Differential age-related changes in localizing a target among distractors across an extended visual field

Abstract

Age differences in the spatial distribution of attention over a wide field of view have only been described in terms of the spatial extent, leaving the topographical aspect unexplored. This study examined age differences between younger and older adults in good general health in an important topographical characteristic, the asymmetry between the upper and lower visual fields. In Experiment 1, we found age differences across the entire attentional visual field. In addition, age differences were greater in the upper compared to the lower field. In Experiment 2, we examined whether the finding of a greater age difference in the ability to localize a target among distractors in the upper visual field in Experiment 1 was a result of possible differential age differences between the upper and lower visual fields in the ability to localize a target even when there was no distractor competing for attention. Our results suggested that the age differences we observed were linked to age differences in the ability to filter out distractors that compete with the target for attention rather than the ability to process only the target over a wide field of view. While younger adults demonstrated an upper visual field advantage in the ability to localize a target among distractors, there was no such field advantage in older adults. We discuss this finding of diminished upper visual field advantage in older adults in light of an account of pervasive loss of neural specialization with age. We postulate that one possible explanation of age differences in the asymmetry between the upper and lower visual fields may be an adaptation to age-related physical decline. We also discuss important implications of our findings in risks of falls and vehicle crashes.

The Effects of Spatial Endogenous Pre-cueing across Eccentricities

“…The probability density at any particular location in the visual field represents the attentional intensity corresponding to that location ( Feng and Spence, 2013 , p.154). In general, the attentional intensity decreases with an increase in the distance from the fixation ( Feng and Spence, 2014 ; Feng et al, 2016 ). Influences from expectations induced by pre-cueing were assumed to modify the distribution of attention.…”

“…In the present study, we used a task measuring the spatial distribution of attention across an extended area of the visual field (Attentional Visual Field Task; Spence et al, 2013 ; Feng and Spence, 2014 ). On this task, the distribution of attention across a large area of the visual field can be reflected by performance in target detection which decreases with the increase in target eccentricity (e.g., Feng and Spence, 2014 ; Feng et al, 2016 ). In the current study, we implemented endogenous cues that occurred before the stimulus displays, to examine the pre-cueing effects across a wide range of visual eccentricities (10°, 20°, and 30°).…”

Adaptive response criteria in road hazard detection among older drivers

“…This task was developed to assess attentional processing of static driving scenes with a brief stimulus exposure. DAT employs a well-controlled task procedure that is similar to typical laboratory measures using abstract stimuli (e.g., the Attentional Visual Field task, see Feng et al, 2016;the Useful Field Of View task, see Ball et al, 1993). This control procedure allows manipulation of many task parameters such as travel direction, level of visual clutter, and a location of the hazard, with repeated measures of all conditions.…”

“…Older drivers showed failures to scan before entering the intersection. While there could be many factors (including degraded attentional processing across the visual field at an older age; e.g., Ball, Owsley, Sloane, Roenker, & Bruni, 1993; Feng, Craik, Levine, Moreno, Naglie, & Choi, 2016) leading to this failure, one hypothesized contributor was that older drivers might have been too engaged in monitoring the road in front of them, thus could not scan sufficiently for hazards in the periphery. In addition, in a study comparing hazard perception abilities among young inexperienced, young experienced and older drivers (Borowsky, Shinar, & Oron-Gilad, 2010), older drivers were found to rely greatly on signs and signals on the road to detect hazards.…”

Regional Gray Matter Volume Identifies High Risk of Unsafe Driving in Healthy Older People

“…The VAN redirects attention from the present focus to the novel stimulus of interest when very important or noticeable events are detected outside of the present focus of attention, such as a sudden pedestrian crossing, and the VAN is thus considered to be involved in bottom-up attention (Long and Kuhl, 2018). Regarding older drivers, top-down attention has been shown to compensate for reduced road hazard detection due to age-related bottomup attentional decline, and diminished top-down attention has been shown to lead to vehicle accidents caused by older drivers (Feng et al, 2018).…”