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. 2014:2014:183924.
doi: 10.1155/2014/183924. Epub 2014 Jul 3.

Inhibition of return in fear of spiders: discrepant eye movement and reaction time data

Elisa Berdica  1 , Antje B M Gerdes  1 , Andre Pittig  1 , Georg W Alpers  1
Affiliations

Inhibition of return in fear of spiders: discrepant eye movement and reaction time data

Elisa Berdica et al. J Ophthalmol. 2014.

Abstract

Inhibition of return (IOR) refers to a bias against returning the attention to a previously attended location. As a foraging facilitator it is thought to facilitate systematic visual search. With respect to neutral stimuli, this is generally thought to be adaptive, but when threatening stimuli appear in our environment, such a bias may be maladaptive. This experiment investigated the influence of phobia-related stimuli on the IOR effect using a discrimination task. A sample of 50 students (25 high, 25 low in spider fear) completed an IOR task including schematic representations of spiders or butterflies as targets. Eye movements were recorded and to assess discrimination among targets, participants indicated with button presses if targets were spiders or butterflies. Reaction time data did not reveal a significant IOR effect but a significant interaction of group and target; spider fearful participants were faster to respond to spider targets than to butterflies. Furthermore, eye-tracking data showed a robust IOR effect independent of stimulus category. These results offer a more comprehensive assessment of the motor and oculomotor factors involved in the IOR effect.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Example of the stimuli used in the experiment.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Sequence of events in a valid and invalid trial: (A) two empty frames appeared on the left and right of the fixation cross; (B) cue was presented for 200 ms in one of the frames; (C) two empty frames appeared again for 400 ms or 800 ms; (D) target stimulus was presented in the cued or uncued location.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Eye-tracking data—mean entry time on target area in milliseconds for the control group and spider fearful group for the 400 ms SOA (a) separately for spider and butterfly targets and for the 800 ms SOA (b). Bars represent the standard error of the mean.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Mean reaction time in milliseconds for the control group and spider fearful group for the 400 ms SOA (a) separately for spider and butterfly targets and for the 800 ms SOA (b). Bars represent the standard error of the mean.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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