Effective processing of masked eye-gaze requires volitional control

S. Al-Janabi, M. Finkbeiner

    Research output: Contribution to journalMeeting abstractpeer-review

    Abstract

    Extant literature indicates that averted eye-gaze cues orient spatial attention. Despite the ease with which
    gaze-triggered shifts of attention occur, however, there remain important questions about the automaticity
    of one’s response to averted gaze. The aim of the present study is to investigate this aforementioned
    issue by determining whether shifts of attention to eye-gaze cues can occur when the cues are masked.
    While we find that unmasked eye-gaze cues are effective in producing a validity effect in a central cueing
    paradigm, we also find that the efficacy of masked eye-gaze cues is sharply constrained by experimental
    context. Specifically, masked eye-gaze cues only produced a validity effect when they appeared in the
    context of predictive unmasked eye-gaze cues. Unmasked eye-gaze cues, in contrast, produced validity
    effects across a range of experimental contexts, including when 80% of the cues were invalid. These
    findings demonstrate that, unlike unmasked eye-gaze cues, the effective processing of masked eye-gaze
    cues is volitional.
    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)27-27
    Number of pages1
    JournalPerception
    Volume41
    Issue number1 supplement
    Publication statusPublished - 2012
    Event35th European Conference on Visual Perception - Alghero, Italy
    Duration: 2 Sept 20126 Sept 2012

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