Louisa Kulke

Automatic Detection of Attention Shifts in Infancy: Eye Tracking in the Fixation Shift Paradigm.

This study measured changes in switches of attention between 1 and 9 months of age in 67 typically developing infants. Remote eye-tracking (Tobii X120) was used to measure saccadic latencies, related to switches of fixation, as a measure of shifts of attention, from a central stimulus to a peripheral visual target, measured in the Fixation Shift Paradigm. Fixation shifts occur later if the central fixation stimulus stays visible when the peripheral target appears (competition condition), than if the central stimulus disappears as the peripheral target appears (non-competition condition). This difference decreases with age. Our results show significantly faster disengagement in infants over 4 months than in the younger group, and provide more precise measures of fixation shifts, than behavioural observation with the same paradigm. Reduced saccadic latencies in the course of a test session indicate a novel learning effect. The Fixation Shift Paradigm combined with remote eye-tracking measures showed improved temporal and spatial accuracy compared to direct observation by a trained observer, and allowed an increased number of trials in a short testing time. This makes it an infant-friendly non-invasive procedure, involving minimal observational training, suitable for use in future studies of clinical populations to detect early attentional abnormalities in the first few months of life.

Is Implicit Theory of Mind a Real and Robust Phenomenon? Results From a Systematic Replication Study:

Recently, theory-of-mind research has been revolutionized by findings from novel implicit tasks suggesting that at least some aspects of false-belief reasoning develop earlier in ontogeny than previously assumed and operate automatically throughout adulthood. Although these findings are the empirical basis for far-reaching theories, systematic replications are still missing. This article reports a preregistered large-scale attempt to replicate four influential anticipatory-looking implicit theory-of-mind tasks using original stimuli and procedures. Results showed that only one of the four paradigms was reliably replicated. A second set of studies revealed, further, that this one paradigm was no longer replicated once confounds were removed, which calls its validity into question. There were also no correlations between paradigms, and thus, no evidence for their convergent validity. In conclusion, findings from anticipatory-looking false-belief paradigms seem less reliable and valid than previously assumed, thus limiting the conclusions that can be drawn from them.

Implicit Theory of Mind – An overview of current replications and non-replications

The current dataset contains a qualitative summary of (non-)replication studies of implicit Theory of Mind paradigms. It summarizes for each paradigm, how many replications, partial replications and non-replications were identified and how many of them were published or unpublished. Furthermore, descriptive data and sample sizes are reported. The dataset provides a qualitative overview of the published and unpublished findings in implicit Theory of Mind research.

Neural Differences between Covert and Overt Attention Studied using EEG with Simultaneous Remote Eye Tracking

Research on neural mechanisms of attention has generally instructed subjects to direct attention covertly while maintaining a fixed gaze. This study combined simultaneous eye tracking and electroencephalogram (EEG) to measure neural attention responses during exogenous cueing in overt attention shifts (with saccadic eye movements to a target) and compared these with covert attention shifts (responding manually while maintaining central fixation). EEG analysis of the period preceding the saccade latency showed similar occipital response amplitudes for overt and covert shifts, although response latencies differed. However, a frontal positivity was greater during covert attention shifts, possibly reflecting saccade inhibition to maintain fixation. The results show that combined EEG and eye tracking can be successfully used to study natural overt shifts of attention (applicable to non-verbal infants) and that requiring inhibition of saccades can lead to additional frontal responses. Such data can be used to refine current neural models of attention that have been mainly based on covert shifts.

Implicit reward associations impact face processing: Time-resolved evidence from event-related brain potentials and pupil dilations

&NA; The present study aimed at investigating whether associated motivational salience causes preferential processing of inherently neutral faces similar to emotional expressions by means of event‐related brain potentials (ERPs) and changes of the pupil size. To this aim, neutral faces were implicitly associated with monetary outcome, while participants (N = 44) performed a face‐matching task with masked primes that ensured performance around chance level and thus an equal proportion of gain, loss, and zero outcomes. During learning, motivational context strongly impacted the processing of the fixation, prime and mask stimuli prior to the target face, indicated by enhanced amplitudes of subsequent ERP components and increased pupil size. In a separate test session, previously associated faces as well as novel faces with emotional expressions were presented within the same task but without motivational context and performance feedback. Most importantly, previously gain‐associated faces amplified the LPC, although the individually contingent face‐outcome assignments were not made explicit during the learning session. Emotional expressions impacted the N170 and EPN components. Modulations of the pupil size were absent in both motivationally‐associated and emotional conditions. Our findings demonstrate that neural representations of neutral stimuli can acquire increased salience via implicit learning, with an advantage for gain over loss associations. HighlightsMotivational salience was acquired through implicit associative learning.A masked prime‐face‐matching task allowed equal proportion of gain/loss outcomes.During learning, motivational incentives boosted sensory encoding of visual stimuli.Changes in pupil size reflected increased attention and arousal in motivational contexts.During next day testing, gain‐associated faces amplified centro‐parietal ERPs.

Money or smiles: Independent ERP effects of associated monetary reward and happy faces

In comparison to neutral faces, facial expressions of emotion are known to gain attentional prioritization, mainly demonstrated by means of event-related potentials (ERPs). Recent evidence indicated that such a preferential processing can also be elicited by neutral faces when associated with increased motivational salience via reward. It remains, however, an open question whether impacts of inherent emotional salience and associated motivational salience might be integrated. To this aim, expressions and monetary outcomes were orthogonally combined. Participants (N = 42) learned to explicitly categorize happy and neutral faces as either reward- or zero-outcome-related via an associative learning paradigm. ERP components (P1, N170, EPN, and LPC) were measured throughout the experiment, and separately analyzed before (learning phase) and after (consolidation phase) reaching a pre-defined learning criterion. Happy facial expressions boosted early processing stages, as reflected in enhanced amplitudes of the N170 and EPN, both during learning and consolidation. In contrast, effects of monetary reward became evident only after successful learning and in form of enlarged amplitudes of the LPC, a component linked to higher-order evaluations. Interactions between expressions and associated outcome were absent in all ERP components of interest. The present study provides novel evidence that acquired salience impacts stimulus processing but independent of the effects driven by happy facial expressions.

The Effect of Stimulus Size and Eccentricity on Attention Shift Latencies

The ability to shift attention between relevant stimuli is crucial in everyday life and allows us to focus on relevant events. It develops during early childhood and is often impaired in clinical populations, as can be investigated in the fixation shift paradigm and the gap–overlap paradigm. Different tests use stimuli of different sizes presented at different eccentricities, making it difficult to compare them. This study systematically investigates the effect of eccentricity and target size on refixation latencies towards target stimuli. Eccentricity and target size affected attention shift latencies with greatest latencies to big targets that were presented at a small eccentricity. Slowed responses to large parafoveal targets are in line with the idea that specific areas in the superior colliculus can lead to inhibition of eye movements. Findings suggest that the two different paradigms are generally comparable, as long as the target is scaled in proportion to the eccentricity.

Implicit Theory of Mind across the life span – Anticipatory looking data

In this work, we present a collection of data from three replication studies of anticipatory looking false belief tasks measuring implicit Theory of Mind. Two paradigms, by Southgate & Senju and Surian & Geraci were replicated in two independent labs. Eye-tracking data was collected and processed in line with the original procedures to allow for an investigation of effects of false belief processing on looking times and first saccades.

Cortical mechanisms of visual attention: combining insights from eye-tracking and EEG

1) Morgan et al (1996). PNAS, 93(10), 4770-4774. 2) Klein, Raschke, & Brandenbusch (2003). Psychophysiology, 40(1), 17-282. 3) Posner, (1980). Quarterly journal of experimental psychology, 32(1), 3-25. Cortical mechanisms of visual attention: Combining insights from eye-tracking and EEG Louisa Kulke1,3, Ankita Agharkar1, Megan Gawryszewski1, John Wattam-Bell1, Janette Atkinson1, Oliver Braddick2 1Visual Development Unit, Department of Developmental Science, UCL 2Department of Experimental Psychology, Oxford University 3Contact: louisa.kulke.12@ucl.ac.uk