Target template and subsequent search misses: The underlying mechanism of multiple-target search errors.

Adamo, Stephen, Orlando FL

Investigators

Abstract

This award was provided as part of NSF's Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences (SBE) Postdoctoral Research Fellowships (SPRF) program and the Perception, Action, and Cognition program. The goal of the SPRF program is to prepare promising, early career doctoral-level scientists for scientific careers in academia, industry or private sector, andgovernment. SPRF awards involve two years of training under the sponsorship of established scientists and encourage Postdoctoral Fellows to perform independent research. NSF seeks to promote the participation of scientists from all segments of the scientific community, including those from underrepresented groups, in its research programs and activities; the postdoctoral period is considered to be an important level of professional development in attaining this goal. Each Postdoctoral Fellow must address important scientific questions that advance their respective disciplinary fields. Under the sponsorship of Dr. Joseph Schmidt and Dr. Mark Neider at the University of Central Florida, this postdoctoral fellowship award supports an early career scientist investigating subsequent search misses (SSMs). SSMs are a pitfall in visual search when observers look for multiple targets in their visual environment. Defined as a decrease in additional target accuracy after detecting a prior target in a visual search, SSMs underlie both real-world search errors (e.g., a radiologist is more likely to miss a smaller tumor if a larger tumor was previously detected) and more simplified, lab-based search errors (e.g., an observer is more likely to miss a target 'T' if a target 'L' was previously detected). Unfortunately, SSMs can account for one-third of radiological errors under certain conditions and little is known about its cognitive underpinnings. This project will investigate an expected cause of SSMs by using simplified and simulated radiological search displays in order to help translate the findings from basic research within visual cognition to cancer detection within radiology. Because SSMs are a real threat within radiology, a better understanding of their cause and ways to mitigate them can save lives. This project will investigate if SSMs occur because a detected, first target is maintained as a target template-an active representation of what the observer is searching for. Within the visual cognition literature, a target template is known to bias observers to find targets that are similar, and consequently, miss targets that are dissimilar to the target template. If a detected target is maintained as a target template, SSMs may occur because critical cognitive processes, necessary for target detection, are processing the first target as a target template, resulting in a failure to detect additional targets. Furthermore, the target template may bias observers to search for targets similar to a first target, consequently making them more likely to miss targets that are dissimilar. Through the use of electroencephalogram (EEG) and eye tracking, the proposed projects will investigate the neural responses associated with detecting a first target, determine if maintenance of a first target as a template causes SSMs, and explore how eye movements towards perceptually similar- and dissimilar-second targets are affected. The proposed projects will then extend these findings back to radiological search displays to determine whether radiologists also show a similar pattern in search performance and eye movements when searching for similar and dissimilar signs of cancer in mammograms (x-ray images of breast tissue). Ultimately, the proposed projects will bridge visual cognition and radiology to elucidate the underlying neural mechanism(s) of SSMs. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.