How to Create Objects With Your Mind: From Object-Based Attention to Attention-Based Objects
Abstract
When staring at a blank grid, one can readily “see” simple shapes—a peculiar experience that does not occur when viewing an empty background. But just what does this “seeing” entail? Previous work has explored many cues to object-based attention (e.g., involving continuity and closure), but here we asked whether attention can be object based even when there are no cues to objecthood. Observers viewed simple grids and attended to particular squares until they could effectively “see” shapes such as a capital H or I. During this scaffolded attention, two probes appeared, and observers reported whether they were the same or different. Remarkably, this produced a traditional same-object advantage: In several experiments (including high-powered direct replications), performance was enhanced for probes presented on the same (purely imagined) object, compared with equidistant probes presented on different objects. We conclude that attention not only operates over objects but also can effectively create object representations.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Oct 21, 2019
- Source ID
- 10.1177/0956797619863072
Entities
People
- Brian J. Scholl
- Joan Danielle K. Ongchoco
Organizations
- Office of Naval Research
- Yale University