Searching is an inevitable behavior for us, but its accuracy is not perfect, and in most cases, it is slow and time-consuming due to optical and structural limitations. Moreover, searching is limited by cognitive bottlenecks: the number and content of objects that can be analyzed and matched to memory at any one time are restricted. Attention is an essential cognitive function during visual searches by prioritizing and selecting objects that seem important, allowing us to come to terms with these constraints. This functionality of attention has been primarily examined in the laboratory using visual search tasks. The present article reviews a brief history of research on visual attention, including visual searches and real-life application studies.
