Aging increases distraction by auditory oddballs in visual, but not auditory tasks

Abstract

Aging is typically considered to bring a reduction of the ability to resist distraction by task-irrelevant stimuli. Yet recent work suggests that this conclusion must be qualified and that the effect of aging is mitigated by whether irrelevant and target stimuli emanate from the same modalities or from distinct ones. Some studies suggest that aging is especially sensitive to distraction within-modality while others suggest it is greater across modalities. Here we report the first study to measure the effect of aging on deviance distraction in cross-modal (auditory-visual) and uni-modal (auditory-auditory) oddball tasks. Young and older adults were asked to judge the parity of target digits (auditory or visual in distinct blocks of trials), each preceded by a task-irrelevant sound (the same tone on most trials-the standard sound-or, on rare and unpredictable trials, a burst of white noise-the deviant sound). Deviant sounds yielded distraction (longer response times relative to standard sounds) in both tasks and age groups. However, an age-related increase in distraction was observed in the cross-modal task and not in the uni-modal task. We argue that aging might affect processes involved in the switching of attention across modalities and speculate that this may due to the slowing of this type of attentional shift or a reduction in cognitive control required to re-orient attention toward the target's modality.

Distraction by deviant sounds: disgusting and neutral words capture attention to the same extent

“…Second, our recognition data show that the deviant words were well discriminated from foils. The absence of an effect of the type of deviant word (semantic effect), combined with the presence of distraction by the deviant words relative to standard trials (deviant effect), adds support to the notion that the two effects are independent (see Parmentier, 2014 , for a discussion). Parmentier ( 2008 ) argued that the first effect reflects the time penalty yielded by the involuntary orientation of attention to and away from deviant sounds, while the second results from the involuntary semantic analysis of the deviant sounds.…”

“…Task-irrelevant stimuli that unexpectedly differ from an otherwise structured or repeated sequence of stimuli (deviant among standard stimuli) capture attention and yield behavioral distraction in an unrelated ongoing task (e.g., Bendixen et al, 2010 ; Escera, Alho, Winkler, & Näätänen, 1998 ; Parmentier, 2014 ; Parmentier, Vasilev, & Andrés, 2018 ; Schröger, 1996 ; Schröger & Wolff, 1998b ; Vasilev, Parmentier, Angele, & Kirkby, 2018 ). While this type of effect has been reported across various sensory modalities (e.g., Berti, 2008 ; Berti & Schröger, 2003 ; Boll & Berti, 2009 ; Li, Parmentier, & Zhang, 2013 ; Ljungberg, Parmentier, Leiva, & Vega, 2012 ; Parmentier, 2016 ; Parmentier, Ljungberg, Elsley, & Lindkvist, 2011 ; Roeber, Widmann, & Schröger, 2003 ), the phenomenon has been most abundantly studied with auditory distractors.…”

“…These are respectively interpreted as the detection of auditory change, the involuntary orienting of attention towards the unexpected sound, and a re-orienting of attention towards the ongoing primary task (e.g., Berti, 2008 ; Berti & Schröger, 2001 ; Escera et al, 1998 ; Schröger, 1996 ). At the behavioral level, unexpected sounds lengthen response times to targets in ongoing tasks and, sometimes, reduce response accuracy (e.g., Parmentier, 2014 ; Schröger, 1996 ). This effect is in part due to the involuntary shift of attention to, and away from, the unexpected sound (e.g., Escera et al, 1998 ; Parmentier, Elford, Escera, Andrés, & Miguel, 2008 ; Schröger, 1996 ), and emanates from the unexpected sounds’ violation of predictions rather than from their low probability of occurrence per se (e.g., Parmentier, Elsley, Andrés, & Barceló, 2011 ; Schröger, Bendixen, Trujillo-Barreto, & Roeber, 2007 ).…”

Multisensory Integration Strategy for Modality-Specific Loss of Inhibition Control in Older Adults

“…Lutfi-Proctor et al re-designed the conventional Stroop test for an audio-visual version and found that auditory interference (i.e., semantics or phonetics distraction) heavily deteriorated the visual task performance [ 37 ]. Interestingly, Leiva et al [ 38 ] examined the saliency of auditory interference in the different age groups, demonstrating that the elderly seemed to show an audio-sensitivity effect in the cross-modal task but not in the unimodal task. More recently, Stothart and Kazanina [ 39 ] conducted an event-related potential (ERP) study to examine peripheral and cortical involvement of auditory interference between different age groups.…”

The semantic aftermath of distraction by deviant sounds: Crosstalk interference is mediated by the predictability of semantic congruency

“…At the behavioral level, deviant sounds delay (and sometimes reduce the accuracy of) responses to target stimuli (see Parmentier, 2014, for a conspectus of behavioral deviance distraction studies), whether presented in uni-modal auditory (e.g., Berti andSchröger, 2003, 2004;Schröger, 1996) or visual tasks (Berti and Schröger, 2004;Boll and Berti, 2009;Grimm et al, 2009), or in cross-modal oddball tasks where an irrelevant stimulus in one sensory modality precedes a target stimulus in another (auditory-visual: Andrés et al, 2006;Boll and Berti, 2009;Escera et al, 1998Escera et al, , 2001Leiva et al, 2014aLeiva et al, , 2014bLi et al, 2013;Mayas et al, 2014;Parmentier and Andrés, 2010;SanMiguel et al, 2010;van Mourik et al, 2007;Wetzel et al, 2009;tactile-visual: Parmentier et al, 2011).…”