Visual search

Visual search is a type of perceptual task requiring attention that typically involves an active scan of the visual environment for a particular object or feature (the target) among other objects or features (the distractors). Visual search can take place either with or without eye movements. The ability to consciously locate an object (target) amongst a complex array of stimuli (distractors) has been extensively studied over the past 40 years. Practical examples of this can be seen in everyday life such as picking out a product on a supermarket shelf, animals searching for food amongst piles of leaves, trying to find your friend in a large crowd of people and playing visual search tasks such as Where's Wally? Many visual search paradigms have used eye movements as a means to measure the degree of attention given to stimuli. However, vast research to date suggests that eye movements move independently of attention and therefore is not a reliable method to examine the role of attention. Much of the previous literature on visual search uses reaction time in order to measure the time taken to detect the target amongst its distractors. An example of this could be a green square (target) amongst a set of red circles (distractors).