Endogenous visuospatial attention increases visual awareness independent of visual discrimination sensitivity.
Visuospatial attention often improves task performance by increasing signal gain at attended locations and decreasing noise at unattended locations. Attention is also believed to be the mechanism that allows information to enter awareness. In this experiment, we assessed whether orienting endogenous visuospatial attention with cues differentially affects visual discrimination sensitivity (an objective task performance) and visual awareness (the subjective feeling of perceiving) during the same discrimination task. Gabor patch targets were presented laterally, either at low contrast (contrast stimuli) or at high contrast embedded in noise (noise stimuli). Participants reported their orientation either in a 3-alternative choice task (clockwise, counterclockwise, unknown) that allowed for both objective and subjective reports, or in a 2-alternative choice task (clockwise, counterclockwise) that provided a control for objective reports. Signal detection theory models were fit to the experimental data: estimated perceptual sensitivity reflected objective performance; decision criteria, or subjective biases, were a proxy for visual awareness. Attention increased sensitivity (i.e., improved objective performance) for the contrast, but not for the noise stimuli. Indeed, with the latter, attention did not further enhance the already high target signal or reduce the already low uncertainty on its position. Interestingly, for both contrast and noise stimuli, attention resulted in more liberal criteria, i.e., awareness increased. The noise condition is thus an experimental configuration where people think they see the targets they attend to better, even if they do not. This could be explained by an internal representation of their attentional state, which influences awareness independent of objective visual signals.
['Vernet|Marine|M|', 'Japee|Shruti|S|', 'Lokey|Savannah|S|', 'Ahmed|Sara|S|', 'Zachariou|Valentinos|V|', 'Ungerleider|Leslie G|LG|']
D000328:Adult D001288:Attention D001364:Awareness D002755:Choice Behavior D003463:Cues D004192:Discrimination, Psychological D005260:Female D006801:Humans D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D009622:Noise D009949:Orientation D010775:Photic Stimulation D011597:Psychomotor Performance D011930:Reaction Time D017603:Signal Detection, Psychological D013028:Space Perception D035501:Uncertainty D014796:Visual Perception D055815:Young Adult
Noise Contrast Signal detection theory Conscious perception Objective and subjective vision