Searching through the hierarchy: How level of target categorization affects visual search

Abstract

Does the same basic-level advantage commonly observed in the categorization literature also hold for targets in a search task? We answered this question by first conducting a category verification task to define a set of categories showing a standard basic-level advantage, which we then used as stimuli in a search experiment. Participants were cued with a picture preview of the target or its category name at either superordinate, basic, or subordinate levels, then shown a target-present/absent search display. Although search guidance and target verification was best using pictorial cues, the effectiveness of the categorical cues depended on the hierarchical level. Search guidance was best for the specific subordinate-level cues, whereas target verification showed a standard basic-level advantage. These findings demonstrate different hierarchical advantages for guidance and verification in categorical search. We interpret these results as evidence for a common target representation underlying categorical search guidance and verification.

Keywords:

• Basic-level advantage
• Categorical search
• Category verification
• Eye movements
• Search guidance

Acknowledgments

We thank Christian Luhmann and Gregory Murphy for their helpful comments in the preparation of this manuscript, and all the members of the Eye Cog Lab for invaluable feedback. This work was supported by NIH Grant R01-MH063748 to GJZ.