A recently developed visual foraging task, involving multiple targets of different types, can provide a rich and dynamic picture of visual attention performance. We measured the foraging performance of 66 children aged 4–7 years, along with measures of two conceptually related constructs, self-regulation and verbal working memory. Our results show that foraging patterns of young children differ from adult patterns. Children have difficulty with foraging for two target types, not only when they are defined by a conjunction of features but, unlike adults, also when they forage simultaneously for two target types that are distinguished from distractors by a single feature. Importantly, such feature/conjunction differences between adults and children are not seen in more traditional single-target visual search tasks. Interestingly, the foraging patterns of the youngest children were slightly more adult-like than of the oldest ones, which may suggest that older children attempt to use strategies that they have not yet fully mastered. The older children were, however, able to complete more trials, during both feature and conjunction foraging. Self-regulation and verbal working memory did not seem to affect foraging strategies, but both were connected with faster and more efficient foraging. We propose that our visual foraging paradigm is a promising avenue for studying the development of visual cognitive abilities.

In foraging tasks multiple targets must be found within a single display. The targets can be of one or more types, typically surrounded by numerous distractors. Visual attention has traditionally been studied with single target search tasks but adding more targets to the search display results in several additional measures of interest, such as how attention is oriented to different features and locations over time. We measured foraging among five age groups:Children in grades 1, 4, 7, and 10, as well as adults, using both simple feature foraging tasks and more challenging conjunction foraging tasks, with two target types per task. We assessed participants' foraging organization, or systematicity when selecting all the targets within the foraging display, on four measures: Intertarget distance, number of intersections, best-r, and

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In the past few years, interest in visual foraging, where participants search for multiple targets at a time, has increased, as such tasks may provide a richer picture of visual attention than traditional single-target visual search tasks. Little is known about visual foraging in childhood, so we tested 67 6 th grade Icelandic children (mean age = 11.80 years, SD = 0.30 years; 36 girls) on a foraging task involving multiple targets of different types, also measuring three subdomains of executive functioning: inhibition, attentional flexibility, and working memory. The foraging results were then compared to findings from a previous study on younger children (66 children aged 4-7 years). The results show that foraging ability improves dramatically between the

Visual foraging tasks require participants to search for multiple targets among numerous distractors. Foraging paradigms enable insights into the function of visual attention above what has been learned from traditional single target search paradigms. These include attentional orienting over time and search strategies involving target selection from different target types. To date, only a handful of studies have been conducted on the development of foraging abilities. Here, the foraging of five age groups, children aged six, nine, twelve, and fifteen, and adults, was measured, as well as their performance on various tasks assessing four subdomains of executive functions; inhibition, attentional flexibility, working memory, and problem solving. Executive functions consist of a complex network of independent but