Search of jumping items: visual marking and discrete motion

Perception. 2003;32(4):449-62. doi: 10.1068/p5023.

Abstract

Watson and Humphreys (1997 Psychological Review 104 90-122) showed that when searching for a target, observers can ignore a previewed set of distractors (other items), effectively decreasing the number of relevant items in a difficult search display and thus speeding performance ('visual marking'). Other researchers have more recently investigated visual marking for continuously moving items, finding that shared features, and preserved inter-item spatial relationships, are helpful. Here, we tested whether visual marking occurs for a set of initial items that moves in one discrete jump (preserving shared features and inter-item spatial relationships). Marking did not occur in these displays, and we interpret this result in the context of previous research on visual marking.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Analysis of Variance
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Motion Perception / physiology*
  • Reaction Time
  • Signal Detection, Psychological / physiology
  • Space Perception / physiology
  • Visual Fields / physiology