Salient Items Research Articles

The neural bases of spatial attention and perceptual rhythms.

Attentional processes allow the brain to overcome its processing capacities limitations by enhancing relevant visual information and suppressing irrelevant information. Thus attention plays a critical role, shaping our perception of the world. Several models have been proposed to describe the neuronal bases of attention and its mechanistic underlyings. Recent electrophysiological evidence show that attentional processes rely on oscillatory brain activities that correlate with rhythmic changes in cognitive performance. In the present review, we first take a historical perspective on how attention is viewed, from the initial spotlight theory of attention to the recent dynamic view of attention selection and we review their supporting psychophysical evidence. Based on recent prefrontal electrophysiological evidence, we refine the most recent models of attention sampling by proposing a rhythmic and continuous model of attentional sampling. In particular, we show that attention involves a continuous exploration of space, shifting within and across visual hemifield at specific alpha and theta rhythms, independently of the current attentional load. In addition, we show that this prefrontal attentional spotlight implements conjointly selection and suppression mechanisms, and is captured by salient incoming items. Last, we argue that this attention spotlight implements a highly flexible alternation of attentional exploration and exploitation epochs, depending on ongoing task contingencies. In a last part, we review the local and network oscillatory mechanisms that correlate with rhythmic attentional sampling, describing multiple rhythmic generators and complex network interactions.

Salience determines attentional orienting in visual selection.

Recently the signal-suppression account was proposed, positing that salient stimuli automatically produce a bottom-up salience signal that can be suppressed via top-down control processes. Evidence for this hybrid account came from a capture-probe paradigm that showed that while searching for a specific shape, observers suppressed the location of the irrelevant color singleton. Here we replicate these findings but also show that this occurs only for search arrays with 4 elements. For larger array sizes when both target and distractor singleton are salient, there is no evidence for suppression; instead and consistent with the stimulus-driven account, there is clear evidence that the salient distractor captured attention. The current study shows that the relative salience of items in the display is a crucial factor in attentional control. In displays with a few heterogeneous items, top-down suppression is possible. However, in larger displays in which both target and distractor singletons are salient, no top-down suppression is observed. We conclude that the signal-suppression account cannot resolve the long-standing debate regarding stimulus-driven and goal-driven attentional capture. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Environmental disasters and public-opinion formation: A natural experiment

This study leverages the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident as natural experiment to determine the causal impact environmental disasters may have on the formation of environmental public opinion. Using Eurobarometer data on more than 60,000 individuals’ attitudes toward environmental salience before and after the incident, I find that Fukushima had indeed a causal effect on whether people see the environment as a salient policy item. This impact is more strongly pronounced for what respondents think dominates the political agenda than for personal priorities. These results have important implications for the understanding of how public opinion about the environment is formed, and they have crucial consequences for the suspected link between policymaking and public opinion.

Roles of saliency and set size in ensemble averaging.

Ensemble statistics are often thought of as a reliable impression of numerous items despite limited capacities to consciously represent each individual. However, whether all items equally contribute to ensemble summaries (e.g., mean) and whether they might be affected by known limited-capacity processes, such as focused attention, is still debated. We addressed these questions via a recently described "amplification effect," a systematic bias of perceived mean (e.g., average size) towards the more salient "tail" of a feature distribution (e.g., larger items). In our experiments, observers adjusted the mean orientation of sets of items varying in set size. We made some of the items more salient or less salient by changing their size. While the whole orientation distribution was fixed, the more salient subset could be shifted relative to the set mean or differ in range. We measured the bias away from the set mean and the standard deviation (SD) of errors, as it is known to reflect the physical range from which ensemble information is sampled. We found that bias and SD changes followed the shifts and range changes in salient subsets, providing evidence for amplification. However, these changes were weaker than those expected from sampling only salient items, suggesting that less salient items were also sampled. Importantly, the SD decreased as a function of set size, which is only possible if the number of sampled elements increased with set size. Overall, we conclude that orientation summary statistics are sampled from an entire ensemble and modulated by the amplification effect of attention.

The effects of post-stimulus elaboration, background valence, and item salience on the emotion-induced memory trade-off

ABSTRACT The effect of emotion on memory often leads to the trade-off: enhanced memory for emotional items comes at the cost of memory for background information. Although this effect is usually attributed to overt attention during encoding, Steinmetz and Kensinger (2013) proposed that such an effect might also be related to post-stimulus elaboration. Based on previous different viewpoints, we used the directed forgetting paradigm to further explore the effect of post-stimulus elaboration on the memory trade-off. In the meantime, we also tested the roles of background valence and item salience (high salient items were placed in the centre of backgrounds while low salient items were placed in the periphery of backgrounds) in modulating the memory trade-off. Our results showed that there was a memory trade-off when backgrounds were neutral, whereas this was no longer the case when backgrounds were negative. This indicated the memory trade-off might be affected by background valence. Meanwhile, we found post-stimulus elaboration contributed to selective memory enhancement for backgrounds, while item salience enhanced item memory performance in the memory trade-off. These findings suggest the emotion-induced memory trade-off may be a complex memory effect, which can be influenced by different factors to varying degrees.

Exploring Accessibility of Culturally Relevant Foods in a Low-Income Neighborhood in Baltimore City

Abstract Objectives Culturally relevant foods (CRF) are food items that hold significance for a particular culture or subcultural group. Improving access to healthy CRF may be important for improving diets of minority populations, who are disproportionately affected by poor diet quality, obesity, and chronic disease. However, few studies have carefully identified CRF and evaluated their availability in retail stores. The present study aimed to (1) identify culturally relevant foods for African Americans living in Northeast Baltimore; and (2) examine access to the identified CRF at community food retail stores. Methods Free listing activities were conducted for 20 adult African American participants that live in Northeast Baltimore to identify CRF, frequency of consumption, and typical purchasing location. Smith's S saliency scores were calculated for each item and location using the AnthroTools package. An environmental checklist was used to determine accessibility of the 16 most salient items at the five most salient locations—Giant, DMG Foods (a small community grocery store in Baltimore), Safeway, Aldi, and Family Dollar. Each location was visited four times to account for price fluctuations and item availability. Availability scores were calculated for each location. Results One hundred and forty-five items were mentioned by participants in the free listing activity. Of these, chicken/fried chicken (S = 0.40) and greens/collard greens (S = 0.30) had the highest saliency scores and were mentioned by over 50% of participants. Other highly salient items included shrimp (S = 0.27), steak (S = 0.17), salad (S = 0.14), tomatoes (S = 0.13), and spaghetti (S = 0.13). Giant and Safeway had the highest availability scores (94%), followed by DMG Foods (69%) Aldi (56%), and Family Dollar (13%). Conclusions This study showed that CRF for adult African Americans living in Baltimore are widely available in large food retail stores, but only moderately available in medium sized grocery stores, and sparsely available in dollar stores. Future analyses will examine variability of stores by depth of stock, placement, and price of CRF. Funding Sources Urban Health Institute Small Grants Program.

Understanding attention, memory and social biases in fragile X syndrome: Going below the surface with a multi-method approach

Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is characterised by atypical social behaviours, such as gaze aversion. However, it remains unclear whether, or if so how, these behaviours affect cognitive processing and influence memory. We asked children with FXS (N = 16) and typically developing children (TD; N = 46) to explore naturalistic scenes containing social and non-social salient items unrelated to their task at hand (searching for a simple target object). We also assessed children’s memory for target locations. We complemented behavioural responses with eye-tracking data for the subset of participants who managed to comply with calibration and the demands of the experimental testing session (6 children with FXS and 43 TD children). Children with FXS performed well at the experimental task, and showed similar accuracy and speed in locating targets in natural scenes to children of equivalent verbal abilities. They also learned target locations over blocks, but their memory of target locations was not as precise as that of comparison children. In addition, children with FXS initially directed few first looks to salient social items within the scenes, but these looks increased over blocks. Like TD children, children with FXS also dwelled gaze upon social items while recalling target locations from memory. Individual differences in everyday social characteristics also related to gaze and behavioural measures. In conclusion, experimental approaches can highlight cognitive underpinnings of atypical social behaviour in FXS, pinpointing both similarities and differences to TD individuals.

Avatar Creation in Videogaming: Between Compensation and Constraint.

Objective: We examine the extent that videogame avatars provide players with opportunities for identity exploration, aiming to test the findings of self-discrepancy theory research on the user/avatar relationship with novel cognitive anthropological methods. Specifically, we examine if avatar traits are idealized (more representative of players' ideal rather than actual self) or actualized (more representative of players' actual self) as a function of players' self-esteem. Materials and Methods: Utilizing cognitive anthropological methods, we examine the relationship between actual, avatar, and ideal selves. We first asked 21 respondents to list traits they associated with their various selves. We then asked 57 new respondents to perform four pile sorts of the salient items from these lists (1 unconstrained sort of like-traits, and 3 sorts of terms indicative of respondents' ideal/actual/avatar self). Analysis of this "free list" and "pile sort" data allowed us to clarify (in a manner sensitive to gamer culture) relationships between respondents' various conceptions of self, including how those relationships were modified by self-esteem. Illustrative quotes from the interviews further clarified these relationships. Results: Paired t-test analysis shows that informants as a whole describe their avatar compared with actual selves with fewer negative terms (idealization). Low-esteem players actualize what they deem as positive traits onto their avatars, while simultaneously idealizing avatars' negative traits by minimizing them. Compared with low-esteem gamers, high-esteem players associate significantly more positive attributes with all their various selves-actual, avatar, and ideal-while describing avatar compared with actual selves with fewer positive terms and comparable numbers of negative terms (the latter a process of actualization). Conclusion: Results point to the necessity of theoretical accounts that recognize that avatars may reflect a complex relationship with the user's actual and ideal self, without assuming that avatar play frees gamers from offline social, psychological, or bodily constraints.

Existence inductive theory building to study coordination failures in sustainable beef production

Case studies are particularly relevant in cleaner production research, as industry-specific product innovations, management practices, and supply--chain arrangements may improve environmental outcomes. Nevertheless, there are theoretical concerns regarding the generalization, external validity and temporal validity of case studies. Methodologically, this study provides an explicit procedure to expand grounded inductive research to incorporate insights from outside the literature (e.g. interviews conducted during fieldwork) through an existence approach. This approach focuses on the most salient items in a set of qualitative interviews. This qualitative evidence then informs precise modelling.The approach is applied to a case study on the Brazilian beef industry. Brazil is the second largest beef exporter in the world, and multinational companies experience difficulties regarding their commitment to zero deforestation in their supply chains. The insights from interviews are related to difficulties experienced by companies in the beef supply chain regarding their commitment to zero deforestation and are distilled into statements on supply-chain coordination failures and consumers’ unwillingness to pay for “greener” beef. The final model links the concept of Shapley value to environmentally-related investments and returns within supply chains. Finally, we analyze how supply chains can overcome coordination failures and improve sustainability and financial performance, thereby generating cleaner production through industry associations, non-governmental organizations, or large companies’ initiatives.

Understanding client and provider perspectives of antenatal care service quality: a qualitative multi-method study from Tanzania.

BackgroundMeasures of quality of care in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) rarely include experience of care. This gap in service quality metrics may be driven by a lack of understanding of client and provider perspectives. Understanding these perspectives is a critical first step in not only improving metrics, but also in improving service delivery. This study identifies the items antenatal care (ANC) clients and health care providers in Tanzania associate with a quality ANC service and explores the experience of care domain from both client and provider perspectives.MethodsWe conducted semi-structured interviews with15 providers and 35 clients in Tanzania that included a free-listing activity to elicit items clients and providers associate with quality ANC services. We analyzed the free-listing for rank order and frequency to identify the most salient items, which were included in the second phase of data collection. We then conducted semi-structured interviews with a pile sort activity with the same 15 providers and 32 new clients to understand the importance of the items identified in the free-listing. We used a thematic analysis driven by the framework approach to analyze interview data.ResultsBoth clients and providers perceived quality of ANC as being comprised of items related to experience of care, provision of care, and cross-cutting essential physical and human resources. The free-listing findings illuminated that the experience of care was equally important to clients and providers as the availability of physical and human resources and the content of the care delivered. In addition, clients and providers perceived that a positive patient care experience – marked by good communication, active listening, keeping confidentiality, and being spoken to politely – increased utilization of health services and improved health outcomes.ConclusionsThe experience of care in LMICs is an overlooked, yet critically important topic. Understanding the experience of care from those who receive and deliver services is key to measuring and improving the quality of ANC. Our research highlights the importance of incorporating experience of care into future quality improvement activities and quality measures. By doing so, we identify barriers and facilitating factors of practical use to policy-makers and governments in LMICs.

Top-down modulation of gaze capture: Feature similarity, optimal tuning, or tuning to relative features?

It is well-known that we can tune attention to specific features (e.g., colors). Originally, it was believed that attention would always be tuned to the exact feature value of the sought-after target (e.g., orange). However, subsequent studies showed that selection is often geared towards target-dissimilar items, which was variably attributed to (1) tuning attention to the relative target feature that distinguishes the target from other items in the surround (e.g., reddest item; relational tuning), (2) tuning attention to a shifted target feature that allows more optimal target selection (e.g., reddish orange; optimal tuning), or (3) broad attentional tuning and selection of the most salient item that is still similar to the target (combined similarity/saliency). The present study used a color search task and assessed gaze capture by differently coloured distractors to distinguish between the three accounts. The results of the first experiment showed that a very target-dissimilar distractor that matched the relative color of the target but was outside of the area of optimal tuning still captured very strongly. As shown by a control condition and a control experiment, bottom-up saliency modulated capture only weakly, ruling out a combined similarity-saliency account. With this, the results support the relational account that attention is tuned to the relative target feature (e.g., reddest), not an optimal feature value or the target feature.

Search and concealment strategies in the spatiotemporal domain.

Although visual search studies have primarily focused on search behavior, concealment behavior is also important in the real world. However, previous studies in this regard are limited in that their findings about search and concealment strategies are restricted to the spatial (two-dimensional) domain. Thus, this study evaluated strategies during three-dimensional and temporal (i.e., spatiotemporal) search and concealment to determine whether participants would indicate where they would hide or find a target in a temporal sequence of items. The items were stacked in an upward (Experiments 1-3) or downward (Experiment 4) direction and three factors were manipulated: scenario (hide vs. seek), partner type (friend vs. foe), and oddball (unique item in the sequence; present vs. absent). Participants in both the hide and seek scenarios frequently selected the oddball for friends but not foes, which suggests that they applied common strategies because the oddball automatically attracts attention and can be readily discovered by friends. Additionally, a principle unique to the spatiotemporal domain was revealed, i.e., when the oddball was absent, participants in both scenarios frequently selected the topmost item of the stacked layer for friends, regardless of temporal order, whereas they selected the first item in the sequence for foes, regardless of the stacked direction. These principles were not affected by visual masking or number of items in the sequence. Taken together, these results suggest that finding and hiding positions in the spatiotemporal domain rely on the presence of salient items and physical accessibility or temporal remoteness, according to partner type.

Applying Q methodology to teacher evaluation research

This article examines Q methodology as an empirical approach for use in teacher evaluation research, specifically research examining evaluative measures as applied to teachers of students with disabilities. Q is a qualiquantalogical method that requires participants to order or scale items relative to each other in characterizing a person or behavior. Participant viewpoints are intercorrelated and factor analyzed to determine common viewpoints regarding the salience of items representing a particular domain. This article provides an overview of Q methodology and includes a description of a study that used Q to determine common viewpoints of the salient features of special education teachers’ instructional practices. Implications for using Q in teacher evaluation research broadly and special education teacher evaluation specifically are discussed.

Failed Suppression of Salient Stimuli Precedes Behavioral Errors.

Our visual system is constantly confronted with more information than it can process. To deal with the limited capacity, attention allows us to enhance relevant information and suppress irrelevant information. Particularly, the suppression of salient irrelevant stimuli has shown to be important as it prevents attention to be captured and thus attentional resources to be wasted. This study aimed at directly connecting failures to suppress distraction with a neural marker of suppression, the distractor positivity (Pd). We measured participants' EEG signal while they performed a visual search task in which they had to report a digit inside a shape target while ignoring distractors, one of which could be a salient color singleton. Reports of target digits served as a behavioral index of enhancement, and reports of color distractor digits served as a behavioral index of failed suppression, each measured against reports of neutral distractor digits serving as a baseline. Participants reported the target identity more often than any distractor identity. The singleton identity was reported least often, suggesting suppression of the singleton below baseline. Suppression of salient stimuli was absent in the beginning and then increased throughout the experiment. When the singleton identity was reported, the Pd was observed in a later time window, suggesting that behavioral errors were preceded by failed suppression. Our results provide evidence for the signal suppression hypothesis that states salient items have to be actively suppressed to avoid attentional capture. Our results also provide direct evidence that the Pd is reflecting such active suppression.

Assessing introspective awareness of attention capture.

Visual attention can sometimes be involuntarily captured by salient stimuli, and this may lead to impaired performance in a variety of real-world tasks. If observers were aware that their attention was being captured, they might be able to exert control and avoid subsequent distraction. However, it is unknown whether observers can detect attention capture when it occurs. In the current study, participants searched for a target shape and attempted to ignore a salient color distractor. On a subset of trials, participants then immediately classified whether the salient distractor captured their attention ("capture" vs. "no capture"). Participants were slower and less accurate at detecting the target on trials on which they reported "capture" than "no capture." Follow-up experiments revealed that participants specifically detected covert shifts of attention to the salient item. Altogether, these results indicate that observers can have immediate awareness of visual distraction, at least under certain circumstances.

Hemispheric Asymmetry of Globus Pallidus Relates to Alpha Modulation in Reward-Related Attentional Tasks.

Whereas subcortical structures such as the basal ganglia have been widely explored in relation to motor control, recent evidence suggests that their mechanisms extend to the domain of attentional switching. We here investigated the subcortical involvement in reward related top-down control of visual alpha-band oscillations (8-13 Hz), which have been consistently linked to mechanisms supporting the allocation of visuospatial attention. Given that items associated with contextual saliency (e.g., monetary reward or loss) attract attention, it is not surprising that the acquired salience of visual items further modulates. The executive networks controlling such reward-dependent modulations of oscillatory brain activity have yet to be fully elucidated. Although such networks have been explored in terms of corticocortical interactions, subcortical regions are likely to be involved. To uncover this, we combined MRI and MEG data from 17 male and 11 female participants, investigating whether derived measures of subcortical structural asymmetries predict interhemispheric modulation of alpha power during a spatial attention task. We show that volumetric hemispheric lateralization of globus pallidus (GP) and thalamus (Th) explains individual hemispheric biases in the ability to modulate posterior alpha power. Importantly, for the GP, this effect became stronger when the value saliency parings in the task increased. Our findings suggest that the GP and Th in humans are part of a subcortical executive control network, differentially involved in modulating posterior alpha activity in the presence of saliency. Further investigation aimed at uncovering the interaction between subcortical and neocortical attentional networks would provide useful insight in future studies.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Whereas the involvement of subcortical regions into higher level cognitive processing, such as attention and reward attribution, has been already indicated in previous studies, little is known about its relationship with the functional oscillatory underpinnings of said processes. In particular, interhemispheric modulation of alpha band (8-13 Hz) oscillations, as recorded with magnetoencephalography, has been previously shown to vary as a function of salience (i.e., monetary reward/loss) in a spatial attention task. We here provide novel insights into the link between subcortical and cortical control of visual attention. Using the same reward-related spatial attention paradigm, we show that the volumetric lateralization of subcortical structures (specifically globus pallidus and thalamus) explains individual biases in the modulation of visual alpha activity.

Target templates in singleton search vs. feature-based search modes

ABSTRACTIt is well-known that visual attention can be tuned in a top-down controlled manner to various attributes. Amongst other search strategies, previous research has identified a feature search mode in which attention is tuned to the target feature (e.g., colour) vs. a singleton search mode, where all salient items can attract attention. A short review of the literature reveals that singleton search mode is not regularly applied in single-target search, but could play a role in two-target search. Here we critically tested whether results suggesting singleton search could alternatively be due to top-down tuning to different attributes of the targets (e.g., luminance). The results of the first experiment show a mixture of attentional tuning to the target colours (red, green), as well as luminance (darker), and residual singleton capture. A second experiment shows that such mixed results can be obtained in the standard paradigm, with only small changes to the stimuli. These results cannot be coherently described within a single mental representation, and are therefore difficult to reconcile with the notion of a target template. Non-representational theories such as feature map theories seem better equipped to explain mixed search results, which could be a decisive weakness of representational theories.

Both exhaustive processing and limited-sample amplification contribute to ensemble averaging

It has been shown that multiple objects can be efficiently represented as ensemble summary statistics, such as the average. Recently, Kanaya et al. (2018) demonstrated the amplification effect in the perception of average. Their participants judged the mean size or temporal frequency of ensembles, and they tended to exaggerate their estimates, especially larger set sizes. Kanaya et al. explained it by non-exhaustive sampling mechanism favoring ~sqrt(N) most salient items, which are either largest or most frequently ones. But how do the rest of elements contribute to ensemble perception? In our study, we used orientation averaging (which does not have any inevitably salient values) and manipulated the salience of individual items via size. Participants had to adjust the average orientation of 4, 8, or 16 triangles. We measured systematic biases, like Kanaya et al. (2018), and SD of errors that are known to correlate with the physical ensemble range. In Experiment 1, most clockwise elements could be bigger, counterclockwise, middle, or all elements were same-size. We found strong clockwise and counterclockwise biases in the corresponding conditions. The biases increased with set size replicating Kanaya et al. (2018). But we found no SD difference between the conditions suggesting that all items were somehow taken into account. In Experiment 2, we compared distributions with same ranges (full-sets) but salient elements being middle or extreme (most clockwise and counterclockwise). We used distribution with only middle elements or only extremes as controls (half-sets). We found that SD in the full-sets were greater than in the middle half-sets and smaller than in the extreme half-sets suggesting that all items were taken into account. We also found that SD in the extreme full-sets were greater than in the middle full-sets in large set size. We conclude that both exhaustive and amplification types of sampling work in averaging.

Visual search asymmetry depends on target-distractor feature similarity: Is the asymmetry simply a result of distractor rejection speed?

Previous studies have shown that in visual search, varying the target and distractor familiarity produces a search asymmetry: Detecting a novel target among familiar distractors is more efficient than detecting a familiar target among novel distractors. One explanation is that novel targets have enhanced salience and are detected preattentively. Conversely, familiar distractors may be easier to reject. The current study postulates that target-distractor feature similarity, in addition to target or distractor familiarity, is a key determinant of visual search efficiency. The results of two experiments reveal that visual search is more efficient when distractors are familiar regardless of target familiarity, but only when the target-distractor similarity is high. When similarity is low, the visual search asymmetry disappears and the search times become highly efficient, with search slopes not different from zero regardless of target or distractor familiarity. However, although distractor familiarity plays an important role in inducing the search asymmetry, comparisons of search efficiency in target-present and target-absent trials reveal that search asymmetries cannot be explained solely by the faster speed of rejecting familiar distractors, as proposed by previous studies. Rather, distractor familiarity influences processes outside of stimulus selection, such as search monitoring and termination decisions. Competition among bottom-up item salience effects and top-down shape recognition processes is proposed to account for these findings.

Female Brass Musicians Address Gender Parity, Gender Equity, and Sexual Harassment: A Preliminary Report on Data from the Brass Bodies Study

The Brass Bodies Study is an exploratory cross-sectional study designed to describe and understand the experience of female brass players. This report discusses selected data from close-ended and open-ended responses to questions regarding gender equity, parity, and sexual harassment within a web-based survey that launched the first phase of the study. The survey queried subjects’ physical changes to their brass playing due to various catalysts: life-cycle events; injury, illness, harassment, mental health, racism, and homophobia. The survey instrument further queried whether subjects received support about these changes and the effectiveness of support. The following report discusses survey responses to questions about gender parity and changes to brass playing due to sexual harassment. Additional qualitative data were generated from open-ended questions in the survey and were qualitatively coded and thematically presented to supplement the descriptive statistics provided. The information presented explores and defines salient items and themes of a population that is under researched with the hopes of generating hypotheses for continued research.