SPATIALLY DIFFUSE INHIBITION AFFECTS MULTIPLE LOCATIONS - A REPLY TO TIPPER, WEAVER, AND WATSON (1996)

S. Tipper, B. Weaver, and F. Watson (1996) suggest that J. Pratt and R . A. Abrams's (1995) failure to find inhibition of return for more tha n the most recently cued location was because their 2-target display d id not adequately capture some of the complexity of real-world visual environments. However, Tipper et al. tested a special case because the y always cued 3 out of 4 potential targets (allowing cued and uncued l ocations to be segregated into 2 spatial regions). The authors show th at only the 1 most recently cued location will be inhibited when 2 non adjacent targets out of 4 possible targets are cued, but both cued loc ations will be inhibited when they are adjacent. Also, only the 1 most recently cued location was inhibited when 3 nonadjacent targets out o f 6 potential target locations were cued. Thus, in a complex environme nt in which several cued locations are interspersed among noncued loca tions, inhibition of return will occur for only the 1 most recently at tended location, consistent with conclusions of Pratt and Abrams.