The visible gorilla: Unexpected fast—not physically salient—Objects are noticeable

Pascal Wallisch; Wayne E. Mackey; Michael W. Karlovich; David J. Heeger

doi:10.1073/pnas.2214930120

The visible gorilla: Unexpected fast—not physically salient—Objects are noticeable

Pascal Wallisch, Wayne E. Mackey, Michael W. Karlovich, David J. Heeger

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

It is widely believed that observers can fail to notice clearly visible unattended objects, even if they are moving. Here, we created parametric tasks to test this belief and report the results of three high-powered experiments (total n = 4,493) indicating that this effect is strongly modulated by the speed of the unattended object. Specifically, fast—but not slow—objects are readily noticeable, whether they are attended or not. These results suggest that fast motion serves as a potent exogenous cue that overrides task-focused attention, showing that fast speeds, not long exposure duration or physical salience, strongly diminish inattentional blindness effects.

Original language	English (US)
Article number	e2214930120
Journal	Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Volume	120
Issue number	22
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2214930120
State	Published - May 30 2023

Keywords

endogenous attention
exogenous attention
inattentional blindness
selective attention
visual motion

ASJC Scopus subject areas

General

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10.1073/pnas.2214930120

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title = "The visible gorilla: Unexpected fast—not physically salient—Objects are noticeable",

abstract = "It is widely believed that observers can fail to notice clearly visible unattended objects, even if they are moving. Here, we created parametric tasks to test this belief and report the results of three high-powered experiments (total n = 4,493) indicating that this effect is strongly modulated by the speed of the unattended object. Specifically, fast—but not slow—objects are readily noticeable, whether they are attended or not. These results suggest that fast motion serves as a potent exogenous cue that overrides task-focused attention, showing that fast speeds, not long exposure duration or physical salience, strongly diminish inattentional blindness effects.",

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AU - Mackey, Wayne E.

AU - Karlovich, Michael W.

AU - Heeger, David J.

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The visible gorilla: Unexpected fast—not physically salient—Objects are noticeable

Abstract

Keywords

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