McMaster University
Dr. Bruce Milliken Print E-mail

Bruce Milliken(Ph.D. - Waterloo)

Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour
1280 Main Street West
Hamilton, ON L8S 4K1 - PC-414
PHONE: (905)525-9140, Ext. 24361 LAB: 27156
FAX: (905)-529-6225
EMAIL: millike@mcmaster.ca 

The aim of research conducted in our laboratory is to better understand processes that comprise the interface between perception and cognition in humans. Although these two subjects are often taught separately at the undergraduate level, even the simplest of interactions with our environment involve what must be a complex interplay between low level perceptual and higher level cognitive processes. In particular, visual selective attention is the focus of much of the research conducted in our lab.

This work looks at how selection of visual information can be both under the control of the observer, and yet also modulated implicitly by past experience. This fundamental theoretical issue plays itself out across a wide range of experimental scenarios. Currently, we are using several attentional paradigms (e.g. negative priming, inhibition of return) to help us identify mechanisms that allow us to respond preferentially to familiar over novel visual stimuli in some situations, but to novel over familiar visual stimuli in others. 


  • Milliken, B., Thomson, D., Bleile, K., MacLellan, E. & Giammarco, M. (in press). Context-specific control and the Stroop negative priming effect. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology.
  • Spadaro, A., He, C. & Milliken, B. (in press). Attention to an intervening event reverses nonspatial repetition effects in 2AFC tasks: Non-spatial IOR? Attention, Perception & Psychophysics.
  • D’Angelo, M. & Milliken, B. (in press). Context-specific control and the single prime negative priming procedure. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology.
  • Thomson, D. & Milliken, B. (in press). Perceptual distinctiveness produces long-lasting priming of popout. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review.
  • Sarmiento, B.R., Shore, D.I., Milliken, B. & Sanabria, D. (in press). Audiovisual interactions depend on context of congruency. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics.
  • Fiacconi, C. & Milliken, B. (in press). Contingency blindness: Interference in visual memory can obscure awareness of spatial contingencies. Memory & Cognition.
  • Thomson, D.R. & Milliken, B. (in press). Contextual distinctiveness produces long-lasting priming of popout.   Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performance.
  • D’Angelo, M., Jimenez, L., Milliken, B., & Lupiáñez, J. (in press). On the specificity of sequential congruency effects in implicit learning of motor and perceptual sequences. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory & Cognition.
  • Fiacconi, C. & Milliken, B. (2011). On the role of attention in generating explicit awareness of contingent relations: Evidence from spatial priming. Consciousness & Cognition, 20, 1433-1451.
  • Thomson, D. & Milliken, B. (2011). A switch in task affects priming of popout: Evidence for the role of episodes. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 73, 318-333.
  • Leboe, J., Leboe, L., & Milliken, B. (2010).  Constraints on the observation of partial match costs: Implications for transfer appropriate processing approaches to immediate priming.  Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 36, 634-648.
  • Vaquero, J., Fiacconi, C. & Milliken, B.   (2010). Attention, awareness and control in spatial localization: A qualitative difference approach. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception & Performanc, 36, 1342-1357.
  • Thomson, D., Milliken, B., & Smilek, D. (2010). Long-term conceptually-driven implicit memory: A decade of evidence. Memory &Cognition, 38, 42-46.
  • Crump, M.J., & Milliken, B. (2009). The flexibility of context-specific control: Evidence for context-driven generalization of item-specific control settings. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 62, 1523-1532.
  • Crump, M., Ansari, I. & Milliken, B. (2008). Shifting views on the symbolic cueing effect: Cueing attention through previous experience. Psicologica, 29, 65-95.
  • Funes, M.J., Lupianez, J. & Milliken, B. (2008). The modulation of exogenous spatial cueing on spatial Stroop interference: Evidence of a set for “cue-target event segregation”. Psicologica, 29, 65-95.
  • Crump, M., Vaquero, J., & Milliken, B. (2008). Context specific learning and control: The role of awareness, task relevance, and relative salience. Consciousness & Cognition, 17, 22-36.
  • Funes, M.J., Lupianez, J. & Milliken, B.   (2007). Separate mechanisms recruited by exogenous and endogenous spatial cues: Evidence from a Spatial Stroop paradigm. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 33, 348-362.
  • Lupianez, B., Ruz, M., Funes, M.J., & Milliken, B. (2007). The manifestation of IOR depends on attentional capture: Facilitation or IOR depends on task demands.   Psychological Research, 71, 77-91.
  • Milliken, B. & Lupianez, J. (2007). Repetition costs in word identification. Evaluating a stimulus-response integration account. Psychological Research, 71, 64-76.
  • Crump, M., Gong, Z. & Milliken, B. (2006). Location as a contextual cue for the item-specific proportion congruent effect. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 13, 316-321.
  • Catena, A., Castillo, A., Fuentes, L., & Milliken, B. (2006). Processing of distractors inside and outside the attentional focus in a priming procedure. Visual Cognition, 13, 601-622. 
  • Funes, M.J., Lupiáñez, J., & Milliken, B. (2005). The role of spatial attention and other processes on the magnitude and time course of cueing effects. Cognitive Processing, 6, 98-116.
  • Leboe, J., Whittlesea, B.W.A., & Milliken, B. (2005). Selective and nonselective transfer: Positive and negative priming in a múltiple task environment. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 31, 1001-1029. 
  • Lupianez, J., Decaix, C., Sieroff, B., Milliken, B., & Bartolomeo, P. (2004).   Independent effects of endogenous and exogenous spatial cueing: Inhibition of return for endogenously attended target locations. Experimental Brain Research, 159, 447-457.
  • Leboe, J. & Milliken. B. (2004). Single-prime negative priming in the shape matching task: Implications for the role of perceptual segmentation processes. Visual Cognition, 11, 603-630.
  • Correa, A., Lupianez, J., Milliken, B., & Tudela, P. (2004). Endogenous temporal orienting in detection and discrimination tasks. Perception & Psychophysics, 66, 264-278.
  • Francis, L., & Milliken, B. (2003). Inhibition of return for the length of a line? Perception & Psychophysics, 65, 1208- 1221.
  • Marczinski, C., Milliken, B., & Nelson, S. (2003). Aging and repetition effects: Separate specific and nonspecific influences. Psychology and Aging, 18, 780-790.
  • Milliken, B., Lupianez, J., Roberts, M., & Stevanovski, B. (2003). Orienting in space and time: Joint contributions to exogenous spatial cueing effects. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 10, 877-883.
  • Leboe, J. & Milliken, B. (2003). Another look at negative priming and surprising intervening events. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 57, 115-124.
  • Lupianez, J., Milliken, B., Solano, C., Weaver, B., & Tipper, S.P. (2001). On the strategic modulation of the time course of facilitation and inhibition of return. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 54A, 753-773.
  • Milliken, B., Tipper, S.P., Houghton, G., & Lupianez, J. (2000).   Attending, ignoring, and repetition: On the relation between negative priming and inhibition of return. Perception & Psychophysics, 62, 1280-1296.
  • Milliken, B., Lupianez, J., Debner, J., & Abello, B. (1999). Automatic and controlled processing in Stroop negative priming: The role of attentional set. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 25, 1384-1402.
  • Lupianez, J. & Milliken, B. (1999). Exogenous cuing effects and the attentional set for integrating vs. differentiating information. Journal of General Psychology. Special issue on attention, 126, 392-418.
  • Milliken, B., Joordens, S., Merikle, P., & Seiffert, A. (1998). Selective attention: A re-evaluation of the implications of negative priming. Psychological Review, 105, 203-229.
  • Wood, T. & Milliken, B. (1998). Negative priming without ignoring. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 5, 470-475.
  • Mondor, T.A., Breau, L.M., & Milliken, B. (1998). Inhibitory processes in auditory selective attention: Evidence of location-based and frequency-based inhibition of return. Perception & Psychophysics, 60, 296-302.
  • Milliken, B., & Rock, A. (1997). Negative priming, attention, and discriminating the present from the past. Invited submission to Consciousness and Cognition, 6, 308-327.
  • Milliken, B., & Joordens, S. (1996).   Negative priming without overt prime selection. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 50, 333-346.
  • Tipper, S. P., Weaver, B., & Milliken, B. (1995). Spatial negative priming without mismatching: A reply to Park and Kanwisher. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human   Perception and Performance, 21, 1220-1229.
  • Milliken, B., Tipper, S.P., & Weaver, B. (1994). Negative priming in a spatial localization task: Feature mismatching and distractor inhibition. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 20, 624-646.
  • Milliken, B., & Jolicoeur, P. (1992). Size effects in recognition memory are determined by perceived size. Memory & Cognition, 20, 83-95.
  • Jolicoeur, P., & Milliken, B. (1989). Identification of disoriented objects: Effects of context of prior presentation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 15, 200--210.