Domain-Generality of Object-Based Attention: the Same-Object Advantage in Vision and Audition

Abstract

Object-Based Attention (OBA) occurs when attentional resources are allocated to discrete units of sensory information that arise as a consequence of perceptual organization. The visual manifestation of OBA is commonly demonstrated through the double-rectangle cueing paradigm (Egly et al., 1994) in which enhanced behavioral performance is observed for non-cued spatial locations of a cued object relative to equidistant locations on a different object (often termed a ‘same-object advantage’). While most OBA research has been conducted on visual objects that unfold over space, research suggests that attentional selection may also occur for auditory objects that unfold over time. However, questions remain as to whether OBA is domain-specific or if the characteristics of visual OBA can generalize across sensory modalities. Here, we investigated auditory OBA using a paradigm that mimics certain aspects of the visual double-rectangle design to determine whether visual and auditory OBA produce similar effects. The stimuli consisted of five non-overlapping auditory objects, each spanning a 7-semitone range that was centered around one of five frequencies (300 Hz; 566 Hz; 1068 Hz; 2016 Hz; 3805 Hz). On each trial, two objects were presented simultaneously while participants responded to targets (four sequential tones of the same frequency). Prior to each trial, attention to a single object was cued via a brief tone presented at one of its constituent frequencies. Across three experiments that varied cue location and cue validity, we observed a same-object advantage in the form of enhanced behavioral performance for targets appearing on cued vs. non-cued objects. Importantly, these effects were not confined to the specific cued frequency but extended to non-cued frequencies of the cued object in a manner somewhat analogous to the visual double-rectangle paradigm. In conclusion, our study presents preliminary evidence that the selection of objects by attention may be domain-general across vision and audition.