Exploring the Link Between Attentional Orienting and Executive Control in Virtual Reality

The study of attentional orienting and executive control functions can help design interfaces that are more compatible with human cognitive requirements, thereby improving the efficiency and safety of human-computer interaction. To examine how attentional orienting and executive control interact in 3D space, we constructed a virtual 3D environment and combined spatial inhibition of return (IOR) with Simon tasks. The study found that spatial IOR and Simon effect existed when the targets appeared either in the closer depth plane and the farther depth plane, and Simon effect was lager at the cued location. The results showed that the task-relevant and task-irrelevant spatial representation could be activated across depth and our visual system could form shared spatial representation in the 3D space during the combination of spatial IOR task and Simon task. This provides a theoretical basis for the design of human-computer interfaces. Violation of the consistency principle of human-computer interface design in 3D space would likely reduce the efficiency of user operation.