Perceptual learning in visual search: fast, enduring, but non-specific

Visual search has been suggested as a tool for isolating visual primitives. Elementary "features" were proposed to involve parallel search, while serial search is necessary for items without a "feature" status, or, in some cases, for conjunctions of "features". In this study, we investigated the role of practice in visual search tasks. We found that, under some circumstances, initially serial tasks can become parallel after a few hundred trials. Learning in visual search is far less specific than learning of visual discriminations and hyperacuity, suggesting that it takes place at another level in the central visual pathway, involving different neural circuits.