Between-object superiority in divided attention

Target–object integration, attention distribution, and object orientation interactively modulate object-based selection

“…This same-object cost is common to divided-attention tasks in which participants are asked to judge between two highly similar or identical targets (Chen & Huang, 2015) and reflects greater binding of features from distinct, albeit neighboring, objects than for features from the same object (Davis & Holmes, 2005). Indeed, it is possible that participants are motivated to attend strictly to the objects when targets and objects are strongly integrated (i.e., when the targets are part 'of' the objects), and thus, when completing the same-different task, they are prone to adopting a strategy whereby they compare whole objects rather than distinct features of those objects (Neill, Li, Seror, & O'Connor, 2009). Consequently, when the targets appear within different objects, participants may base their response on whether or not the two objects match.…”