There have been conflicting findings on the degree to which exogenous/reflexive visual attention is selective for depth, and this issue has important implications for attention models. Previous findings have attempted to find depth-based cueing effects on such attention using reaction time measures for stimuli presented in stereo goggles with a display screen. Results stemming from such approaches have been mixed, depending on whether target/distractor discrimination was required. To help clarify the existence of such depth effects, we have developed a paradigm that measures accuracy rather than reaction time in an immersive virtual-reality environment, providing a more appropriate context of depth. Four modified Posner Cueing paradigms were run to test for depth-specific attentional selectivity. Participants fixated a cross while attempting to identify a rapidly masked letter that was preceded by a cue that could be valid in depth and side, depth only, or side only. In Experiment 1, a potent cueing effect was found for side validity and a weak effect was found for depth. Experiment 2 controlled for differences in cue and target sizes when presented at different depths, which caused the depth validity effect to disappear entirely even though participants were explicitly asked to report depth and the difference in virtual depth was extreme (20 vs 300 meters). Experiments 3a and 3b brought the front depth plane even closer (1 m) to maximize effects of binocular disparity, but no reliable depth cueing validity was observed. Thus, it seems that rapid/exogenous attention pancakes 3-dimensional space into a 2-dimensional reference frame.
The diachronic account of attentional selectivity
