TY - JOUR
T1 - Presaccadic attention improves or impairs performance by enhancing sensitivity to higher spatial frequencies
AU - Li, Hsin Hung
AU - Pan, Jasmine
AU - Carrasco, Marisa
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank members of the Carrasco Lab for helpful discussions. This work was supported by NIH grant R01-EY019693 (to M.C.). H.-H.L. was supported by NIH Grant R90DA043849.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, The Author(s).
PY - 2019/12/1
Y1 - 2019/12/1
N2 - Right before we move our eyes, visual performance and neural responses for the saccade target are enhanced. This effect, presaccadic attention, is considered to prioritize the saccade target and to enhance behavioral performance for the saccade target. Recent evidence has shown that presaccadic attention modulates the processing of feature information. Hitherto, it remains unknown whether presaccadic modulations on feature information are flexible, to improve performance for the task at hand, or automatic, so that they alter the featural representation similarly regardless of the task. Using a masking procedure, here we report that presaccadic attention can either improve or impair performance depending on the spatial frequency content of the visual input. These counterintuitive modulations were significant at a time window right before saccade onset. Furthermore, merely deploying covert attention within the same temporal interval without preparing a saccade did not affect performance. This study reveals that presaccadic attention not only prioritizes the saccade target, but also automatically modifies its featural representation.
AB - Right before we move our eyes, visual performance and neural responses for the saccade target are enhanced. This effect, presaccadic attention, is considered to prioritize the saccade target and to enhance behavioral performance for the saccade target. Recent evidence has shown that presaccadic attention modulates the processing of feature information. Hitherto, it remains unknown whether presaccadic modulations on feature information are flexible, to improve performance for the task at hand, or automatic, so that they alter the featural representation similarly regardless of the task. Using a masking procedure, here we report that presaccadic attention can either improve or impair performance depending on the spatial frequency content of the visual input. These counterintuitive modulations were significant at a time window right before saccade onset. Furthermore, merely deploying covert attention within the same temporal interval without preparing a saccade did not affect performance. This study reveals that presaccadic attention not only prioritizes the saccade target, but also automatically modifies its featural representation.
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U2 - 10.1038/s41598-018-38262-3
DO - 10.1038/s41598-018-38262-3
M3 - Article
C2 - 30804358
AN - SCOPUS:85062096232
SN - 2045-2322
VL - 9
JO - Scientific reports
JF - Scientific reports
IS - 1
M1 - 2659
ER -