FLEXIBILITY IN SPATIAL ATTENTION BEFORE AND AFTER PRACTICE

These experiments used spatial probes to measure how spatial attention is allocated across the visual field during search for a target lette r in an eight-letter array. There were three main findings: Attentiona l strength is flexibly adjusted according to the confusability between target and distractors. Distractor locations near the target receive more inhibition than those farther from the target, indicating that th e nearby distractors interfere more with target identification. Despit e the fact that consistent practice improves search rate, it does not diminish the strength of spatial attention in this task.