The control of fixation duration in visual search

A study is reported how fixation durations are affected as observers voluntarily use information in the visual environment to direct saccades in search of a target. In experiments with direction-coded displays, search fixation durations for correct and incorrectly directed saccades were comparable during image-driven/bottom-up search. In contrast, for knowledge-driven search, the relationship depended on peripheral preview. With ample access to peripheral preview, search fixation durations preceding correct saccades were shorter than those preceding incorrectly directed saccades. However, they were longer when preview was constrained by a gaze-contingent moving window. Fixation control was modeled as sigmoid functions.