The present study shows that under such conditions of external selection, distractor inhibition is used to ensure that selection is efficient. In external selection, analysis of distractors is limited, causing later recognition of distractor items to be poor. In contrast, during real-world selection a person may be confronted with a number of potential targets and may have to decide what will be the target for action. Under these conditions of internal selection, inhibition of distracting information does not occur. Moreover, distractors are more fully analyzed and thus better recognized at a later test.
ISSN:0096-1523
DOI:10.1037/0096-1523.23.6.1617