Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues

Visual attention allows relevant information to be selected for further processing. Both conscious and unconscious visual stimuli can bias attentional allocation, but how these two types of visual information interact to guide attention remains unclear. In this study, we explored attentional allocat...

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Main Authors: Andrea Alamia, Oleg Solopchuk, Alexandre Zénon
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2018-10-01
Series:Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00427/full
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author Andrea Alamia
Oleg Solopchuk
Alexandre Zénon
Alexandre Zénon
author_facet Andrea Alamia
Oleg Solopchuk
Alexandre Zénon
Alexandre Zénon
author_sort Andrea Alamia
collection DOAJ
description Visual attention allows relevant information to be selected for further processing. Both conscious and unconscious visual stimuli can bias attentional allocation, but how these two types of visual information interact to guide attention remains unclear. In this study, we explored attentional allocation during a motion discrimination task with varied motion strength and unconscious associations between stimuli and cues. Participants were instructed to report the motion direction of two colored patches of dots. Unbeknown to participants, dot colors were sometimes informative of the correct response. We found that subjects learnt the associations between colors and motion direction but failed to report this association using the questionnaire filled at the end of the experiment, confirming that learning remained unconscious. The eye movement analyses revealed that allocation of attention to unconscious sources of information occurred mostly when motion coherence was low, indicating that unconscious cues influence attentional allocation only in the absence of strong conscious cues. All in all, our results reveal that conscious and unconscious sources of information interact with each other to influence attentional allocation and suggest a selection process that weights cues in proportion to their reliability.
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spelling doaj.art-02f227a592c8433ca51c31515c85507b2022-12-21T18:43:03ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Human Neuroscience1662-51612018-10-011210.3389/fnhum.2018.00427414499Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious CuesAndrea Alamia0Oleg Solopchuk1Alexandre Zénon2Alexandre Zénon3Institute of Neuroscience, Université catholique de Louvain, Brussels, BelgiumInstitute of Neuroscience, Université catholique de Louvain, Brussels, BelgiumInstitute of Neuroscience, Université catholique de Louvain, Brussels, BelgiumUMR5287 Institut de Neurosciences Cognitives et Intégratives d’Aquitaine (INCIA), CNRS, Bordeaux, FranceVisual attention allows relevant information to be selected for further processing. Both conscious and unconscious visual stimuli can bias attentional allocation, but how these two types of visual information interact to guide attention remains unclear. In this study, we explored attentional allocation during a motion discrimination task with varied motion strength and unconscious associations between stimuli and cues. Participants were instructed to report the motion direction of two colored patches of dots. Unbeknown to participants, dot colors were sometimes informative of the correct response. We found that subjects learnt the associations between colors and motion direction but failed to report this association using the questionnaire filled at the end of the experiment, confirming that learning remained unconscious. The eye movement analyses revealed that allocation of attention to unconscious sources of information occurred mostly when motion coherence was low, indicating that unconscious cues influence attentional allocation only in the absence of strong conscious cues. All in all, our results reveal that conscious and unconscious sources of information interact with each other to influence attentional allocation and suggest a selection process that weights cues in proportion to their reliability.https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00427/fullunconscious learningeye movementsvisual attentioneye trackingimplicit learning
spellingShingle Andrea Alamia
Oleg Solopchuk
Alexandre Zénon
Alexandre Zénon
Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
unconscious learning
eye movements
visual attention
eye tracking
implicit learning
title Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues
title_full Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues
title_fullStr Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues
title_full_unstemmed Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues
title_short Strong Conscious Cues Suppress Preferential Gaze Allocation to Unconscious Cues
title_sort strong conscious cues suppress preferential gaze allocation to unconscious cues
topic unconscious learning
eye movements
visual attention
eye tracking
implicit learning
url https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00427/full
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