The effect of reward and punishment on the extinction of attentional capture elicited by value-related stimuli.

ABSTRACT: Particular features of the stimuli that predict significant outcomes tend to capture our attention in a rather automatic and inflexible way. This form of attention has been described as a Pavlovian bias that mimics the phenomenon of sign-tracking described in animals, where reward-predictive cues become motivational magnets. In humans, Value-Modulated Attentional Capture (VMAC) refers to a phenomenon where distractors that signal high-value outcomes receive higher attentional priority. VMAC is particularly difficult to extinguish, showing a similar persistence often described in animal sign-tracking. In the present study, we evaluated to what extent VMAC would persist using a more specific extinction procedure than previous research, where instead of removing the possibility of obtaining r

SUBMITTER: Garre-Frutos F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12003608 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature