Search

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. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The human visual system can actively prioritize task-relevant features to search for a target. Recent studies have reported cases in which the system may suppress irrelevant features by using a template for rejection. However, in those studies, the templates used for rejection were limited to the color domain, and they have yielded mixed results. Our literature review identified three differences among studies that may be responsible for such mixed results: differences in the spatial segmentation of items (i.e., segregated or intermixed across the display), differences in how features are defined and reported (i.e., combined or separate), and differences in cue lead times (short or long). Participants searched for a target-line segment in a shape and identified its orientation from among non-target line-shaped compound shapes that were preceded by one of three cue displays. Positive cues indicated that the target segment would appear in a shape, and negative cues that it would not appear in a shape. Neutral cues indicated that a particular shape would not appear in the current search display. The results demonstrated that reaction times were faster under the negative-cue condition than the neutral-cue condition, reflecting the effect of a shape-based template for rejection (Experiment 1). Experiment 2 replicated the absence of the effect in the shape domain. Experiment 3 indicated that the template-for-rejection effect occurred only when the cue lead time was relatively long, suggesting that time is required (approximately 2,400 ms or longer) for the visual system to form rejection templates. Experiment 4 excluded the possibility that a confound in the target-defining/reporting feature was involved. These results indicated that apparent inconsistencies in research on the template-for-rejection effect can be explained in terms of the time required for templates to be configured. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing research has revealed that uninformative spatial sounds facilitate the early processing of visual stimuli. This study examined the crossmodal interactions of semantically congruent stimuli by assessing whether the presentation of event-related characteristic sounds facilitated or interfered with the visual search for corresponding event scenes in pictures. The search array consisted of four images: one target and three non-target pictures. Auditory stimuli were presented to participants in synchronization with picture onset using three types of sounds: a sound congruent with a target, a sound congruent with a distractor, or a control sound. The control sound varied across six experiments, alternating between a sound unrelated to the search stimuli, white noise, and no sound. Participants were required to swiftly localize a target position while ignoring the sound presentation. Visual localization resulted in rapid responses when a sound that was semantically related to the target was played. Furthermore, when a sound was semantically related to a distractor picture, the response times were longer. When the distractor-congruent sound was used, participants incorrectly localized the distractor position more often than at the chance level. These findings were replicated when the experiments ruled out the possibility that participants would learn picture-sound pairs during the visual tasks (i.e., the possibility of brief training during the experiments). Overall, event-related crossmodal interactions occur based on semantic representations, and audiovisual associations may develop as a result of long-term experiences rather than brief training in a laboratory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]