On asymmetries in cross-modal spatial attention orienting

In a previous study, Ward (1994) reported that spatially uninformative visu al cues orient auditory attention but that spatially uninformative auditory cues fail to orient visual attention. This cross-modal asymmetry is consis tent with other intersensory perceptual phenomena that are dominated by the visual modality (e.g., ventriloquism). However, Spence and Driver (1997) f ound exactly the opposite asymmetry under different experimental conditions and with a different task. In spite of the several differences between the two studies, Spence and Driver (see also Driver & Spence, 1998) argued tha t Ward's findings might have arisen from response-priming effects, and that the cross-modal asymmetry they themselves reported, in which auditory cues affect responses to visual targets but not vice versa, is in fact the corr ect result. The present study investigated cross-modal interactions in stim ulus-driven spatial attention orienting under Ward's complex cue environmen t conditions using an experimental procedure that eliminates response-primi ng artifacts. The results demonstrate that the cross-modal asymmetry report ed by Ward (1994) does occur when the cue environment is complex. We argue that strategic effects in cross-modal stimulus-driven orienting of attentio n are responsible for the opposite asymmetries found by Ward and by Spence and Driver (1997).