Research on attentional control has largely focused on single senses and the importance of behavioural goals in controlling attention. However, everyday situations are multisensory and contain regularities, both likely influencing attention. We investigated how visual attentional capture is simultaneously impacted by top-down goals, the multisensory nature of stimuli, and the contextual factors of stimuli's semantic relationship and temporal predictability. Participants performed a multisensory version of the Folk et al. (1992) spatial cueing paradigm, searching for a target of a predefined colour (e.g. a red bar) within an array preceded by a distractor. We manipulated: 1) stimuli's goal-relevance via distractor's colour (matching vs. mismatching the target), 2) stimuli's multisensory nature (colour distractors appearing alone vs. with tones), 3) the relationship between the distractor sound and colour (arbitrary vs. semantically congruent) and 4) the temporal predictability of distractor onset. Reaction-time spatial cueing served as a behavioural measure of attentional selection. We also recorded 129-channel event-related potentials (ERPs), analysing the distractor-elicited N2pc component both canonically and using a multivariate electrical neuroimaging framework. Behaviourally, arbitrary target-matching distractors captured attention more strongly than semantically congruent ones, with no evidence for context modulating multisensory enhancements of capture. Notably, electrical neuroimaging of surface-level EEG analyses revealed context-based influences on attention to both visual and multisensory distractors, in how strongly they activated the brain and type of activated brain networks. For both processes, the context-driven brain response modulations occurred long before the N2pc time-window, with topographic (network-based) modulations at ∼30 ms, followed by strength-based modulations at ∼100 ms post-distractor onset. Our results reveal that both stimulus meaning and predictability modulate attentional selection, and they interact while doing so. Meaning, in addition to temporal predictability, is thus a second source of contextual information facilitating goal-directed behaviour. More broadly, in everyday situations, attention is controlled by an interplay between one's goals, stimuli's perceptual salience, meaning and predictability. Our study calls for a revision of attentional control theories to account for the role of contextual and multisensory control.

注意力控制的研究主要集中在单一感官和行为目标在控制注意力方面的重要性。然而，日常情况是多感官的并且包含规律性，两者都可能影响注意力。我们研究了视觉注意力捕获如何同时受到自上而下的目标、刺激的多感官性质以及刺激的语义关系和时间可预测性的上下文因素。参与者执行了 Folk 等人的多感官版本。(1992) 空间提示范式，在干扰物之前的阵列内搜索预定义颜色（例如红色条）的目标。我们操纵：1）通过干扰物的颜色（匹配与不匹配目标）刺激的目标相关性，2）刺激的多感官性质（单独出现的颜色干扰物与音调），3）干扰物声音和颜色之间的关系（任意与. 语义一致）和 4） 干扰物发作的时间可预测性。反应时间空间线索作为注意力选择的行为测量。我们还记录了 129 个通道的事件相关电位 (ERP)，分析干扰物引发的 N2pc 组件既规范又使用多变量电神经成像框架。在行为上，任意目标匹配干扰物比语义一致的干扰物更能吸引注意力，没有证据表明上下文调节多感官捕获增强。值得注意的是，表面脑电图分析的电神经成像揭示了基于上下文对视觉和多感觉干扰物的注意力的影响，它们激活大脑的强度和激活的大脑网络的类型。对于这两个过程，上下文驱动的大脑反应调制发生在 N2pc 时间窗之前很久，拓扑（基于网络的）调制在 ~30 毫秒，然后是基于强度的调制，在 100 毫秒后分心开始。我们的研究结果表明，刺激意义和可预测性都会调节注意力选择，并且它们在这样做的同时相互作用。因此，除了时间可预测性之外，意义是促进目标导向行为的第二个上下文信息来源。更广泛地说，在日常情况下，注意力是由一个人的目标、刺激的感知显着性、意义和可预测性之间的相互作用控制的。我们的研究要求对注意力控制理论进行修订，以解释情境和多感官控制的作用。目标、刺激的感知显着性、意义和可预测性。我们的研究要求对注意力控制理论进行修订，以解释情境和多感官控制的作用。目标、刺激的感知显着性、意义和可预测性。我们的研究要求对注意力控制理论进行修订，以解释情境和多感官控制的作用。