The modulation of spatial congruency by object-based attention: Analysing the “locus” of the modulation

Abstract

Earlier studies have demonstrated that spatial cueing differentially reduces stimulus–stimulus congruency (e.g., spatial Stroop) interference but not stimulus–response congruency (e.g., Simon; e.g., Lupiáñez & Funes, 2005). This spatial cueing modulation over spatial Stroop seems to be entirely attributable to object-based attention (e.g., Luo, Lupiáñez, Funes, & Fu, 2010). In the present study, two experiments were conducted to further explore whether the cueing modulation of spatial Stroop is object based and/or space based and to analyse the “locus” of this modulation. In Experiment 1, we found that the cueing modulation over spatial Stroop is entirely object based, independent of stimulus–response congruency. In Experiment 2, we observed that the modulation of object-based attention over the spatial Stroop only occurred at a short cue–target interval (i.e., stimulus onset asynchrony; SOA), whereas the stimulus–response congruency effect was not modulated either by object-based or by location-based attentional cueing. The overall pattern of results suggests that the spatial cueing modulation over spatial Stroop arises from object-based attention and occurs at the perceptual stage of processing.

Keywords:

• Object-based attention
• Space-based attention
• Spatial Stroop effect
• Simon effect
• Compatibility effect

Acknowledgments

This research was supported in part by grants from 973 Program of Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology (Grant 2011CB302201) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant 90820305) and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation funded project (Grant 20090460558 and Grant 201003171). This research was also financially supported in part by the Spanish “Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia” (PSI2008–03595PSIC, EUI2009–04082, and PSI2008–04223PSIC Research Projects).