Consensus emerges and biased competition wins: A commentary on Luck et al. (2021)

ABSTRACT

As the debate about the automaticity of attentional capture has raged on over the years, knowledge of how selection functions has been accumulating in the literature. Luck et al. (2021) highlights emerging areas of consensus, including support for multiple mechanisms that influence attentional guidance. Here, I revisit the biased competition model of [Desimone, R., & Duncan, J. (1995). Neural mechanisms of selective visual attention. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 18(1), 193–222. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ne.18.030195.001205] to bring additional perspective. This aims to provide insight about open questions of “control” and to offer guidance in how to address other conceptual issues that hinder progress toward a better understanding of attentional functioning.

KEYWORDS:

• Attentional capture
• biased competition
• selection

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Eye Institute [grant number R15EY030370 to CJL].