Katherine S. Moore¹ (), Victoria Fedorko², Gabriel Conn¹, Zoe Kempf¹, Zephyr Markley¹; ¹Arcadia University, ²University of Chicago

When conducting a visual search (e.g., for green letters), distractors that share features with targets (e.g., green digits) automatically capture attention, a phenomenon known as contingent attentional capture. A related phenomenon, set-specific capture, occurs when people search for more than one target type simultaneously (e.g., green letters and orange letters). Set-specific capture costs are greater than contingent capture costs when a distractor (e.g., a green digit) matches one attentional set, but the target on that trial is from a different attentional set (e.g., an orange letter). Target identification is also affected by selection history. In particular, inter-trial priming refers to the phenomenon in which the presence of a target or a distractor sharing target features on the previous trial affects performance on the current trial. Attentional selection is superior when targets and distractors have similar characteristics from one trial to the next. Here, we investigate the effects of inter-trial priming on both forms of attentional capture. In five experiments, participants searched for green and orange letters appearing in a heterogeneously colored rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP). Distractors matching the target on that trial or the other target color appeared before the targets in the RSVP, at varying time lags. Trials containing both targets and distractors were always preceded by a trial with only a target or only a distractor item. We replicated both kinds of capture. Moreover, we found that performance was improved by a target-color matching prime on the previous trial, regardless of whether the prime was a distractor or a target. These primes had a profound effect on performance, even though prior studies have shown capture effects to be shorter-lived. These findings suggest that the timing target set enhancement from attentional capture may last longer than previously thought.