Abstract
The presentation of a remote – but not proximal – distractor concurrent with target onset increases prosaccade reaction times (RT) (i.e., the remote distractor effect: RDE). The competitive integration model asserts that the RDE represents the time required to resolve the conflict for a common saccade threshold between target- and distractor-related saccade generating commands in the superior colliculus. To our knowledge however, no previous research has examined whether remote and proximal distractors differentially influence antisaccade RTs. This represents a notable question because antisaccades require decoupling of the spatial relations between stimulus and response (SR) and therefore provide a basis for determining whether the sensory- and/or motor-related features of a distractor influence response planning. Participants completed pro- and antisaccades in a target-only condition and conditions wherein the target was concurrently presented with a proximal or remote distractor. As expected, prosaccade RTs elicited a reliable RDE. In contrast, antisaccade RTs were increased independent of the distractor’s spatial location and the magnitude of the effect was comparable across each distractor location. Thus, distractor-related antisaccade RT costs are not accounted for by a competitive integration between conflicting saccade generating commands. Instead, we propose that a visual distractor increases uncertainty related to the evocation of the response-selection rule necessary for decoupling SR relations.
Highlights
Prosaccades are rapid eye movements that bring a target of interest onto the fovea
Results from this work have shown that prosaccades are characterized by short latencies and accurate endpoints —a finding attributed to their mediation via dedicated retinotopic motor maps in intermediate layers of the superior colliculus (SC) [1]
We propose that the null remote distractor effect reported in previous work may relate to an exiguous replication sample size
Summary
Prosaccades are rapid eye movements that bring a target of interest onto the fovea. The majority of work involving prosaccades has employed an experimental paradigm wherein a target stimulus is presented in an impoverished (i.e., empty) visual environment. Results from this work have shown that prosaccades are characterized by short latencies and accurate endpoints —a finding attributed to their mediation via dedicated retinotopic motor maps in intermediate layers of the superior colliculus (SC) [1]. It is, important to recognize that the visual environments in which humans interact are rarely comprised of a single stimulus; rather, PLOS ONE | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0122345. Antisaccade Distractor Effects doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0122345.g001 successful prosaccades require disentangling the location of a target from task-irrelevant visual cues. Distractor location elicits a converse effect on prosaccade amplitudes such that proximal distractors bias amplitudes toward the distractor (i.e., the global effect), whereas remote distractors do not influence amplitudes [2, 4,5,6] (for review see [7])
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