Attending to eye movements and retinal eccentricity: Evidence for the activity distribution model of attention reconsidered

When testing between spotlight and activity distribution models of visual attention, D. LaBerge, R. L. Carlson, J. K. Williams, and B. G. Bunney (1997) used an experimental paradigm in which targets are embedded in 3 brief displays. This paradigm, however, may be confounded by retinal eccentricity effects and saccadic eye movements. When the retinal eccentricities of the targets are equated and eye position is monitored, the pattern of results reported by LaBerge et al., which supported the activity distribution model, is not found. This result underscores the importance of considering targets' eccentricity and people's inclination to make saccadic eye movements in certain types of visual cognition tasks.