Hs. Chan et Aj. Courtney, EFFECTS OF COGNITIVE FOVEAL LOAD ON A PERIPHERAL SINGLE-TARGET DETECTION TASK, Perceptual and motor skills, 77(2), 1993, pp. 515-533
This experiment investigated the effects of foveal cognitive load on a
primary peripheral single-target detection task. Four levels of fovea
l task with cognitive loads involving identification and summation of
numerals were used. Number of correct targets detected seemed unaffect
ed by the foveal load in the near periphery but a decrement occurred b
eyond 7.7-degrees. Response times for correct responses showed large d
ispersion compared with that for correct locations. At a low cognitive
load, foveal task performance showed no deterioration for all eccentr
icities tested, but at a higher cognitive load performance declined gr
adually across eccentricities. Mild evidence of tunnel vision was obta
ined as indicated by the significant interaction of cognitive loads x
eccentricities. Resources theory accounted well for the results.