Researchers from the University of Southern California found that visual attention of men and women differs thus prioritising sensory information differently.
While previous study of vision and attention had disregarded individual factors such as gender, race and age, the study authored by Dr Laurent Itti and doctoral student John Shen, demonstrated that men and women pay visual attention in different ways.
The study included 34 participants who watched videos of people being interviewed. Behind the interview subjects, within the video frame, pedestrians, bicycles and cars passed by- distractions included to pull attention away from the filmed conversation.
While participants watched and listened to the interview, another camera was pointed at participants' eyes, recording the movement of their pupils as they glanced across the screen, a university statement said.
Men, when focused on the person being interviewed, parked their eyes on the speaker's mouth. They tended to be most distracted by distinctive movement behind the interview subjects.
By contrast, women shift their focus between the interview subject's eyes and body. When they were distracted, it was typically by other people entering the video frame.
The study was published in the journal Vision Research.
