Context and reminder effects in a visual search analog of latent inhibition

Two experiments used a two-phase visual search task in which participants i dentified the presence of a unique shape against a background of homogeneou s distractors. Latent inhibitionlike (LI) effects (poorer performance when the target had previously been a distractor and the distracter had been a t arget as compared to a novel target with distracters that had been a target ) and novel pop-out (NPO) effects were examined. In both experiments, and a s in previous studies, robust LI was obtained, but unlike those studies, th ere was no NPO. The LI-like effect was strengthened by the presence of remi nder trials (Experiment I) and weakened by a change of context from the pre exposure to the test phase (Experiment 2). The results support the position that the visual search paradigm taps the same processes as those in tradit ional LI experiments that assess learning deficits as a function of preexpo sure to irrelevant stimuli, (C) 2001 Academic Press.