Distraction driven by reward history: Attentional capture and sequential effects

Values learned through previous experiences of reward can later modulate attentional capture if associated with a distractor in singleton search tasks (value-driven attentional capture; VDAC). Moreover, it has been shown that re-encountering distractor features can facilitate performance or reduce attentional capture (sequential effects). However, little is known about how sequential effects and attentional capture are jointly modulated by learned distractor value. Here, we examined the role of learned reward in sequential modulation of attentional capture. In two experiments we used a VDAC paradigm, varying the type of reward (monetary vs. sustainability-related). After associating letter colors with a high or low reward, or none at all, in a flanker task (learning phase), in a subsequent singleton task (test phase) we manipulated the effects of distractor value of the present and of the previous trial on attentional capture. In both experiments repetition of the same distractor value from trial N-1 to trial N was associated with faster responses, and reward value did not modulate this facilitation. In addition, attentional capture by rewarded, compared with unrewarded, distractors was observed when the preceding trial was unrewarded. Value-signaling distractors, if re-encountered, reduced attentional capture in the current trial, and this happened even for rewarded distractors of different values (e.g., high value followed by low value, and vice versa). These results suggest that, for different forms of incentives, repetition of previously rewarded distractors and attentional capture by the current reward interact in modulating the processing of learned values.