Alertness and cognitive control: Toward a spatial grouping hypothesis

Attention, Perception & Psychophysics
Darryl W Schneider

Abstract

A puzzling interaction involving alertness and cognitive control is indicated by the finding of faster performance but larger congruency effects on alert trials (on which alerting cues are presented before the task stimuli) than on no-alert trials in selective attention tasks. In the present study, the author conducted four experiments to test hypotheses about the interaction. Manipulation of stimulus spacing revealed a difference in congruency effects between alert and no-alert trials for narrowly spaced stimuli but not for widely spaced stimuli, inconsistent with the hypothesis that increased alertness is associated with more diffuse attention. Manipulation of color grouping revealed similar differences in congruency effects between alert and no-alert trials for same-color and different-color groupings of targets and distractors, inconsistent with the general hypothesis that increased alertness is associated with more perceptual grouping. To explain the results, the author proposes that increased alertness is associated specifically with more spatial grouping of stimuli, possibly by modulating the threshold for parsing stimulus displays into distinct objects.

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Nov 21, 2017·Journal of Experimental Psychology. Human Perception and Performance·Darryl W Schneider
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Citations

Oct 26, 2018·Attention, Perception & Psychophysics·Darryl W Schneider
Apr 26, 2019·Behavioral Sciences·Soudabeh NourHélène Stengers
May 28, 2019·Attention, Perception & Psychophysics·Darryl W Schneider
Jul 25, 2019·Attention, Perception & Psychophysics·Christian H Poth
Feb 23, 2020·Attention, Perception & Psychophysics·Darryl W Schneider
Aug 28, 2020·Attention, Perception & Psychophysics·Cathleen M MooreJ Toby Mordkoff
Oct 22, 2020·Attention, Perception & Psychophysics·Cailey A Salagovic, Carly J Leonard
Jul 24, 2021·The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology : QJEP·Tianfang Han, Robert W Proctor

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