Previous research has shown that state anxiety facilitates stimulus-driven attentional capture and impairs goal-directed attentional control by increasing sensitivity to salient distractors or threat cues or narrowing spatial attention. However, recent findings in this area have been mixed, and less is known about how state-dependent anxiety may affect attentional performance. Here, we employed a novel dual-target search paradigm to investigate this relationship. This paradigm allowed us to investigate attentional control and how focus narrows under different anxiety states. Participants watched a short movie-either anxiety-inducing or neutral-before engaging in the dual-target visual search task. We found that they performed faster and more accurately in trials without the salient distractor compared to those with distractors, and they performed better in tasks presented on the center than the periphery. However, despite a significant increase in self-reported anxiety in the anxiety-inducing session, participants\' performance in terms of speed and accuracy remain comparable across both anxious and neutral sessions. This resilience is likely due to compensatory mechanisms that offset anxiety, a result of the high demands and working memory load inherent in the dual-target task.

Studies suggest that visual short-term memory (VSTM) is a continuous resource that can be flexibly allocated using probabilistic cues that indicate test likelihood (i.e., goal-directed attentional priority to those items). Previous studies using simultaneous cues have not examined this flexible allocation beyond two distinct levels of priority. Moreover, previous studies have not examined whether there are individual differences in the ability to flexibly allocate VSTM resources, as well as whether this ability benefits from practice. The current study used a continuous report procedure to examine whether participants can use up to three levels of attentional priority to allocate VSTM resources via simultaneous probabilistic spatial cues. Three experiments were performed with differing priority levels, cues, and cue presentation times. Group level analysis demonstrated flexible allocation of VSTM resources; however, there was limited evidence that participants could use three goal-directed priority levels. A temporal analysis suggested that task fatigue, rather than practice effects, may interact with item priority. A Bayesian individual-differences analysis revealed that a minority of participants were using three levels of attentional priority, demonstrating that, while possible, it is not the predominant pattern of behaviour. Thus, we provided evidence that flexible allocation to three attention levels is possible under simultaneous cuing conditions for a minority of participants. Flexible allocation to three categories may be interpreted as a skill of high-performing participants akin to high memory capacity.

The attentional priority of a stimulus is influenced by both its relationship to task goals and reward history. While experiments probing goal-directed visual search typically dictate which stimuli should receive attentional priority by virtue of highly constrained task demands, individuals in real-world scenarios choose what to search for. In such complex and dynamic environments, it is unclear how reward history might influence the strategic control of attention. In the present study, participants completed a modified version of the Adaptive Choice Visual Search (ACVS) task integrated with the value-driven attentional capture design. In a training phase, participants learned to associate one of two possible target colors with monetary reward. In a subsequent test phase, they completed the ACVS task in which a target in both a previously rewarded and unrewarded color was present on each trial and participants could choose how to search. Our results reveal that participants were biased to voluntarily search through the previously reward-associated color regardless of whether the distribution of stimuli made it optimal to do so, which came at a cost in performance when searching through the previously rewarded color was a suboptimal strategy. In the absence of prior reward training, in contrast, search strategy was inconsistent with respect to color. Our findings provide evidence that reward history biases voluntary search processes.

People deploy top-down, goal-directed attention to accomplish tasks, such as finding lost keys. By tuning the visual system to relevant information sources, object recognition can become more efficient (a benefit) and more biased toward the target (a potential cost). Motivated by selective attention in categorisation models, we developed a goal-directed attention mechanism that can process naturalistic (photographic) stimuli. Our attention mechanism can be incorporated into any existing deep convolutional neural networks (DCNNs). The processing stages in DCNNs have been related to ventral visual stream. In that light, our attentional mechanism incorporates top-down influences from prefrontal cortex (PFC) to support goal-directed behaviour. Akin to how attention weights in categorisation models warp representational spaces, we introduce a layer of attention weights to the mid-level of a DCNN that amplify or attenuate activity to further a goal. We evaluated the attentional mechanism using photographic stimuli, varying the attentional target. We found that increasing goal-directed attention has benefits (increasing hit rates) and costs (increasing false alarm rates). At a moderate level, attention improves sensitivity (i.e. increases d \' ) at only a moderate increase in bias for tasks involving standard images, blended images and natural adversarial images chosen to fool DCNNs. These results suggest that goal-directed attention can reconfigure general-purpose DCNNs to better suit the current task goal, much like PFC modulates activity along the ventral stream. In addition to being more parsimonious and brain consistent, the mid-level attention approach performed better than a standard machine learning approach for transfer learning, namely retraining the final network layer to accommodate the new task.

Reading acquisition is extremely difficult for about 5% of children because they are affected by a heritable neurobiological disorder called developmental dyslexia (DD). Intervention studies can be used to investigate the causal role of neurocognitive deficits in DD. Recently, it has been proposed that action video games (AVGs)-enhancing attentional control-could improve perception and working memory as well as reading skills. In a partial crossover intervention study, we investigated the effect of AVG and non-AVG training on attentional control using a conjunction visual search task in children with DD. We also measured the non-alphanumeric rapid automatized naming (RAN), phonological decoding and word reading before and after AVG and non-AVG training. After both video game training sessions no effect was found in non-alphanumeric RAN and in word reading performance. However, after only 12 h of AVG training the attentional control was improved (i.e., the set-size slopes were flatter in visual search) and phonological decoding speed was accelerated. Crucially, attentional control and phonological decoding speed were increased only in DD children whose video game score was highly efficient after the AVG training. We demonstrated that only an efficient AVG training induces a plasticity of the fronto-parietal attentional control linked to a selective phonological decoding improvement in children with DD.

Why do we sometimes easily retrieve memories, but other times appear to forget them? We often look to our external environment for retrieval cues, but another way to optimize memory retrieval is to be in a mental state, or mode, that prioritizes access to our internal representation of the world. Such a \'retrieval mode\' was proposed by Endel Tulving (1983), who considered it a neurocognitive state in which one keeps the goal of memory retrieval in mind. Building on Tulving\'s proposal, we review converging evidence from multiple lines of research that emphasize the importance of internal states in the instantiation of retrieval modes that optimize successful remembering. We identify three key factors that contribute to a retrieval mode by modulating either the likelihood or the content of retrieval: (1) an intention to remember or forget (either in the present or the future), (2) attentional selection of goal-relevant memories and suppression of distractors, and (3) fluctuating levels of acetylcholine in the hippocampus. We discuss empirical evidence that these internal states individually influence memory retrieval and propose how they may interact synergistically. Characterizing these dynamic internal factors is an important key for unlocking our understanding of the organization and accessibility of our memories.

In visual marketing, the truism that \"unseen is unsold\" means that products that are not noticed will not be sold. This truism rests on the idea that the consumer choice process is heavily influenced by visual search. However, given that the majority of available products are not seen by consumers, this article examines the role of peripheral vision in guiding attention during the consumer choice process. In two eye-tracking studies, one conducted in a lab facility and the other conducted in a supermarket, the authors investigate the role and limitations of peripheral vision. The results show that peripheral vision is used to direct visual attention when discriminating between target and non-target objects in an eye-tracking laboratory. Target and non-target similarity, as well as visual saliency of non-targets, constitute the boundary conditions for this effect, which generalizes from instruction-based laboratory tasks to preference-based choice tasks in a real supermarket setting. Thus, peripheral vision helps customers to devote a larger share of attention to relevant products during the consumer choice process. Taken together, the results show how the creation of consideration set (sets of possible choice options) relies on both goal-directed attention and peripheral vision. These results could explain how visually similar packaging positively influences market leaders, while making novel brands almost invisible on supermarket shelves. The findings show that even though unsold products might be unseen, in the sense that they have not been directly observed, they might still have been evaluated and excluded by means of peripheral vision. This article is based on controlled lab experiments as well as a field study conducted in a complex retail environment. Thus, the findings are valid both under controlled and ecologically valid conditions.

When performing any task for an extended period of time, attention fluctuates between good and bad states. These fluctuations affect performance in the moment, but may also have lasting consequences for what gets encoded into memory. Experiment 1 establishes this relationship between attentional states and memory, by showing that subsequent memory for an item was predicted by a response time index of sustained attention (average response time during the three trials prior to stimulus onset). Experiment 2 strengthens the causal interpretation of this predictive relationship by treating the sustained attention index as an independent variable to trigger the appearance of an encoding trial. Subsequent memory was better when items were triggered from good versus bad attentional states. Together, these findings suggest that sustained attention can have downstream consequences for what we remember, and they highlight the inferential utility of adaptive experimental designs. By continuously monitoring attention, we can influence what will later be remembered.

BACKGROUND: In this study, we investigated the distraction power of the unusual and usual images on the attention of 20 healthy primary school children.
METHODS: Our study was different from previous ones in that the participants were asked to fix the initial position of their attention on a predefined location after being presented with unusual images as distractors. The goals were presented in locations, which were far from the attraction basin of distractors. We expected that the pre-orienting of the attention to the position of targets would reduce the attractive effect of unusual images compared to the usual ones. The percentage of correct responses and the reaction time were measured as behavioral indicators of attention performance.
RESULTS: Results showed that using the goal-directed attention, subjects ignored both kinds of distractors nearly the same way.
CONCLUSIONS: With regard to previous reports about more attraction towards the unusual images, it is suggested that the dynamics of the visual attention system be sensitive to the initial condition. That is, changing the initial position of the attention can lead to the decrement of the unusual images effects. However, several other possibilities such as a probable delay in processing unusual features could explain this observation, too.

Mechanisms of attention assign priority to sensory inputs on the basis of current task goals. Previous studies have shown that lateralized neural oscillations within the alpha (8-14Hz) range are associated with the voluntary allocation of attention to the contralateral visual field. It is currently unknown, however, whether similar oscillatory signatures instantiate the involuntary capture of spatial attention by goal-relevant stimulus properties. Here we investigated the roles of theta (4-8Hz), alpha, and beta (14-30Hz) oscillations in human goal-directed visual attention. Across two experiments, we had participants respond to a brief target of a particular color among heterogeneously colored distractors. Prior to target onset, we cued one location with a lateralized, non-predictive cue that was either target- or non-target-colored. During the behavioral task, we recorded brain activity using electroencephalography (EEG), with the aim of analyzing cue-elicited oscillatory activity. We found that theta oscillations lateralized in response to all cues, and this lateralization was stronger if the cue matched the target color. Alpha oscillations lateralized relatively later, and only in response to target-colored cues, consistent with the capture of spatial attention. Our findings suggest that stimulus induced changes in theta and alpha amplitude reflect task-based modulation of signals by feature-based and spatial attention, respectively.