Occulomotor Analysis as an Indicator of Perceptual Performance,

Human visual system plays a crucial role in the processes of orientation in the surrounding world. Its proper functioning is a necessary precondition for every pilot. During the assessment of visual functioning a psychologist has to evaluate the abilities of visual processes which determine the efficient extraction of information from visual modality, especially in the situations which require performing several tasks in parallel. The mechanism of attention, however, is a functional structure, which is responsible not only for visual perception. In this research the processes of attention are conceptualized similarly as in the theories of Michael Posner. The notion of attention itself in those theories is close to the position of William James, who defined the attention in the following way quoted also by Posner Everybody knows what attention is. It is engagement of the mind in a clear and active way by something which appears to be one of several objects accessible at the same time or lines of thoughts. Posner distinguishes between broad and narrow understanding of attention. In a narrow notion, attention is a selection mechanism which operates on the incoming sensory information. Such a position is represented by a number of researchers in visual attention, among them A. Allport 1989 and A. Van der Heijden 1992. Attention understood broadly is rather ...a system for providing priority for motor acts, consciousness and memory Posner, 1994, p. 7398, see also Posner, 1980 1994. The aim of the methods proposed here is the assessment of the accuracy of functioning of visual attention, thus we focus only on those mechanisms, which control the scope of a visual field, and the processes of searching for and receiving visual information.