Object-based visual attention with endogenous orienting

In a series of experiments, we examined covert orienting using endogenous c uing, in which attention is voluntarily directed toward a peripheral locati on. In one experiment, subjects were cued to attend to one end of an oblong object. They then detected targets on the cued object or elsewhere. In ano ther experiment, subjects provided judgments of the relative temporal order of two flashes after their attention had moved endogenously. In a third ex periment, subjects were directed to attend to an empty spatial location and subsequently discriminated features of objects that appeared at or near th e locus of attention. In each of these situations, attentional orienting wa s object based, in the sense that non-attended locations that were on the c ued object had an advantage over non-attended locations that were not on th e object. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for obje ct-based representations and the differences between exogenous and endogeno us orienting of attention.