Anti-Saccade Task¶
HED Task ID: hedtsk_anti_saccade
Also known as: AST, Antisaccade
Participants must suppress a prepotent saccade toward a peripheral cue and generate a voluntary saccade to the opposite location; errors and saccade latency index oculomotor inhibition.
Description¶
The Anti-Saccade Task measures voluntary control over reflexive eye movements. Participants fixate centrally while a peripheral stimulus suddenly appears in the left or right visual field. Instead of looking toward the stimulus (the reflexive prosaccade), participants must look in the opposite direction (antisaccade). This requires inhibiting the automatic orienting response and generating a volitional saccade. Performance is measured by antisaccade accuracy, latency, and the rate of prosaccadic intrusions (errors). The task indexes voluntary oculomotor control and prefrontal inhibitory function.
Inclusion test¶
Procedure |
A peripheral cue appears; participants must suppress the reflexive saccade toward it and instead generate a voluntary saccade to the mirror-opposite location. |
Manipulation |
Prosaccade vs. antisaccade blocks or interleaved trials; cue eccentricity; gap vs. overlap conditions. |
Measurement |
Saccade direction errors (% erroneous prosaccades on antisaccade trials); saccade latency; corrective saccade latency. |
Variations¶
Variation |
Description |
Justification |
|---|---|---|
Standard Anti-Saccade |
Look away from peripheral cue to mirror-image location. |
Canonical paradigm: participant inhibits reflexive saccade and redirects gaze to mirror location |
Prosaccade (Control Condition) |
Look toward peripheral cue; establishes baseline oculomotor performance. |
Opposite stimulus-response mapping (look toward cue); different response requirement from anti-saccade |
Interleaved Pro/Anti-Saccade |
Random mixing of pro- and anti-saccade trials; increases executive demands. |
Mixed trial types require on-trial task-set switching; distinct from blocked presentation |
Blocked Pro/Anti-Saccade |
Separate blocks for each task type; lower executive demand. |
Separate blocks of pro- and anti-saccade trials; different cognitive context from interleaved |
Gap vs. Overlap Conditions |
Fixation disappears before (gap) or remains during (overlap) cue; gap reduces saccade latency. |
Fixation offset timing changes saccade initiation dynamics and error rates |
Delayed Anti-Saccade |
Maintain fixation during delay after cue before generating antisaccade; increases memory/inhibition demands. |
Memory-guided response after delay period; adds working memory component |
Emotional Anti-Saccade |
Emotional faces as cues; measures emotion-driven capture of eye movements. |
Emotional stimuli as saccade targets; retained per §5.1 (EMOT retired) |
Memory-Guided Anti-Saccade |
Combine with spatial memory demands. |
Target location must be retained in memory before response; distinct memory demand |
Double-Step Anti-Saccade |
Target location shifts after initial saccade; tests online correction. |
Two-step target displacement requires online motor reprogramming |
Cognitive processes¶
This task engages the following cognitive processes:
Key references¶
{‘authors’: ‘Hallett, P.’, ‘year’: 1978, ‘title’: ‘Primary and secondary saccades to goals defined by instructions’, ‘venue’: ‘Vision Research’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Vision Research’, ‘volume’: ‘18’, ‘issue’: ‘10’, ‘pages’: ‘1279-1296’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/0042-6989(78)90218-3’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Hallett, P. E. (1978). Primary and secondary saccades to goals defined by instructions. Vision Research, 18(11), 1279-1296.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/0042-6989(78)90218-3’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Munoz, D. P., & Everling, S.’, ‘year’: 2004, ‘title’: ‘Look away: the anti-saccade task and the voluntary control of eye movement’, ‘venue’: ‘Nature Reviews Neuroscience’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Nature Reviews Neuroscience’, ‘volume’: ‘5’, ‘issue’: ‘3’, ‘pages’: ‘218-228’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1038/nrn1345’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Munoz, D. P., & Everling, S. (2004). Look away: The anti-saccade task and the voluntary control of eye movement. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 5(3), 218-228.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn1345’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Everling, S., & Fischer, B.’, ‘year’: 1998, ‘title’: ‘The antisaccade: a review of basic research and clinical studies’, ‘venue’: ‘Neuropsychologia’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Neuropsychologia’, ‘volume’: ‘36’, ‘issue’: ‘9’, ‘pages’: ‘885-899’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/s0028-3932(98)00020-7’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Everling, S., & Fischer, B. (1998). The antisaccade: A review of basic research and clinical findings. Neuropsychologia, 36(9), 885-899.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/s0028-3932(98)00020-7’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
Recent references¶
{‘authors’: ‘Hutton, S. B., & Ettinger, U.’, ‘year’: 2006, ‘title’: ‘The antisaccade task as a research tool in psychopathology: A critical review’, ‘venue’: ‘Psychophysiology’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Psychophysiology’, ‘volume’: ‘43’, ‘issue’: ‘3’, ‘pages’: ‘302-313’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1111/j.1469-8986.2006.00403.x’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: “Hutton, S. B., & Ettinger, U. (2006). The antisaccade task as a research tool in psychopathology: A critical review. Psychophysiology, 43(3), 302–313. [Updated: Amador, S. C., Hood, A. J., Schiess, M. C., Izor, R., & Sereno, A. B. (2006). Dissociating cognitive deficits involved in voluntary eye movement dysfunctions in Parkinson’s disease patients. Neuropsychologia, 44(8), 1475–1482.]”, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-8986.2006.00403.x’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Antoniades, C., Ettinger, U., Gaymard, B., Gilchrist, I., Kristjánsson, A., Kennard, C., John Leigh, R., Noorani, I., Pouget, P., Smyrnis, N., Tarnowski, A., Zee, D. S., & Carpenter, R.’, ‘year’: 2013, ‘title’: ‘An internationally standardised antisaccade protocol’, ‘venue’: ‘Vision Research’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Vision Research’, ‘volume’: ‘84’, ‘issue’: None, ‘pages’: ‘1-5’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/j.visres.2013.02.007’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Antoniades, C. A., Ettinger, U., Gaymard, B., et al. (2013). An internationally standardised antisaccade protocol. Vision Research, 84, 1–5.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/j.visres.2013.02.007’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Crawford, T. J., Higham, S., Renvoize, T., Patel, J., Dale, M., Suriya, A., & Tetley, S.’, ‘year’: 2005, ‘title’: ‘Inhibitory control of saccadic eye movements and cognitive impairment in Alzheimer’s disease’, ‘venue’: ‘Biological Psychiatry’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Biological Psychiatry’, ‘volume’: ‘57’, ‘issue’: ‘9’, ‘pages’: ‘1052-1060’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/j.biopsych.2005.01.017’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: “Crawford, T. J., Higham, S., Renvoize, T., Patel, J., Dale, M., Surber, A., & Smeeton, R. (2005). Inhibitory control of saccadic eye movements and cognitive impairment in Alzheimer’s disease. Biological Psychiatry, 57(9), 1052–1060. [Updated context: Kaufman, L. D., Pratt, J., Levine, B., & Black, S. E. (2012). Executive deficits detected in mild Alzheimer’s disease patients using the antisaccade task. Brain and Behavior, 2(1), 15–21.]”, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2005.01.017’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Munoz, D. P., Armstrong, I. T., Hampton, K. A., & Moore, K. D.’, ‘year’: 2003, ‘title’: ‘Altered Control of Visual Fixation and Saccadic Eye Movements in Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder’, ‘venue’: ‘Journal of Neurophysiology’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Journal of Neurophysiology’, ‘volume’: ‘90’, ‘issue’: ‘1’, ‘pages’: ‘503-514’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1152/jn.00192.2003’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: “Munoz, D. P., Armstrong, I. T., Hampton, K. A., & Moore, K. D. (2003). Altered control of visual fixation and saccadic eye movements in attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. Journal of Neurophysiology, 90(1), 503–514. [Updated: Wiecki, T. V., Antoniades, C. A., Golla, A., et al. (2016). A computational cognitive biomarker for early-stage Huntington’s disease. PLoS ONE, 11(2), e0148409.]”, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1152/jn.00192.2003’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}