CCN meeting | Daniela Gresch (LMU Munich, Germany) & Anaïs Servais (University of Liège, Belgium), invited by Gilles Pourtois

*Daniela Gresch:
Behavioural and neural markers of shifting and distributing attention across domains 

Efficient goal-directed behaviour requires attention to be dynamically and selectively directed towards task-relevant information, whether that information is present in the external world or maintained internally in memory. Accordingly, attention can be classified by the domain in which it operates – either perception (external attention) or memory (internal attention). Because external and internal attention have typically been studied in isolation, we are only beginning to understand how attention is coordinated across these domains. In this talk, I will present two lines of work examining this coordination: one focusing on sequential shifts of attention between perception and working memory, and the other one on the simultaneous distribution of attention across both domains. Both lines of research used a combined perception and working-memory task in which retro-cues directed attention to previously encoded working-memory items, whereas pre-cues directed attention to upcoming perceptual items. By presenting these cues either sequentially or simultaneously, we were able to examine attentional shifting and distribution across versus within domains. Behavioural, gaze, and M/EEG measures provided complementary indices of cross-domain attention, capturing performance outcomes, time-resolved spatial orienting, and decodable neural dynamics. Together, our findings demonstrate that external and internal attention can be flexibly coordinated. However, our results also show that this flexibility comes at a cost: cross-domain coordination can impair behaviour and engages neural dynamics that differ from those supporting attentional shifts or distribution within a single domain.

*Anais Servais:
Investigating gaze aversion as a marker of attentional switching from the external environment to memory

Attention can be directed either toward the external world (e.g., when reading this abstract) or toward the internal mental world (e.g., when remembering what talk you attended to during the last seminar). Internal attention is involved in many cognitive activities, including memory retrieval and mind-wandering. Because attentional resources are limited, external and internal attention compete, requiring frequent switches between the two. A switch toward the internal world is typically accompanied by disengagement from the external environment, a phenomenon known as perceptual decoupling. Identifying an objective behavioral or physiological marker of this attentional switch would therefore be valuable, particularly in contexts where attention needs to be maintained toward the external world. Eye movements are promising candidates, as internal attention is often associated with ocular behaviors that reduce visual processing, including gaze aversion. Here, bridging theories of attention, autobiographical memory, mind-wandering, and eye-movement research, we propose a hypothetical framework in which gaze aversion (i.e., the direction of gaze toward a neutral space during memory recall) may serve as a behavioral marker of the switch from external to internal attention at the single-trial level. Although common and widespread, this behavior has rarely been examined scientifically. We first conducted two online experiments (N = 160), showing that averted gaze is used as a social cue to distinguish states of internal and external attention. We then conducted a behavioral eye-tracking study during autobiographical memory retrieval (N = 32). The results supported a relationship between gaze aversion and the attentional switch to memory. They also provided an initial characterization of gaze aversion, showing that it lasts approximately six seconds on average, is not accompanied by head movement, and occurs in multiple directions. Although further work is needed to refine these markers, the present findings suggest that gaze aversion may constitute a promising behavioral indicator of the transition from external to internal attention.