Uncovering mechanisms of attentional control by tracking preparatory states in real time

我们对外部世界的感知，以及我们与外部物体和事件互动的方式，不仅取决于传入的感官信息，还取决于我们的期望和意图。我们不仅仅是感知信号的被动接受者--通常情况下，我们已经为预期的东西和在特定情况下相关的东西做好了准备。做好准备可以让我们更有效地处理我们的环境，把我们的注意力集中在重要的事情上，过滤掉其他可以安全忽略的信息。很明显，准备是人类认知最重要的方面之一--它塑造了我们的意识体验，并指导我们与世界的互动。然而，我们对如何为即将到来的任务做准备仍然知之甚少。其原因是，准备状态的激活是一种内在的心理现象，通常发生在没有任何直接可观察到的行为的情况下。因此，这种状态很难用实验心理学传统的基于表现的措施来评估。在这个项目中，我们将直接测量准备状态，当它们发生时，通过记录观察者在准备即将到来的视觉搜索任务时的大脑活动（EEG）。在这些任务中，他们必须在多个不相关的对象（干扰物）中搜索特定的已知目标对象。他们可以通过激活这个目标物体的心理表征来准备搜索，这将有助于在目标出现时引导他们的注意力。我们最近开发了新的方法来直接测量这种预备性的“头脑中的图像”，当它们被激活时，并在真实的时间内跟踪这些激活状态。因此，我们现在可以直接观察准备何时开始以及它如何随时间变化。我们还可以确定这些预备状态的内容。例如，当我们准备在凌乱的桌子上寻找我们的移动的手机时，我们是激活了整个物体的心理图像，还是仅仅激活了这个物体的特定属性，如它的颜色或形状？我们能控制我们准备的内容，并在不同的情况下故意采用不同的准备策略吗？例如，我们是否因为与动机相关的任务目标与更高的奖励相关联而更有效地准备任务目标？当任务目标突然改变时，我们能多快地改变受影响的准备状态？重要的是，我们还将调查准备和选择性注意失败之间的联系。我们经常找不到我们要找的东西，或者注意力被不相关的物体和事件分散。通过比较在随后的注意选择有效运作的场合和不有效运作的场合下测量的准备状态，我们可以发现准备状态的波动如何产生不同的行为结果。 我们如何为当前相关的物体和事件做准备的问题对于选择性注意的心理学理论很重要，因此我们的研究将对注意力研究具有重要的理论和概念意义。虽然该项目侧重于基础研究问题，但从长远来看，这项研究的见解也可能与更多的应用问题相关。在现代技术发达的社会中，生活的一个关键特征是多个信息源之间无处不在的竞争，这导致了对注意对象选择和选择的永久性要求。对准备状态的性质以及这些状态如何决定我们关注什么以及何时关注的新见解，对养育子女、教育、工作场所设计和经济决策等不同领域都有明确的实际影响，也可能为调查注意力控制缺陷（如ADHD）提供新的方法。

Our perception of the outside world, and the way that we interact with external objects and events, is not just determined by incoming sensory information, but also by our expectations and intentions. We are not merely passive recipients of perceptual signals - very often, we are already prepared for what to expect and for what will be relevant in a given situation. Being prepared allows us to deal with our environment more effectively, by focussing our attention on what is important, and filtering out other information that can be safely ignored. It is obvious that preparation is one of the most important aspects of human cognition - it shapes our conscious experience and guides our interactions with the world. However, we still know very little about how we prepare for upcoming tasks. The reason for this is that the activation of preparatory states is an internal mental phenomenon that usually takes place in the absence of any directly observable behaviour. Such states are therefore difficult to assess with the conventional performance-based measures of experimental psychology. In this project, we will measure preparatory states directly, while they occur, by recording brain activity (EEG) from observers when they prepare for upcoming visual search tasks. In these tasks, they have to search for a specific known target object among multiple irrelevant objects (distractors). They can prepare for search by activating a mental representation of this target object, which will then help to guide their attention to the target when it appears. We have recently developed new methods to measure such preparatory "images in the mind" directly, at the moment when they are activated, and to track these activation states in real time. We can therefore now directly observe when preparation starts and how it changes across time. We can also determine the content of such preparatory states. For example, when we prepare to search for our mobile phone on our cluttered desk, do we activate a mental image of the whole object, or just a specific attribute of this object, such as its colour or shape? Can we control the content of what we prepare for, and deliberately employ different preparation strategies in different contexts? For example, do we prepare more effectively for task goals that are motivationally relevant, because they are associated with a higher reward? How quickly can we change preparatory states affected when task goals suddenly change? Importantly, we will also investigate links between preparation and failures of selective attention. We often fail to find what we are looking for, or attention can be distracted by irrelevant objects and events. By comparing preparatory states measured on an occasion where subsequent attentional selection operates efficiently and on an occasion where it does not, we can find out how fluctuations in preparedness produce different behavioural outcomes. The question how we prepare for currently relevant objects and events is important for psychological theories of selective attention, and our research will therefore have important theoretical and conceptual implications for attention research. Although this project focuses on basic research questions, it is likely that in the longer term, the insights from this research will also become relevant for more applied questions. A key feature of life in modern technologically advanced societies is the ubiquitous competition between multiple sources of information, which result in permanent demands on attentional object selection and choice. New insights into the nature of preparatory states and how these states determine what we attend to and when has clear practical implications for areas as diverse as parenting, education, workplace design, and economic decision making, and may also offer new ways of investigating deficits of attentional control, such as ADHD.