Time course of attentional shift in response to another person’s gaze direction M Ogawa1, T Seno2, H Ito3, S Sunaga3 |
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1Graduated School of Design, Kyushu University, Japan |
| The gaze direction and head orientation can capture an observer’s attention. We investigated when this capture occurs, employing three-frame stimuli; in the first frame, a face with the straight gaze was presented. In the second frame, the eyes, head or both of them were presented as 30 deg rotated images for 40 ms. Finally, in the third frame, the eyes and head were presented as 60 deg and 30 deg rotated images, respectively, in the same direction as that in the second frame. We examined which frame was important for the observer’s attentional shift. The task of the observers was to respond to a target which appeared in the left or right of the visual field as quickly and correctly as possible. The results showed that the direction of gaze or head contributed to shortening reaction times when the eye/head rotation direction and the target direction were congruent in the second frame. The third frame further shortened the reaction times in the congruent condition. We conclude that an observer’s attention was captured at the beginning of the eye/head rotation with a short latency and that the attentional shift was further strengthened by the following eye/head rotation. |
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