Modifying the Methodology of Letter Cancellation Test for Digital Representation

Standard tools of attention diagnosis have seen only a few attempts of modernization. A theoretical and methodological analysis revealed data contradictions both in assignment and criteria. Digital versions of cognitive diagnostic material could be more objective due to modern hardware and software methods that register psychophysiological indicators. This research was an attempt to digitalize a standard letter variant of letter cancellation test. It involved a theoretical and methodological analysis of attention studies and diagnostic methods. The authors developed new stimulus material for digital attention tests and studied them using oculography. The research involved 90 people (33 men and 57 women) aged 16–70 y.o. The oculography revealed a set of oculomotor reactions that made it possible to describe the peculiarities of attention process and its stages, as well as to establish such a phenomenon as inattention blindness. The experiment also revealed some stable patterns in search strategies and oculomotor reactions that occurred during the testing. While searching for a target stimulus in a limited time, respondents usually employ two basic strategies: 1) they read elementary units of information to integrate them into a single image; 2) they stick to symbolic content with subsequent selective processing to select the target stimulus from the information flow. In this research, however, the participants also used additional strategies: 3) they completely ignored the target word; 4) they reduced the volume of the target stimulus (incomplete response) with its complete detection by oculomotor reactions; 5) they combined elements mechanically; 6) they turned to confabulation.