The effects of stimulus rotation and familiarity in visual search

Rauschenberger and Yantis (2006) observed that an intersecting circle-line combination enjoyed significantly greater search efficiency when it was oriented to resemble a "Q" than when it was oriented so that the intersecting line was vertical (cf. Treisman and Souther, 1985). Although a control experiment made it unlikely that the obliqueness of the line was responsible for the observed benefit, there was no direct evidence that this benefit was attributable to the "Q-ness" of the stimulus. In the present study, a subset of Rauschenberger and Yantis's experiments was repeated with Chinese subjects, who had never been exposed to the Latin alphabet. For these subjects, there was no benefit for the"Q"-like stimulus, in contrast to the results of Rauschenberger and Yantis's study. These results show that a simple 45 degrees rotation of a stimulus can affect search efficiency significantly--but only when this rotation bestows meaning, or familiarity, to that stimulus.     

The effect of background familiarity in visual search: An analysis of underlying factors

The speed and accuracy of visual target search are strongly dependent on the familiarity of the background through which the search proceeds. Search through unfamiliar elements is much more difficult than search through familiar ones. This effect of background familiarity is examined in a series of three experiments. Experiment 1 suggests that the effect is not attributable to an inherently slow classification of individually unfamiliar nontargets. Experiments 2 and 3 investigate three aspects of multicharacter processing potentially sensitive to background familiarity. The results suggest that the background familiarity effect is most parsimoniously viewed as the result of slow or inaccurate segmentation of features extracted from adjacent characters. Mechanisms linking the familiarity of the background with the efficiency of character segregation are discussed in closing.     

Inhibitory tagging in visual search can be found if search stimuli remain visible

Klein (1988) reported that inhibitory tagging (i.e., inhibition of return in visual search) made reaction times for the detection of small probes increase at locations where there had previously been rejected items in serial visual search. It is reasonable that the attended and rejected locations are inhibited. However, subsequent studies did not support Klein's idea. In these studies, inhibitory tagging was tested after removing the items from the search tasks. The paradigms in these studies were not appropriate for testing an object-based inhibitory effect because the objects (i.e., items) were removed from the display. In the present study, we found that evidence of inhibitory tagging could be observed only when the items of the search tasks were maintained until the responses for the small probes were made. This appeared to be an object-based effect.     

Effects of consumer perceptions of brand experience on the web: brand familiarity,satisfaction and brand trust

Creating a customer experience that is synonymous with a particular (website) brand is becoming increasingly recognised as a vital driver of e‐performance. E‐tailors are just as likely to try to influence consumers' shopping behaviour, through atmospherics and service, as brick‐and‐mortar stores. This study investigates several questions that have been left unanswered in recent studies of consumer behaviour in the context of internet‐based marketing. Its focus lies in addressing the issue of whether there is a direct relationship between brand experience and brand trust or whether there is an indirect relationship via satisfaction or brand familiarity. The results of an empirical study of e‐consumer behaviour show that brand trust is achieved through the following dimensions operating and interrelating as antecedent constructs: first, various brand experiences and the search for information, secondly, a high level of brand familiarity, and thirdly, customer satisfaction based on cognitive and emotional factors. These findings should assist marketers and academics in their understanding of the development of brand trust in an internet‐based environment. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Precuing benefits for color and location in a visual search task

Selection in multiple-item displays has been shown to benefit immensely from advance knowledge of target location (e.g., Henderson, 1991), leading to the suggestion that location is completely dominant in visual selective attention (e.g., Tsal & Lavie, 1993). Recently, direct selection by color has been reported in displays in which location does not vary (Vierck & Miller, 2005). The present experiment investigated the possibility of independent selection by color in a task with multiple-item displays and location precues in order to see whether color is also used for selection even when target location does vary and supposedly dominant location precues can be used. Precues provided independent information about the location and color of a target, and each type of precue could be either valid or invalid. The precues were followed by brief displays of six letters in six different colors, and participants had to discriminate the case of a prespecified target letter (e.g., R vs. r). Performance was much better when location cues were valid than when they were invalid, confirming the large advantage associated with valid advance location information. Performance was also better with valid advance color information, however, both when location cues were valid and when they were invalid. But these color benefits were dependent on the closeness of the colored letter to the cued location. Our results thus suggest that selection by color in a multiple-item display, where location and color information are independent from each other and equalized, is mediated by location information.     

Seeing faces: The role of brand visual processing and social connection in brand liking

This paper investigates how brands—through visuals—can fill a void for consumers experiencing a lack of social connection. Using psychometric measures and mock advertisements with visuals of human faces and non‐faces, Study 1 shows that seeing faces relates to greater brand liking with processing fluency mediating, and individual loneliness and tendency to anthropomorphize moderating the effect. Study 2 replicates findings with other‐race faces corroborating that fluency but not ethnic self‐referencing underlies the effect. Study 3 complements the psychometric measures of Studies 1 and 2 with eye tracking data to demonstrate that fluency correlates with distinct patterns of attention. Study 4 uses actual brand stimuli to show that effects are robust and extend beyond advertisements. Taken together, the findings show that communicating brand names in conjunction with visuals seen by consumers as human faces can increase brand liking.     

“We” are familiar but “It” is not: Ingroup pronouns trigger feelings of familiarity

The notion that language can shape social perception has a long history in psychology. The current work adds to this literature by investigating the relationship between ingroup-designating pronouns and perceptions of familiarity. In two experiments, participants were exposed to nonsense syllables that were primed with ingroup (e.g., we) and control (e.g., it) pronouns before perceptions of the syllables’ familiarity (Experiments 1 and 2) and positivity (Experiment 2) were assessed. Because previous work has shown that ingroup pronouns are perceived positively (Perdue, Dovidio, Gurtman, & Tyler, 1990), and that positivity can trigger familiarity (e.g., [Garcia-Marques et al., 2004] and [Monin, 2003]), we predicted that syllables primed with ingroup-designating pronouns would be perceived as more familiar and positive than would syllables primed with control pronouns. These predictions were confirmed. Additionally, Experiment 2 provided suggestive evidence that the effect of ingroup pronouns on perceived familiarity is mediated by positivity. Implications of these results for the literatures on how language shapes intergroup biases and on how positivity triggers feelings of familiarity are discussed.     

Visual search asymmetry: The influence of stimulus familiarity and low-level features

Wang, Cavanagh, and Green (1994) demonstrated a pop-out effect in searching for an unfamiliar target among familiar distractors (U—F search) and argued for the importance of a familiarity difference between the target and the distractors in determining search efficiency. In four experiments, we explored the generality of that finding. Experiment 1 compared search efficiency across a variety of target-distractor pairs. In Experiments 2, 3, and 4, we used Chinese characters and their transforms as targets and distractors and compared search performance between Chinese and non-Chinese participants. We demonstrated that search asymmetry and search efficiency in the U—F condition are influenced by the presence of low-level feature differences between the familiar and the unfamiliar stimuli. Our findings suggest that the familiarity of the distractors, rather than the familiarity difference between the target and the distractors, determines search efficiency. We also documented a counterintuitive familiarity-inferiority effect, suggesting that knowledge of search stimuli may, sometimes, be detrimental to search performance.     

Attention in visual search: Multiple search classes

Data from visual-search tasks are typically interpreted to mean that searching for targets defined by feature differences does not require attention and thus can be performed in parallel, whereas searching for other targets requires serial allocation of attention. The question addressed here was whether a parallel-serial dichotomy would be obtained if data were collected using a variety of targets representing each of several kinds of defining features. Data analyses included several computations in addition to search rate: (1) target-absent to target-present slope ratios; (2) two separate data transformations to control for errors; (3) minimum reaction time; and (4) slopes of standard deviation as a function of set size. Some targets showed strongly parallel or strongly serial search, but there was evidence for several intermediate search classes. Sometimes, for a given target-distractor pair, the results depended strongly on which character was the target and which was the distractor. Implications from theories of visual search are discussed.     

Panoramic search: the interaction of memory and vision in search through a familiar scene

How do observers search through familiar scenes? A novel panoramic search method is used to study the interaction of memory and vision in natural search behavior. In panoramic search, observers see part of an unchanging scene larger than their current field of view. A target object can be visible, present in the display but hidden from view, or absent. Visual search efficiency does not change after hundreds of trials through an unchanging scene (Experiment 1). Memory search, in contrast, begins inefficiently but becomes efficient with practice. Given a choice between vision and memory, observers choose vision (Experiments 2 and 3). However, if forced to use their memory on some trials, they learn to use memory on all trials, even when reliable visual information remains available (Experiment 4). The results suggest that observers make a pragmatic choice between vision and memory, with a strong bias toward visual search even for memorized stimuli.     

Implicit memory and consumer choice: the mediating role of brand familiarity

Two experiments investigated the influence of implicit memory on consumer choice for brands with varying levels of familiarity. Priming was measured using a consideration‐choice task, developed by Coates, Butler and Berry ( 2004 ). Experiment 1 employed a coupon‐rating task at encoding that required participants to meaningfully process individual brand names, to assess whether priming could affect participants' final (preferred) choices for familiar brands. Experiment 2 used this same method to assess the impact of implicit memory on consideration and choice for unknown and leader brands, presented in conjunction with familiar competitors. Significant priming was obtained in both experiments, and was shown to directly influence final choice in the case of familiar and highly familiar leader brands. Moreover, it was shown that a single prior exposure could lead participants to consider buying an unknown, and indeed fictitious, brand. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Lifespan changes in attention: The visual search task

There are two popular frameworks for the study of visual attention. Treisman's Feature Integration Theory focuses on the effortful process of binding together the multiple attributes of an object. Posner's Visual Orienting Theory emphasizes the movement of an attentional spotlight across space. Although both aspects are undoubtedly important in any visual search task, it is not clear how each of these aspects changes with age. We tested observers aged 6, 8, 10, 22, and 72 years on visual search tasks designed to isolate these factors. No age-related differences were found in single- or double-feature discrimination, attention movement to a single item, or search for a single-feature target among distractors. Two age-related changes were found: (1) young children were less able than either young adults or seniors to search for targets defined by a conjunction of features, and (2) both children and seniors were less able than young adults to move attention voluntarily from item to item. This implies that feature integration and voluntary movement of attention have different trajectories over the lifespan.     

Attention in visual search: multiple search classes.

Data from visual-search tasks are typically interpreted to mean that searching for targets defined by feature differences does not require attention and thus can be performed in parallel, whereas searching for other targets requires serial allocation of attention. The question addressed here was whether a parallel-serial dichotomy would be obtained if data were collected using a variety of targets representing each of several kinds of defining features. Data analyses included several computations in addition to search rate: (1) target-absent to target-present slope ratios; (2) two separate data transformations to control for errors; (3) minimum reaction time; and (4) slopes of standard deviation as a function of set size. Some targets showed strongly parallel or strongly serial search, but there was evidence for several intermediate search classes. Sometimes, for a given target-distractor pair, the results depended strongly on which character was the target and which was the distractor. Implications from theories of visual search are discussed.     

Categorical target templates: Typical category members are found and identified quickly during word-cued search

What information do people use to guide search when they lack precise details about the appearance of their target? In this study, we employed categorical (word-cued) search and eye tracking, to examine how category typicality influences search performance. We found that typical category members were fixated and identified more quickly than atypical categories. This finding held when the participant was cued at the superordinate level (finding “clothing” among non-clothing items) or the basic level (finding a “shirt” among other clothing items). This suggests that categorical target templates may be constructed by piecing together features from the most typical category member(s).     

Prioritization in visual search: visual marking is not dependent on a mnemonic search

Visual marking (VM) refers to our ability to completely exclude old items from search when new stimuli are presented in our visual field. We examined whether this ability reflects an attentional scan of the old items, possibly allowing observers to apply inhibition of return or maintain a memory representation of already seen locations. In four experiments, we compared performance in two search conditions. In the double-search (DS) condition, we required participants to pay attention to a first set of items by having them search for a target within the set. Subsequently, they had to search a second set while the old items remained in the field. In the VM condition, the participants expected the target only to be in the second (new) set. Selection of new items in the DS condition was relatively poor and was always worse than would be expected if only the new stimuli had been searched. In contrast, selection of the new items in the VM condition was good and was equal to what would be expected if there had been an exclusive search of the new stimuli. These results were not altered when differences in Set 1 difficulty, task switching, and response generation were controlled for. We conclude that the mechanism of VM is distinct from mnemonic and/or serial inhibition-of-return processes as involved in search, although we also discuss possible links to more global and flexible inhibition-of-return processes not necessarily related to search.     

The development of organized visual search

Visual search plays an important role in guiding behavior. Children have more difficulty performing conjunction search tasks than adults. The present research evaluates whether developmental differences in children's ability to organize serial visual search (i.e., search organization skills) contribute to performance limitations in a typical conjunction search task. We evaluated 134 children between the ages of 2 and 17 on separate tasks measuring search for targets defined by a conjunction of features or by distinct features. Our results demonstrated that children organize their visual search better as they get older. As children's skills at organizing visual search improve they become more accurate at locating targets with conjunction of features amongst distractors, but not for targets with distinct features. Developmental limitations in children's abilities to organize their visual search of the environment are an important component of poor conjunction search in young children. In addition, our findings provide preliminary evidence that, like other visuospatial tasks, exposure to reading may influence children's spatial orientation to the visual environment when performing a visual search.     

The influence of stimulus incongruity on the familiarity effect in visual selection

A consistent finding in the literature concerning visual selection is that a stimulus exposed to S subsequently loses some of its potential to elicit looking responses. Studies examining the familiarity effect in visual selection have not systematically examined the influence on that effect of various stimulus characteristics possessed by the familiarized stimulus. The present experiments examined the relationship between the magnitude of the familiarity effect and the level of incongruity represented by the familiarized stimulus and found it to be increasing and monotonie. In addition, Experiment 3 examined the generality of reports that familiarized stimuli are “liked” less than their unfamiliarized counterparts. The ease of explaining the results of the experiments using an “affect change” model of the familiarity effect and an “inforjnation-conflict resolution” model of that effect are discussed.