| Attention refers to the direction and concentration of certain objects by psychological activities.It’s the tendency to process some related stimuli while ignoring others selectively.It has been well documented that the level of perceptual load in the field is one of the crucial factors affecting attentional selection,and when the stimulus matched the content of visual working memory(WM)can automatically and preferentially capture attention.However,as a sub-component of the WM system,the researches of the effects of verbal WM on attentional capture is relatively rare and controversial.The present study adopted the classic dual-task paradigm combined the WM task and the visual search task,used the eye tracking technology,present verbal WM contents from the visual and auditory modal respectively.Based on the perceptual load theory and WM load theory,we tested attentional capture effect from different perceptual load and WM load when the stimulus matched the content of verbal WM,and compared the effects from the two modals to investigate whether it has modal superiority in the process of attentional capture.The present research was divided into 2 parts and 7 experimental researches.Study 1 aimed to explore the effect of attentional capture in different perceptual load and WM load conditions while the verbal WM was present through visual modal.In Experiment 1,the problem was verified by presenting one item of verbal WM content.Experiment 2 and 3 explored the change of attentional capture effect by increasing WM load respectively,and tested the effect of perceptual load on visual search.Based on Study 1,Study 2 further discussed the effect of presenting verbal WM content through auditory modal on attentional capture,and made a cross-modal comparison with Study 1.Experiment 5,6 and 7 corresponds to the three experiments in Study 1 respectively.Experiment 4 was a single-task,only included a visual search task,which was used to manipulate check the corresponding independent variables in the above experiments.The results showed that:(1)When the verbal WM contents were presented through visual modal,perceptual load affected the speed of visual search.The reaction time of visual search was faster under high perceptual load than low perceptual load condition.(2)When the distractors matched the current visual or auditory verbal WM contents,it can capture attention preferentially,and the attentional capture effect occurs in the early stage of information processing,which is a relatively automatic process.(3)The verbal WM load can modulate the effect of perceptual load during visual searchtasks.With the increasing of visual verbal WM load,the effect of perceptual load was reduced,and the effect of attentional capture was also weakened.(4)Compared with auditory modal,the attentional capture effect was stronger and more stable when the verbal WM was presented through visual modal,showing a certain of advantages of attentional capture.In conclusion,the perceptual load affected the speed of visual search,the attentional capture effect would occur when the distractors matched the content of verbal WM in different modals.The effect of attentional capture was modulated by the current verbal WM load,and the effect of attentional capture was more stable when verbal WM was presented through visual modal. |
