Abstract
Searching for an object in a complex scene is influenced by high-level factors such as how much the item would be expected in that setting (semantic consistency). There is also evidence that a person gazing at an object directs our attention towards it. However, there has been little previous research that has helped to understand how we integrate top-down cues such as semantic consistency and gaze to direct attention when searching for an object. Also, there are separate lines of evidence to suggest that older adults may be more influenced by semantic factors and less by gaze cues compared to younger counterparts, but this has not been investigated before in an integrated task. In the current study we analysed eye-movements of 34 younger and 30 older adults as they searched for a target object in complex visual scenes. Younger adults were influenced by semantic consistency in their attention to objects, but were more influenced by gaze cues. In contrast, older adults were more guided by semantic consistency in directing their attention, and showed less influence from gaze cues. These age differences in use of high-level cues were apparent early in processing (time to first fixation and probability of immediate fixation) but not in later processing (total time looking at objects and time to make a response). Overall, this pattern of findings indicates that people are influenced by both social cues and prior expectations when processing a complex scene, and the relative importance of these factors depends on age.
Highlights
In the visual environment, we are constantly changing the locus of our visual attention in order to focus on some locations or objects, while ignoring others
We focused on measures that are commonly reported in studies on scene viewing and visual search: (a) the time to first fixate the target; (b) the probability of having fixated the target at each fixation ordinal number; (c) the total fixation time at the target; and (d) the answer response time
The time elapsed between the onset of the search scene and the first fixation at the target object is a measure that reflects the capacity of the object to attract early visual attention
Summary
We are constantly changing the locus of our visual attention in order to focus on some locations or objects, while ignoring others. Studies have focused mainly on the effects of either image features (saliency; e.g., Foulsham & Underwood, 2008; Itti & Koch, 2000) or the meaning and structure of images (context; e.g., De Graef, Christiaens, & d’Ydewalle, 1990; Henderson, Weeks, & Hollingworth, 1999; Loftus & Mackworth, 1978), with substantial research investigating the relative contribution of these factors For example, can override the effects of low-level capture of attention (Foulsham & Underwood, 2007; Henderson, Brockmole, Castelhano, & Mack, 2007) and eye guidance can be driven by a process of locating “object entities” in scenes (object-driven models; Stoll, Thrun, Nuthmann, & Einhäuser, 2015), and, when searching for an object, preferentially looking at regions of the scene where the object is expected to be (Torralba, Oliva, Castelhano, & Henderson, 2006)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
