TY - JOUR AU - Yook, Jane AU - Hogendoorn, Hinze AU - Fink, Gereon R. AU - Vossel, Simone AU - Weidner, Ralph TI - When visual attention is divided in the flash-lag effect JO - Journal of vision VL - 24 IS - 9 SN - 1534-7362 CY - Rockville, Md. PB - ARVO M1 - FZJ-2024-05458 SP - 17 - PY - 2024 AB - The flash-lag effect (FLE) occurs when a flash's position seems to be delayed relative to a continuously moving object, even though both are physically aligned. Although several studies have demonstrated that reduced attention increases FLE magnitude, the precise mechanism underlying these attention-dependent effects remains elusive. In this study, we investigated the influence of visual attention on the FLE by manipulating the level of attention allocated to multiple stimuli moving simultaneously in different locations. Participants were cued to either focus on one moving stimulus or split their attention among two, three, or four moving stimuli presented in different quadrants. We measured trial-wise FLE to explore potential changes in the magnitude of perceived displacement and its trial-to-trial variability under different attention conditions. Our results reveal that FLE magnitudes were significantly greater when attention was divided among multiple stimuli compared with when attention was focused on a single stimulus, suggesting that divided attention considerably augments the perceptual illusion. However, FLE variability, measured as the coefficient of variation, did not differ between conditions, indicating that the consistency of the illusion is unaffected by divided attention. We discuss the interpretations and implications of our findings in the context of widely accepted explanations of the FLE within a dynamic environment. LB - PUB:(DE-HGF)16 C6 - 39325434 UR - <Go to ISI:>//WOS:001459134200016 DO - DOI:10.1167/jov.24.9.17 UR - https://juser.fz-juelich.de/record/1030755 ER -