The Effect Of Task-irrelevant Rewards On Object Attention In Conflict Situation

Object-based attention is a kind of selective attention,which means that in the process of individual attention selection,the object can be selected by attention as a perceptual unit.It can be manifested that the recognition of two or more targets in the same object is faster and more accurate than that between different objects.Previous studies have found that the object-based attention was easily modulated by many factors,such as reward.Reward usually refers to the positive value of an object or a behavior,which can be used as a kind of driving force to promote one’s behavioral performance and learning process.The rewards manipulated by previous studies were mainly taskrelevant rewards,which meant subjects could get reward based on task performance after completing the experimental task.Meanwhile,other studies have found that taskirrelevant rewards could also modulate the object-based attention.The parallel distributed processing model pointed out that both task-relevant information and task-irrelevant information on stimulus could be noticed and processed by the cognitive system.Not only the task-relevant information could activate the task response,but the task-irrelevant information could also activate the corresponding response trend.Conflict situations arised when the response trend conflicted with the task response.Previous studies have shown that task-irrelevant rewards in conflict situations could interfere with behavior and slow down the response speed significantly,but no research has focused on whether and how task-irrelevant reward in conflict situation modulate object-based attention.Therefore,using a variant of the two-rectangle cueing paradigm,this study systematically explored whether and how task-irrelevant rewards modulate the object-based attention in conflict situations through three experiments.The exploration of this study can further enrich the cognitive mechanism about how rewards modulate object-based attention.Experiment 1 adopted a 3(congruency: congruent,conflict,neutral)× 3(validity:valid,invalid same object,invalid different objects)within-subject experimental design,combining the Stroop paradigm and the two-rectangle cueing paradigm,and took color words as targets of two-rectangle cueing paradigm,exploring whether this variant of the two-rectangle cueing paradigm could produce object-based attention effect.It was found that all three congruency conditions produced the object-based attention effect.The result showed that this variant of the two-rectangle cueing paradigm was effective.Experiment2 used 2(reward: rewarded,unrewarded)× 4(congruency: congruent,conflict-rewarded,conflict-unrewarded,neutral)× 3(validity: valid,invalid same object,invalid different objects)within-subject experimental design to explore whether and how task-irrelevant rewards modulate the object-based attention in conflict situation.The results of experiment 2 found that the object-based attention effect appeared under the "conflictunrewarded" condition and disappeared under the "conflict-rewarded" condition for the rewarded color,and the reason for the disappearance was that the response on the invalid same object position was significantly slower.The result showed that the task-irrelevant rewards could modulate the object-based attention by interfering with the response behavior on the invalid same object position under the conflict situations,and had no significant influence on the valid position and the invalid different objects position.Importantly,we found the above phenomenon just in the rewarded colors.For rewarded colors,participants could get reward feedback for each correct response,thus the connection between color and reward would be strengthened in time,and it also became easier for participants to process task-irrelevant color rewards.Accordingly,the effect of task-irrelevant rewards on the object-based attention in conflict situations may be modulated by the strength of the task-irrelevant reward connection.Some researches have shown that the cognitive processing of money is a process that is both rapid and automated.In the process of individual growth,the connection between money and reward has been deeply integrated into daily life,so that individuals can process monetary reward quickly without establishing additional connection.Experiment 3 adopted a 4(congruency:congruent,conflict-high reward,conflict-low reward,neutral)× 3(validity: valid,invalid same object,invalid different objects)within-subject experimental design,which used RMB banknotes marked with black number "1" or "100" as targets to explore whether and how task-irrelevant monetary rewards influence the object-based attention in conflict situations.The results found that there was no object-based attention effect under the "conflict-low reward" condition,while the object-based attention effect was reversed under the "conflict-high reward" condition,and the reason for the reversal was that the response on the invalid same object position was significantly slower.The results showed that task-irrelevant monetary reward could also modulate the object-based attention by interfering with the response behavior on the invalid same object position in conflict situations,and had no significant effect on the valid position and invalid different objects position.The results of experiment 3 are consistent with the results of experiment 2.Based on the above experimental results and discussions,the study draws the following conclusions:(1)Task-irrelevant rewards could modulate the object-based attention in conflict situations.(2)The influence of task-irrelevant rewards on the object-based attention in conflict situations could be modulated by the strength of task-irrelevant reward connection.The higher the strength of task-irrelevant reward connection,the greater the influence on the object-based attention.(3)The influence of task-irrelevant rewards on the object-based attention in conflict situations could be modulated by the size of task-irrelevant rewards.The greater the size of task-irrelevant rewards,the greater the influence on the object-based attention.(4)The facilitative effect of task-relevant rewards on the behavior may be offset by task-irrelevant rewards in conflict situations.