This article applies to:
E-Prime 3.0
E-Prime 1.0
Detail
Experiment Author: Susan Campbell. Adapted from STEP and used with permission of Brian MacWhinney
Experiment Description
This experiment presents participants with a circle of letters, some of which have been cued, and the participants are expected to decide whether an "S" or a "C" appears in the cued area. Four variables are manipulated between trials: how long before the letters appear that the cue appears, number of positions in the circle cued, whether there are distractors ("S" or "C") present outside the cue area, and how far those distractors are from the display area.
The interactions of these four variables should show that attention has a focus, but that that focus bleeds out into the area around it. Competing letters should slow processing more the closer they are to the cued area.
The smaller version cues one position in a line of letters and sees whether the cued letter is named faster.
Experiment Instructions
In this experiment, participants will be presented with a circle of letters that appear for 50 milliseconds. Target letters 'S' and 'C' will appear in the circle and participants must respond, quickly pressing the corresponding letter on their keyboard if it is present. There are three lists totaling 144 samples, There is variation in the duration and number of underlines which prime participants before the circle of letters appear. Underlines appear in the same place as target letters for durations of 50, 100, and 200 milliseconds. Anywhere between one and three underlines will appear. A blank slide will be shown for one second after each sample.
Display settings should be set to 640x480 pixels.
Simplified Version
The simplified version cues one target letter out of a line of letters, instead of a circle of letters. The duration of the cue is 1100 milliseconds. The duration of the target stimuli is varies between 500, 600, 700, and 800 milliseconds. There are 48 total trials in the simplified version of this experiment. Participants must respond with capital letters. Caps Lock must be on or participants must hold shift when pressing letters on a keyboard.
Display settings should be set to 640x480 pixels.
Experiment Citation
Eriksen, C. W., & St. James, J. D. (1986). "Visual attention within and around the field of focal attention: A zoom lens model. " Perception and Psychophysics 40, 225-240.
Experiment Abstract or Original Experiment Abstract
The operation of attention in the visual field has often been compared to a spotlight. We propose that a more apt analogy is that of a zoom or variable-power lens. Two experiments focused upon the following questions: (1) Can the spatial extent of the attentional focus be made to vary in response to precues? (2) As the area of the attentional focus increases, is there a decrease in processing efficiency for stimuli within the focus? (3) Is the boundary of the focus sharply demarked from the residual field, or does it show a gradual dropoff in processing resources? Subjects were required to search eight-letter circular displays for one of two target letters and reaction times were recorded. One to four adjacent display positions were precued by underlines at various stimulus onset asynchronies before display presentation. A response competition paradigm was used, in which the “other target” was used as a noise letter in noncued as well as cued locations. The results were in good agreement with the zoom lens model.
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