Overt Attention and Context Factors: The Impact of Repeated Presentations, Image Type, and Individual Motivation
2011

The Impact of Context Factors on Attention

Sample size: 45 publication 10 minutes Evidence: moderate

Author Information

Author(s): Kaspar Kai, König Peter

Primary Institution: Institute of Cognitive Science, University of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany

Hypothesis

Repeated presentations of stimuli induce a memory trace that influences eye movement behavior, resulting in a successive locally-oriented focus of attention.

Conclusion

The study found that motivational tendencies linked to personality and individual preferences significantly affected viewing behavior.

Supporting Evidence

  • Attention focus became more local with repeated presentations of images.
  • Subjects who rated images as interesting showed more explorative viewing behavior.
  • Inter-subject variance of fixation distributions increased with repeated presentations.

Takeaway

When people look at pictures multiple times, they start to focus more on specific details, especially if they find the pictures interesting.

Methodology

Participants viewed different categories of images multiple times while their eye movements were recorded.

Potential Biases

Potential biases due to self-reported measures of interest and motivation.

Limitations

The study focused on a specific demographic (university students) which may limit generalizability.

Participant Demographics

45 university students (12 male), average age 24.2 years.

Statistical Information

P-Value

p<0.001

Statistical Significance

p<0.05

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

10.1371/journal.pone.0021719

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