TY - JOUR
T1 - Attentional guidance during visual search among patients with schizophrenia
AU - Elahipanah, Ava
AU - Christensen, Bruce K.
AU - Reingold, Eyal M.
PY - 2011/9
Y1 - 2011/9
N2 - The current study investigated visual guidance and saccadic selectivity during visual search among patients with schizophrenia (SCZ). Data from a previous study (Elahipanah, A., Christensen, B.K., & Reingold, E.M., 2008. Visual selective attention among persons with schizophrenia: The distractor ratio effect. Schizophr. Res. 105, 61-67.) suggested that visual guidance for the less frequent distractors in a conjunction search display (i.e., the distractor ratio effect) is intact among SCZ patients. The current study investigated the distractor ratio effect among SCZ patients when: 1) search is more demanding, and 2) search involves motion perception. In addition, eye tracking was employed to directly study saccadic selectivity for the different types of distractors. Twenty-eight SCZ patients receiving a single antipsychotic medication and 26 healthy control participants performed two conjunction search tasks: a within-dimension (i.e., colour × colour) search task; and a cross-dimension (i.e., motion × colour) search task. In each task the relative frequency of distractors was manipulated across 5 levels. Despite slower search times, patients' eye movement data indicated unimpaired visual guidance in both tasks. However, in the motion × colour conjunction search task, patients displayed disproportionate difficulty detecting the moving target when the majority of distractors were also moving. Results demonstrate that bottom-up attentional guidance is unimpaired among patients with SCZ; however, patients' impairment in motion discrimination impedes their ability to detect a moving target against noisy backgrounds.
AB - The current study investigated visual guidance and saccadic selectivity during visual search among patients with schizophrenia (SCZ). Data from a previous study (Elahipanah, A., Christensen, B.K., & Reingold, E.M., 2008. Visual selective attention among persons with schizophrenia: The distractor ratio effect. Schizophr. Res. 105, 61-67.) suggested that visual guidance for the less frequent distractors in a conjunction search display (i.e., the distractor ratio effect) is intact among SCZ patients. The current study investigated the distractor ratio effect among SCZ patients when: 1) search is more demanding, and 2) search involves motion perception. In addition, eye tracking was employed to directly study saccadic selectivity for the different types of distractors. Twenty-eight SCZ patients receiving a single antipsychotic medication and 26 healthy control participants performed two conjunction search tasks: a within-dimension (i.e., colour × colour) search task; and a cross-dimension (i.e., motion × colour) search task. In each task the relative frequency of distractors was manipulated across 5 levels. Despite slower search times, patients' eye movement data indicated unimpaired visual guidance in both tasks. However, in the motion × colour conjunction search task, patients displayed disproportionate difficulty detecting the moving target when the majority of distractors were also moving. Results demonstrate that bottom-up attentional guidance is unimpaired among patients with SCZ; however, patients' impairment in motion discrimination impedes their ability to detect a moving target against noisy backgrounds.
KW - Attentional guidance
KW - Distractor ratio
KW - Eye movements
KW - Motion perception
KW - Schizophrenia
KW - Visual search
KW - Visual selective attention
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=80051794069&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.schres.2011.05.026
DO - 10.1016/j.schres.2011.05.026
M3 - Article
SN - 0920-9964
VL - 131
SP - 224
EP - 230
JO - Schizophrenia Research
JF - Schizophrenia Research
IS - 1-3
ER -