Item

Abstract

Our ability to see meaningful actions when presented with point-light traces of human
movement is commonly referred to as the perception of biological motion. While traditional
explanations have emphasized the spontaneous and automatic nature of this ability, more
recent findings suggest that attention may play a larger role than is typically assumed. In
two studies we show that the speed and accuracy of responding to point-light stimuli is
highly correlated with the ability to control selective attention. In our first experiment we
measured thresholds for determining the walking direction of a masked point-light figure, and
performance on a range of attention-related tasks in the same set of observers. Mask-density
thresholds for the direction discrimination task varied quite considerably from observer to
observer and this variation was highly correlated with performance on both Stroop and flanker
interference tasks. Other components of attention, such as orienting, alerting and visual search
efficiency, showed no such relationship. In a second experiment, we examined the relationship
between the ability to determine the orientation of unmasked point-light actions and Stroop
interference, again finding a strong correlation. Our results are consistent with previous
research suggesting that biological motion processing may requite attention, and specifically
implicate networks of attention related to executive control and selection.