Passive distractor filtering in visual search

Luck, Gaspelin, Folk, Remington, & Theeuwes [(in press). Progress Toward Resolving the Attentional Capture Debate. Visual Cognition] proposes that proactive attentional mechanisms suppress a salient distractor by top-down inhibitory signals. However, considering the abundance of distracting information surrounding us, an automatic and passive distractor filtering system that requires little cognitive resources would benefit. Recent studies showed that passive exposure to distractors (without any competition with a target) before a search task attenuates interference from distractors during the actual visual search, called passive distractor filtering, and suggested that habituation is its core mechanism. This commentary summarizes research on passive distractor filtering, discusses habituation processes, and proposes future directions.