Altered vision near the hands

The present study explored the manner in which hand position may affect visual processing. We studied three classic visual attention tasks (visual search, inhibition of return, and attentional blink) during which the participants held their hands either near the stimulus display, or far from the dis...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Cognition 2008-06, Vol.107 (3), p.1035-1047
Main Authors: Abrams, Richard A., Davoli, Christopher C., Du, Feng, Knapp, William H., Paull, Daniel
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Action
Activity levels. Psychomotricity
Attention
Attentional Blink
Biological and medical sciences
Body
Cognitive Processes
Cognitive psychology
Evaluation
Eye Movements
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Hand
Human Body
Humans
Inhibition of return
Movement
Observation
Perception
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Psychomotor activities
Reaching
Reaction Time
Reading Difficulties
Senses
Sight
Vigilance. Attention. Sleep
Vision
Vision, Ocular
Visual attention
Visual Perception
Visual search
Visual Stimuli
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The present study explored the manner in which hand position may affect visual processing. We studied three classic visual attention tasks (visual search, inhibition of return, and attentional blink) during which the participants held their hands either near the stimulus display, or far from the display. Remarkably, the hands altered visual processing: people shifted their attention between items more slowly when their hands were near the display. The same results were observed for both visible and invisible hands. This enhancement in vision for objects near the hands reveals a mechanism that could facilitate the detailed evaluation of objects for potential manipulation, or the assessment of potentially dangerous objects for a defensive response.
ISSN:0010-0277
1873-7838
DOI:10.1016/j.cognition.2007.09.006