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Our eyes deviate away from a location where a distractor is expected to appear

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Abstract

Previous research has shown that in order to make an accurate saccade to a target object, nearby distractor objects need to be inhibited. The extent to which saccade trajectories deviate away from a distractor is often considered to be an index of the strength of inhibition. The present study shows that the mere expectation that a distractor will appear at a specific location is enough to generate saccade deviations away from this location. This suggests that higher-order cognitive processes such as top-down expectancy interact with low-level structures involved in eye movement control. The results will be discussed in the light of current theories of target selection and possible neurophysiological correlates.

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Notes

  1. To test whether there was a difference in the magnitude of the expectation effect on the saccade trajectory deviations between the two experiments, we run a mixed ANOVA with Experiment as a between-subjects factor. There was no interaction between Experiment and condition (F<1) suggesting that the magnitude of the expectation effect was similar in both experiments. There was no main effect of Experiment (F<1).

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by a grant from NWO (Netherlands organization for Scientific Research), grant 402-01-630-PROG to Jan Theeuwes.

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  1. Department of Cognitive Psychology, Vrije Universiteit, Van der Boechorststraat 1, 1081 BT, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Stefan Van der Stigchel & Jan Theeuwes

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  1. Stefan Van der Stigchel
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  2. Jan Theeuwes
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Correspondence to Stefan Van der Stigchel.

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Van der Stigchel, S., Theeuwes, J. Our eyes deviate away from a location where a distractor is expected to appear. Exp Brain Res 169, 338–349 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-005-0147-2

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