Abstract
Five experiments are reported from which it is concluded that attending on the basis of a stimulus feature (e.g., red) does not directly affect the sensory quality of stimuli that possess that feature. Feature-based attention was manipulated in a visual search task by providing information about the probability that the target would possess a given feature (e.g., "The target has a 1.0 probability of being red when present."). Feature-based attention failed to aid performance under "data-limited" conditions (i.e., those under which performance was primarily affected by the quality of the stimulus) but did affect performance under conditions that were not data limited (Experiments 1-3). If attending to a feature had affected the sensory quality of stimuli, performance should have been aided under all conditions. Experiments 4 and 5 provided converging support for this conclusion.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 1296-1310 |
Number of pages | 15 |
Journal | Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance |
Volume | 24 |
Issue number | 4 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Aug 1998 |
Externally published | Yes |
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
- Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
- Behavioral Neuroscience