More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action
Salient visual stimuli capture attention and trigger an eye-movement towards its location reflexively, regardless of an observer’s intentions. Here we investigate the effect of aging 1) on the extent to which salient yet task-irrelevant stimuli capture saccades, and 2) on the ability to selectively...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2011-10-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Psychology |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00267/full |
| _version_ | 1818857969593352192 |
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| author | K. Richard eRidderinkhof K. Richard eRidderinkhof Jasper G Wijnen |
| author_facet | K. Richard eRidderinkhof K. Richard eRidderinkhof Jasper G Wijnen |
| author_sort | K. Richard eRidderinkhof |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Salient visual stimuli capture attention and trigger an eye-movement towards its location reflexively, regardless of an observer’s intentions. Here we investigate the effect of aging 1) on the extent to which salient yet task-irrelevant stimuli capture saccades, and 2) on the ability to selectively suppress such oculomotor responses. Young and older adults were asked to direct their eyes to a target appearing in a stimulus array. Analysis of overall performance shows that saccades to the target object were disrupted by the appearance of a task-irrelevant abrupt-onset distractor when the location of this distractor did not coincide with that of the target object. Conditional Capture Function analyses revealed that, compared to young adults, older adults were more susceptible to oculomotor capture, and exhibited deficient selective suppression of the responses captured by task-irrelevant distractors. These effects were uncorrelated, suggesting two independent sources off age-related decline. The fact that these process-specific age effects remained concealed in overall oculomotor performance analyses emphasizes the utility of looking beyond the surface; indeed, there may be more than meets the eye. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-19T08:48:50Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-f9b31534905d43dbb672a254c7f5c058 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-1078 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-19T08:48:50Z |
| publishDate | 2011-10-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Psychology |
| spelling | doaj.art-f9b31534905d43dbb672a254c7f5c0582022-12-21T20:28:46ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782011-10-01210.3389/fpsyg.2011.0026711436More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor actionK. Richard eRidderinkhof0K. Richard eRidderinkhof1Jasper G Wijnen2University of AmsterdamUniversity of AmsterdamUniversity of AmsterdamSalient visual stimuli capture attention and trigger an eye-movement towards its location reflexively, regardless of an observer’s intentions. Here we investigate the effect of aging 1) on the extent to which salient yet task-irrelevant stimuli capture saccades, and 2) on the ability to selectively suppress such oculomotor responses. Young and older adults were asked to direct their eyes to a target appearing in a stimulus array. Analysis of overall performance shows that saccades to the target object were disrupted by the appearance of a task-irrelevant abrupt-onset distractor when the location of this distractor did not coincide with that of the target object. Conditional Capture Function analyses revealed that, compared to young adults, older adults were more susceptible to oculomotor capture, and exhibited deficient selective suppression of the responses captured by task-irrelevant distractors. These effects were uncorrelated, suggesting two independent sources off age-related decline. The fact that these process-specific age effects remained concealed in overall oculomotor performance analyses emphasizes the utility of looking beyond the surface; indeed, there may be more than meets the eye.http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00267/fullAgingsaccadeInhibitory Controldistributional analysisoculomotor capture |
| spellingShingle | K. Richard eRidderinkhof K. Richard eRidderinkhof Jasper G Wijnen More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action Frontiers in Psychology Aging saccade Inhibitory Control distributional analysis oculomotor capture |
| title | More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action |
| title_full | More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action |
| title_fullStr | More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action |
| title_full_unstemmed | More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action |
| title_short | More than meets the eye:age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action |
| title_sort | more than meets the eye age differences in the capture and suppression of oculomotor action |
| topic | Aging saccade Inhibitory Control distributional analysis oculomotor capture |
| url | http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00267/full |
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