Abstract
Recent research has shown that nonpredictive gaze cues trigger reflexive shifts in attention toward the looked-at location. But just how generalizable is this spatial cuing effect? In particular, are people especially tuned to gaze cues provided by conspecifics, or can comparable shifts in visual attention be triggered by other cue providers and directional cues? To investigate these issues, we used a standard cuing paradigm to compare the attentional orienting produced by different cue providers (i.e., animate vs. inanimate) and directional cues (i.e., eyes vs. arrows). The results of three experiments revealed that attentional orienting was insensitive to both the identity of the cue provider and the nature of the triggering cue. However, compared with arrows, gaze cues prompted a general enhancement in the efficiency of processing operations. We consider the implications of these findings for accounts of reflexive visual orienting.
Article PDF
References
Allison, T., Puce, A., &McCarthy, G. (2000). Social perception from visual cues: Role of the STS region.Trends in Cognitive Sciences,4, 267–278.
Baron-Cohen, S. (1995).Mindblindness: An essay on autism and theory of mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Call, J., Hare, B., &Tomasello, M. (1998). Chimpanzee gaze following in an object choice task.Animal Cognition,1, 89–90.
Deaner, R. O., &Platt, M. L. (2003). Reflexive social attention in monkeys and humans.Current Biology,13, 1609–1613.
Driver, J., Davis, G., Ricciardelli, P., Kidd, P., Maxwell, E., &Baron-Cohen, S. (1999). Gaze perception triggers visuospatial orienting by adults in a reflexive manner.Visual Cognition,6, 509–540.
Emery, N. J. (2000). The eyes have it: The neuroethology, function and evolution of social gaze.Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews,24, 581–604.
Friesen, C. K., &Kingstone, A. (1998). The eyes have it! Reflexive orienting is triggered by nonpredictive gaze.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,5, 490–495.
Friesen, C. K., &Kingstone, A. (2003). Abrupt onsets and gaze direction cues trigger independent reflexive attentional effects.Cognition,87, 1–10.
Goren, C. C., Sarty, M., &Wu, P. Y. (1975). Visual following and pattern discrimination of face-like stimuli by newborn infants.Pediatrics,56, 544–549.
Haxby, J. V., Hoffman, E. A., &Gobbini, M. I. (2000). The distributed human neural system for face perception.Trends in Cognitive Sciences,4, 223–233.
Hietanen, J. K. (1999). Does your gaze direction and head orientation shift my visual attention?NeuroReport,10, 3443–3447.
Hoffman, E. A., &Haxby, J. V. (2000). Distinct representations of eye gaze and identity in the distributed human neural system for face processing.Nature Neuroscience,3, 80–84.
Hood, B. M., Willen, J. D., &Driver, J. (1998). Adults’ eyes trigger shifts of visual attention in human infants.Psychological Science,9, 131–134.
Johnson, M. H., Dziurawiec, S., Ellis, H., &Morton, J. (1991). Newborns’ preferential tracking of face-like stimuli and its subsequent decline.Cognition,40, 1–19.
Kingstone, A., Friesen, C. K., &Gazzaniga, M. S. (2000). Reflexive joint attention depends on lateralized cortical connections.Psychological Science,11, 159–166.
Kingstone, A., Smilek, D., Ristic, J., Friesen, C. K., &Eastwood, J. D. (2003). Attention, researchers! It is time to take a look at the real world.Current Directions in Psychological Science,12, 176–180.
Kleinke, C. L. (1986). Gaze and eye contact: A research review.Psychological Bulletin,100, 78–100.
Langton, S. R. H., &Bruce, V. (1999). Reflexive social orienting.Visual Cognition,6, 541–567.
Langton, S. R. H., Watt, R. J., &Bruce, V. (2000). Do the eyes have it? Cues to the direction of social attention.Trends in Cognitive Sciences,4, 50–59.
Macrae, C. N., Hood, B. M., Milne, A. B., Rowe, A. C., &Mason, M. F. (2002). Are you looking at me? Eye gaze and person perception.Psychological Science,13, 460–464.
Miklosi, A., Polgardi, R., Topal, J., &Csanyi, V. (1998). Use of experimenter-given cues in dogs.Animal Cognition,1, 113–121.
Morton, J., &Johnson, M. H. (1991). CONSPEC and CONLERN: A two-process theory of infant face recognition.Psychological Review,98, 164–181.
Müller, H. J., &Rabbitt, P. M. A. (1989). Reflexive and voluntary orienting of visual attention: Time course of activation and resistance to interruption.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance,15, 315–330.
Perrett, D. I., Hietanen, J. K., Oram, M. W., &Benson, P. J. (1992). Organization and functions of cells responsive to faces in the temporal cortex.Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London: Series B,335, 23–30.
Perrett, D. I., Smith, P. A., Potter, D. D., Mistlin, A. J., Head, A. S., Milner, A. D., &Jeeves, M. A. (1985). Visual cells in the temporal cortex sensitive to face view and gaze direction.Proceedings of the Royal Society of London: Series B,223, 293–317.
Posner, M. I. (1980). Orienting of attention.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,32, 3–25.
Povinelli, D. J., &Eddy, T. J. (1996). Chimpanzees: Joint visual attention.Psychological Science,7, 129–135.
Povinelli, D. J., &Eddy, T. J. (1997). Specificity of gaze-following in young chimpanzees.British Journal of Developmental Psychology,15, 213–222.
Puce, A., Allison, T., Bentin, S., Gore, J. C., &McCarthy, G. (1998). Temporal cortex activation in humans viewing eye and mouth movements.Journal of Neuroscience,18, 2188–2199.
Ristic, J., Friesen, C. K., &Kingstone, A. (2002). Are eyes special? It depends on how you look at it.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,9, 507–513.
Schuller, A.-M., &Rossion, B. (2001). Spatial attention triggered by eye gaze increases and speeds up early visual acuity.NeuroReport,12, 2381–2386.
Tipples, J. (2002). Eye gaze is not unique: Automatic orienting in response to uninformative arrows.Psychonomic Bulletin & Review,9, 314–318.
Tomasello, M., Call, J., &Hare, B. (1998). Five primate species follow the visual gaze of conspecifics.Animal Behaviour,55, 1063–1069.
von Grünau, M., &Anston, C. (1995). The detection of gaze direction: A stare-in-the-crowd effect.Perception,24, 1297–1313.
Wicker, B., Michel, F., Henaff, M. A., &Decety, J. (1998). Brain regions involved in the perception of gaze: A PET study.NeuroImage,8, 221–227.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Quadflieg, S., Mason, M.F. & Macrae, C.N. The owl and the pussycat: Gaze cues and visuospatial orienting. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 11, 826–831 (2004). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03196708
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03196708