Inhibition of return for the discrimination of faces

• Published in: Perception & psychophysics Vol. 70; no. 2; pp. 279 - 290
• Main Authors: Taylor, Tracy L., Therrien, Megan E.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer-Verlag 01.02.2008; Psychonomic Society
• Subjects: Activity levels. Psychomotricity; Attention; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Biological and medical sciences; Cognitive Psychology; Cues; Discrimination Learning; Face; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Humans; Inhibition (Psychology); Orientation; Pattern Recognition, Visual; Perception; Perceptual Distortion; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Psychophysics; Reaction Time; Vigilance. Attention. Sleep; Vision; Target Location; Face Target; Face Stimulus; Stimulus Onset Asynchrony; Uncued Location; Human; Discrimination; Vision; Perception; Cognition; Inhibition of return; Experimental study; Face; Visual attention
• ISSN: 0031-5117; 1532-5962
• DOI: 10.3758/PP.70.2.279

When a target appears unpredictably in the same rather than a different location relative to a preceding onset cue, reaction times (RTs) of participants tasked with responding to the target are slowed. This pattern of results, referred to as inhibition of return (IOR), is believed to reflect the operation of a mechanism that prevents perseverative search of nontarget locations. On the grounds that an evolved mechanism might be sensitive to social stimuli, Taylor and Therrien (2005) examined IOR for localization responses under conditions in which cues and targets could be intact face configurations or nonface configurations; contrary to their predictions, there was no influence of cue or target configuration on the magnitude of IOR, indicating that the mere occurrence of taskirrelevant face and nonface stimuli does not alter IOR. In the present study, we further examined this issue in a task that required a face/nonface target discrimination. When target configuration was thereby made task relevant, we found that IOR differed for face and nonface targets in terms of magnitude (when a single cue-target stimulus onset asynchrony was employed) and time course. We suggest that the RT delay associated with IOR may enable additional processing time and/or response selection when a task-relevant face is presented at the cued location.