What to expect when you are not expecting it: How implicit regularities drive attentional selection

Información del proyecto

LEARNATTEND

Identificador del acuerdo de subvención: 833029

DOI

10.3030/833029

Proyecto cerrado

Fecha de la firma de la CE 21 Octubre 2019

Fecha de inicio 1 Enero 2020

Fecha de finalización 31 Marzo 2026

Financiado con arreglo a

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Coste total

€ 2 499 875,00

Aportación de la UE

€ 2 499 875,00

Coordinado por

STICHTING VU
Netherlands

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - LEARNATTEND (What to expect when you are not expecting it: How implicit regularities drive attentional selection)

Período documentado: 2023-01-01 hasta 2024-06-30

Resumen del contexto y de los objetivos generales del proyecto

Have you ever wondered why we are able to negotiate busy traffic intersections or why we are able to find rather quickly the products we need in a busy supermarket? Our visual system is usually overloaded with massive amounts of information, and still we are able to pick up the right information at the right moment in time. Indeed, we should not and cannot pay attention to all events. Instead, we need to direct attention to those events that have proven to be important in the past and suppress those that were distracting and irrelevant. Experiences moulded through a learning process enable us to extract and adapt to the statistical regularities in the world. This process is often referred to as statistical learning. The current project investigates these learning processes determining on how, when and what information is extracted by the visual system. Through brain imaging we seek to understand how learning taking place in brain and this affects attentional representations within putative priority maps across the visual hierarchy. This type of learning is largely unconscious, unintentional, and implicit; it runs "in the background", both seeking and giving structure to the world around us; making it coherent, predictable and quickly manageable. Even though a lot is known about how statistical learning affects language acquisition, object recognition, motor learning, and decision making, the current project is among the first to focus on its role in attention and selection. Visual perception must be selective, as we are confronted with the massive amount of available sensory input. Statistical learning occurring often beneath the level of awareness provides structure to the environment uncovering the relations between objects in space and time.

Trabajo realizado desde el comienzo del proyecto hasta el final del período abarcado por el informe y los principales resultados hasta la fecha

Since the beginning of the project (January 2000), we have conducted many behavioral experiments uncovering the boundary conditions of statistical learning and attentional selection. We have focused on (1) the role of awareness during learning (2) the role of working memory during learning (3) whether learning is a truly automatic process (4) the role of statistical learning during reading (5) learning about across trial transitions (6) the extent to which distracting information can be ignored due to learning (6) learning across time and space (7) statistical learning and individual differences. All these projects have resulted in multiple published papers (see website: www.theeuweslab.com). There have been two major review papers: one paper that explains the applied societal relevance of statistical learning in a paper by Theeuwes (2021) in the journal “Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications”, and one paper in which we summarize the results of this project up till now by Theeuwes, Bogaerts & Van Moorselaar 2022 in het high impact journal “Trends in Cognitive Science”

Avances que van más allá del estado de la técnica e impacto potencial esperado (incluida la repercusión socioeconómica y las implicaciones sociales más amplias del proyecto hasta la fecha)

The progress is excellent. Due to Covid-19, up till now, we have mainly focused behavioral studies that could be conducted on-line. This has worked out very well. For the coming period we will focus more on brain imaging, EEG studies and eye tracking, which all require research in the lab. The progress we will make the coming years in this respect will depend on the pandemic and how it will affect access to the laboratory which is needed for these type of studies.

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