Studies of voluntary visual attention: Theory, methods, and psychometric issues

Abstract

The paper discusses the study of voluntary visual attention (VVA), a relatively new area of active experimentation. VVA concerns "natural" viewing behavior or visual browsing when the subject is under no constraints regarding the distribution of attention. This is contrasted with traditional studies of directed visual attention, such as the typical study of visual judgment in tachistoscopic research. Discussed are (1) the logic of investigating VVA, (2) a comprehensive set of constructs that are thought to be of theoretical importance, (3) methods for calibrating these variables in terms of treatment parameters, (4) the logic of scaling both independent and dependent variables, (5) a summary of salient findings, (6) some recent findings not previously reported, and (7) an overview of the psychometric issues in the study of VVA.