Using eye tracking to investigate the evaluation-performance relationship in visual attention

Abstract

Recently, two accounts have attempted to account for the effects of evaluation on performance, the mere effort account (Harkins, 2006; McFall, Jamieson, & Harkins, 2009) and the focus of attention account (Muller & Butera, 2007; Normand, Bouquet, & Croizet, 2014). The focus of attention account suggests that undergoing evaluation causes a reduction in processing capacity, which, in turn, leads individuals to prioritize the most relevant information and disregard less focal information. In support of this notion, Normand, Bouquet, and Croizet (2014) report an experiment in which participants were asked to look at a fixation cross followed by a brief abrupt onset cue that flashed in one of four locations forming a square followed by a display of four letters (three Qs and one O) in the same square. The participants task was to identify the location of the O as quickly and as accurately as possible. The brief onset cue appeared either in the location where the O would appear (valid trials), in a location where the Q would appear (invalid trials), or onsets flashed in all four locations (neutral trials). Normand et al., found that participants subject to evaluation exhibited smaller cueing effects (i.e., the difference between invalid and valid trial reaction times) than their non-evaluated counterparts, which they interpreted as evidence for the cue having less impact on reaction times.