The ability to select and combine multiple sensory inputs in support of accurate decisions is a hallmark of adaptive behaviour. Attentional selection is often needed to prioritize task-relevant stimuli relative to irrelevant, potentially distracting stimuli. As most studies of perceptual decision-making to date have made use of task-relevant stimuli only, relatively little is known about how attention modulates decision making. To address this issue, we developed a novel 'integrated' decision-making task, in which participants judged the average direction of successive target motion signals while ignoring concurrent and spatially overlapping distractor motion signals. In two experiments that varied the role of attentional selection, we used regression to quantify the influence of target and distractor stimuli on behaviour. Using electroencephalography, we characterised the neural correlates of decision making, attentional selection and feature-specific responses to target and distractor signals. While targets strongly influenced perceptual decisions and associated neural activity, we also found that concurrent and spatially coincident distractors exerted a measurable bias on both behaviour and brain activity. Our findings suggest that attention operates as a real-time but imperfect filter during perceptual decision-making by dynamically modulating the contributions of task-relevant and irrelevant sensory inputs.

中文翻译：

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知觉决策过程中的证据积累对注意力选择的动态很敏感

选择和组合多种感官输入以支持准确决策的能力是适应性行为的标志。通常需要注意选择来优先考虑与任务相关的刺激相对于不相关的、可能分散注意力的刺激。由于迄今为止对知觉决策的大多数研究仅使用与任务相关的刺激，因此对注意力如何调节决策知之甚少。为了解决这个问题，我们开发了一种新颖的“集成”决策任务，其中参与者判断连续目标运动信号的平均方向，同时忽略并发和空间重叠的干扰运动信号。在改变注意力选择作用的两个实验中，我们使用回归来量化目标和干扰物刺激对行为的影响。使用脑电图，我们表征了决策、注意力选择和对目标和干扰信号的特定特征反应的神经相关性。虽然目标强烈影响感知决策和相关的神经活动，但我们还发现，并发和空间重合的干扰因素对行为和大脑活动产生了可测量的偏差。我们的研究结果表明，通过动态调节与任务相关和无关的感官输入的贡献，注意力在感知决策过程中作为实时但不完美的过滤器运行。我们还发现，并发和空间重合的干扰因素对行为和大脑活动产生了可测量的偏差。我们的研究结果表明，通过动态调节与任务相关和无关的感官输入的贡献，注意力在感知决策过程中作为实时但不完美的过滤器运行。我们还发现，并发和空间重合的干扰因素对行为和大脑活动产生了可测量的偏差。我们的研究结果表明，通过动态调节与任务相关和无关的感官输入的贡献，注意力在感知决策过程中作为实时但不完美的过滤器运行。