Modelling the formation of attentional episodes: It’s about

time

Brad Wyble

Molly Potter

andHoward Bowman

Mark Nieuwenstein

Jenn Olejarczyk

25/08/08Utrecht

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Bridge

3

Dogs

?

Attentional Blink

Time(ms)

T2

|T1

300 6000

T1

T2

100 msec

56

A9

B4

..DTTD..

Spreading of Sparing

Olivers, Van Der Stighchel & Hulleman (2007)Kawahara, Kumada, & DiLollo (2007)

…D T1 T2 D D… 90 ms

…D T1 T2 T3 D…

% A

ccu

racy

100

70

40

…D T1 D T2 D…

Sparing

Sparing and Blinking:A temporal attention strategy

DT

TT

T

DT

One Window

Two Windows

D

DD

TD

Working MemoryEncoding

Targets*

Competitive RegulationOf Temporal Attention

Attention

Competitive Attention In RSVP:

D D T1 D D D

Sparing Blink

AttentionT1 Encoding

Spreading the Sparing

D D T1 T2 D D DD D T1 T2 T3 D DD D T1 D D D D

A Target Gap Produces a blink

D D T1 D T2 D

Sparing

T1

Blink

Simultaneous-TypeSerial -Token

Episod

icTokens

Binding Pool

1 2 3 4

Encoding

Types

T1 Tn

Input

T2 D

…

…

Task Demand Input

*

BlasterTransientAttention

Working MemoryEncoding

Targets

Attention

Lag-3Blink!

T1

T1 T2

Lag-5No Blink

Two targets

TypeAttention

T2Working Memory

T1

500 ms

T1 T2

Simulating the blink

Data from: Chun & Potter (1995)

Lag Lag

T1T2|T1

Acc

ura

cy

Acc

ura

cy

Spreading of Sparing

Data from Olivers, Van Der Stigchel, & Hulleman (2007)

Same ParametersSame Parameters

Prediction:

~200 ms temporal Interval between targets initiate an Attentional Blink

One RSVP Experiment 4 conditions

all mixed together

...D T D T D T D T D...

...D T T T T D D D D...

...DDTDTDTDTDD...

...DDTTTTDDDDD...

107 ms SOA

53 ms SOA

56NBKD3425943

Letters

56NBKD3425943

Letters

Slow Trials: Predictions and Data

two-tailed t, p < .001

400ms

700ms

62%52%

Std Err

Acc

ura

cy

Fast Trials

Std Err

Time course of attention unaltered by distractors

DTDTDTDTD

400ms (50ms SOA)

D T T T T D

400ms (100 ms SOA)

Std Err

Why care about episodes?

Sparing:More Items

Blinking:Episodic

Distinctiveness

Measure temporal order as an index of episodic information

Temporal Order for Targets 200ms apart

TDTDTDT

TTTTDDD200ms

91%

79%p < .015std err ~4%

Blinked

Spared CorrectlyOrdered

100%

86%

T1T2T3

Encoding Temporal order Sparing/Blinking

T1 T2D

Blinking

Sparing

CONCLUSION

eSTST ModelThe Attentional Blink provides Episodic

Distinctiveness: Sparing at a Cost

Wyble, Bowman,Nieuwenstein (In Press) JEP: HPP

http://www.bradwyble.com/research/models/eSTST/

Attention structures perception into episodes

This strategy manifests as sparing and blinking

Temporal intervals between target onsets, not distractors, trigger the end of an episode