Abstract
Subjects monitored a visual display for occasional increments in the horizontal movement of a bar of light. When the display was viewed without head restraint, detection probability was directly related to the amplitude of the increments in movement which constituted critical signals and inversely related to background event rate (the frequency of neutral events in which critical signals were embedded). When positioning of the head was restrained by a headrest, the detectability of low-amplitude signals was enhanced considerably and the influence of background event rate was attenuated. The results are considered as providing further support for the importance of sense mode coupling in visual monitoring.
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This research was sponsored by the Institute of Space Sciences of the University of Cincinnati under National Aeronautics and Space Administration Grant NGL-36-004-014.
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Warm, J.S., Wait, R.G. & Loeb, M. Head restraint enhances visual monitoring performance. Perception & Psychophysics 20, 299–304 (1976). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03199456
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03199456