Reward history modulates attention based on feature relationship.

Abstract

Prioritizing attention to reward-predictive items is critical for survival, but challenging because these items rarely appear in the same feature or within the same environment. However, whether attention selection can be adaptively tuned to items that matched the context-dependent, relative feature of previously rewarded items remains largely unknown. In four experiments (N = 40 per experiment), we trained participants to learn the color-reward association and then adopted visual search tasks in which the color of a singleton distractor matched either the feature value (e.g., red or yellow) or feature relationship (i.e., redder or yellower) of previously rewarded colors. We consistently found enhanced attentional capture by a singleton distractor when it was relationally matched to the high reward compared with the low reward relationship, in addition to observing the typical effect of learned value on singletons matching the previously rewarded colors. Our findings provide novel evidence for the flexibility of value-driven attention via feature relationship, which is particularly useful given the changeable sensory inputs in real-world searches.

Reward history modulates attention based on spatial relationship

“…We propose that a relational-based account may provide a domain-general mechanism for value-driven attention, building upon the previous findings of value-driven attention based on feature relationship (Chen et al, 2023). However, unlike feature-reward associative learning, where both feature-specific and relational-based mechanisms likely co-exist, our current findings indicate that reward history primarily modifies the spatial priority map based on spatial relationship rather than absolute locations.…”

“…Additionally, building on recent findings of value-driven attention based on feature relationship (Chen et al, 2023), evidence consistent with a relational account of value-driven spatial attention could also lend support to the idea that a relational-based account reflects a domain-general mechanism underlying value-driven attention.…”