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Attention improves or impairs visual performance by enhancing spatial resolution

Author

Listed:
  • Yaffa Yeshurun

    (New York University)

  • Marisa Carrasco

    (New York University)

Abstract

Covert attention, the selective processing of visual information at a given location in the absence of eye movements, improves performance in several tasks, such as visual search and detection of luminance and vernier targets1,2,3,4,5,6. An important unsettled issue is whether this improvement is due to a reduction in noise (internal or external)6,7,8,9, a change in decisional criteria10,11, or signal enhancement3,5,12. Here we show that attention can affect performance by signal enhancement. For a texture segregation task in which performance is actually diminished when spatial resolution is too high, we observed that attention improved performance at peripheral locations where spatial resolution was too low, but impaired performance at central locations where spatial resolution was too high4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12. The counterintuitive impairment of performance that we found at the central retinal locations appears to have only one possible explanation: attention enhances spatial resolution.

Suggested Citation

  • Yaffa Yeshurun & Marisa Carrasco, 1998. "Attention improves or impairs visual performance by enhancing spatial resolution," Nature, Nature, vol. 396(6706), pages 72-75, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:396:y:1998:i:6706:d:10.1038_23936
    DOI: 10.1038/23936
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    Cited by:

    1. Duffy, Sean & Gussman, Steven & Smith, John, 2021. "Visual judgments of length in the economics laboratory: Are there brains in stochastic choice?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    2. Duffy, Sean & Gussman, Steven & Smith, John, 2019. "Judgments of length in the economics laboratory: Are there brains in choice?," MPRA Paper 93126, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. David Bressler & Nicole Spotswood & David Whitney, 2007. "Negative BOLD fMRI Response in the Visual Cortex Carries Precise Stimulus-Specific Information," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 2(5), pages 1-10, May.
    4. Adam J Woods & John W Philbeck & Philip Wirtz, 2013. "Hyper-Arousal Decreases Human Visual Thresholds," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(4), pages 1-8, April.
    5. Leopold Zizlsperger & Thomas Sauvigny & Thomas Haarmeier, 2012. "Selective Attention Increases Choice Certainty in Human Decision Making," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(7), pages 1-9, July.

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