Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Letter
  • Published:

Involuntary orienting to sound improves visual perception

Nature volume 407, pages 906–908 (2000)Cite this article

Abstract

To perceive real-world objects and events, we need to integrate several stimulus features belonging to different sensory modalities. Although the neural mechanisms and behavioural consequences of intersensory integration have been extensively studied1,2,3,4, the processes that enable us to pay attention to multimodal objects are still poorly understood. An important question is whether a stimulus in one sensory modality automatically attracts attention to spatially coincident stimuli that appear subsequently in other modalities, thereby enhancing their perceptual salience. The occurrence of an irrelevant sound does facilitate motor responses to a subsequent light appearing nearby5,6,7. However, because participants in previous studies made speeded responses rather than psychophysical judgements, it remains unclear whether involuntary auditory attention actually affects the perceptibility of visual stimuli as opposed to postperceptual decision and response processes. Here we provide psychophysical evidence that a sudden sound improves the detectability of a subsequent flash appearing at the same location. These data show that the involuntary orienting of attention to sound enhances early perceptual processing of visual stimuli.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Experimental set-up.
Figure 2: Mean data over all participants from experiment 1.
Figure 3: Mean data over all participants from experiment 2.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Bertelson, P. & Aschersleben, G. Automatic visual bias of perceived auditory location. Psychon. Bull. Rev. 5, 482–489 (1998).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Stein, B. E., London, N, Wilkinson, L. K. & Price, D. D. Enhancement of perceived visual intensity by auditory stimuli: A psychophysical analysis. J. Cog. Neurosci. 8, 497– 506 (1996).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Stein, B. E. & Meredith, M. A. The Merging of the Senses (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1993).

    Google Scholar 

  4. Welch, R. B. & Warren, D. H. in Handbook of Perception and Human Performance Vol. 1 (eds Boff, K. R., Kaufman, L. & Thomas, J. P.) 251, 25–36 (Wiley, New York, 1986).

    Google Scholar 

  5. McDonald, J. J. & Ward, L. M. Involuntary listening aids seeing: Evidence from human electrophysiology. Psychol. Sci. 11, 167–171 ( 2000).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Schmitt, M., Postma, A. & de Haan, E. Interactions between exogenous auditory and visual spatial attention. Q. J. Exp. Psychol. A 53, 105 –130 (2000).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Spence, C. & Driver, J. Audiovisual links in exogenous covert spatial orienting. Percept. Psychophys. 59, 1–22 (1997).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Mondor, T. A. & Amirault, K. J. Effect of same- and different-modality spatial cues on auditory and visual target identification. J. Exp. Psychol. Hum. Percept. Perform. 24, 745– 755 (1998).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Ward, L. M., McDonald, J. J. & Golestani, N. in Visual Attention (ed. Wright, R.) 232 –268 (Oxford Univ., New York, 1998 ).

    Google Scholar 

  10. Ward, L. M. Supramodal and modality-specific mechanisms for stimulus-driven shifts of auditory and visual attention. Can. J. Exp. Psychol. 48, 242–259 (1994).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Ward, L. M., McDonald, J. J. & Lin, D. On asymmetries in crossmodal spatial attention orienting. Percept. Psychophys. 62, 1258– 1264 (2000)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Driver, J. & Spence, C. Attention and the crossmodal construction of space. Trends Cog. Sci. 2, 254– 262 (1998).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Driver, J. & Spence, C. Crossmodal attention. Curr. Opin. Neurobiol. 8, 245–253 (1998).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Sperling, G. & Dosher, B. A. in Handbook of Perception and Performance Vol. 1 (eds Boff, K. R., Kaufman, L. & Thomsas, J. P.) Ch. 2.1, 2–65 (Wiley, New York, 1986).

    Google Scholar 

  15. Shiu, L. & Pashler, H. Negligible effect of spatial precuing on identification of single digits. J. Exp. Psychol. Hum. Percept. Perform. 20, 1037–1054 ( 1994).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Pashler, H. E. The Psychology of Attention (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1998).

    Google Scholar 

  17. Green, D. M. & Swets, J. A. Signal Detection Theory and Psychophysics (Wiley, New York, 1966).

    Google Scholar 

  18. Luck, S. J., Hillyard, S. A., Mouloua, M. & Hawkins, H. L. Mechanisms of visual-spatial attention: Resource allocation or uncertainty reduction? J. Exp. Psychol. Hum. Percept. Perform. 22, 725–737 (1996).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Luck, S. J. & Thomas, S. J. What variety of attention is automatically captured by peripheral cues? Percept. Psychophys. 61 , 1424–1435 (1999).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  20. Santee, J. L. & Egeth, H. E. Do reaction time and accuracy measure the same aspects of letter recognition? J. Exp. Psychol. Hum. Percept. Perform. 8, 489–501 ( 1982).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  21. Meredith, M. A., Nemitz, J. W. & Stein, B. E. Determinants of multisensory integration in superior colliculus neurons. I. Temporal factors. J. Neurosci. 7, 3215–3229 (1987).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Dufour, A. Importance of attentional mechanisms in audiovisual links. Exp. Brain. Res. 126, 215–222 (1999).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  23. Mills, A. W. On the minimum audible angle. J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 30 , 237–246 (1958).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank D. Heraldez for research assistance, M. M. Marlow for computer assistance and L. Anllo-Vento for comments on the manuscript. This work was supported by grants from the National Institute of Health.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Neurosciences, School of Medicine, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, 92093-0608, California, USA

    John J. McDonald, Wolfgang A. Teder-Sälejärvi & Steven A. Hillyard

Authors
  1. John J. McDonald
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Wolfgang A. Teder-Sälejärvi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Steven A. Hillyard
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to John J. McDonald.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

McDonald, J., Teder-Sälejärvi, W. & Hillyard, S. Involuntary orienting to sound improves visual perception. Nature 407, 906–908 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/35038085

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/35038085

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing