Monetary Modulates Attentional Orienting And Localized Attentional Interference Effect

In order to behave adaptively,attention can be directed in space either voluntarily(i.e.endogenously)according to strategic goals,or involuntarily(i.e.exogenously)through reflexive capture by salient or novel events.The emotional or motivational values of stimuli can also influence attentional orienting.However,little is known about how reward-related effects compete or interact with endogenous and exogenous attention mechanisms,particularly outside of awareness.Here the visual search paradigm was used to study supraliminal and subliminal value-based attentional orienting.we designed a visual search paradigm in which goal-driven and stimulus-driven shifts of attention were manipulated by classic spatial cueing procedures,while an irrelevant,but previously rewarded stimulus also appeared as a distractor and hence competed with both types of spatial attention during search.In Experiment 1 results demonstrated that stimuli previously associated with a high monetary reward received higher attentional priority in the subsequent visual search task,even though these stimuli and reward were no longer task-relevant,mitigating the attentional orienting induced by both endogenous and exogenous cues.In Experiment 2 results demonstrated that symbols previously associated with a monetary reward received higher attentional priority in the subsequent visual search task,even though these stimuli and reward were no longer task-relevant,and despite reward being unconsciously acquired.Thus,motivational processes operating independent of conscious awareness may provide powerful influences on mechanisms of attentional selection,which could mitigate both stimulus-driven and goal-directed shifts of attention.On the other hand,it is well documented that monetary reward improves performance of cognitive tasks by increasing task concentration and engagement.we investigated the effect of reward expectation on the localized attentional interference effect(LAI).LAI occurs when attending to a visual object degrades the processing of nearby objects,with the interference subsiding with increasing distance from the attended item.We carried out two experiments based on visual search paradigm.The results showed that shorter reaction times was observed in the incentive condition than in the non-incentive condition.The response accuracy in identifying the two targets was higher in the incentive condition than that in the non-incentive condition when the two targets were distant from each other,but the pattern was reversed when they were close to each other.Namely,the LAI effect was larger in the incentive condition than that in the non-incentive condition,but we did not observe this effect in In Experiments 4.In conclusion:1.Both in supraliminal and subliminal condition,the high rewarded stimulus have influence on endogenous and exogenous attentional orienting.2.The LAI effect was larger in the incentive condition than that in the non-incentive condition when the cue was presented in supraliminal way.Individual's awareness of reward information interfered the task performance.But there is not significant difference in accuracy between the incentive and non-incentive condition when the cue was presented outside of awareness.The reduced reaction time shows that even the cue was presented outside of awareness can improve the motivation level of the subjects,that made them well prepared for task response.