Outline
What is Attention? Orienting
Cueing Attention Visual Search
Selective Attention Dichotic Listening Tasks Bottleneck Theories
Divided Attention Capacity Model
Automatic vs. Controlled Processing Visual Neglect
What Is Attention?
DefinitionAttention is the process by which the mind
chooses from among the various stimuli that strike the senses at any given moment
• allows only some info to enter into consciousness Related Concepts:
AlertnessConcentrationSelectivityControl
Big Issues in Attention
Facts that drive attention researchWe are bombarded by more
information than we can attend to• Selective Attention• Divided Attention• Automaticity
Some tasks can be performed with little, if any, attention
Orienting
We don’t passively see or hearWe actively look and listen
Different ways to orient to a stimulusOvert OrientingCovert Orienting
Attentional GazeAttention can be drawn to a particular
location independent of where our eyes are looking or our ears are oriented
Cuing Attention
Give people a cue where a target will appear in the visual field
Manipulate the kind of cue Valid Cue Neutral Cue Invalid Cue
How does cue affect performance?
Results
Different kinds of cues are possibleVoluntary Orienting
• Endogenous Cue• Arrow
Automatic Orienting• Exogenous Cue
• Flashing light
Find the Blue L
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Shadowing Results
Physical attributes of unattended channel are detectedMale vs. female voiceHuman vs. musical instruments
Semantic attributes of unattended channel were missedDon’t notice foreign languageDon’t notice repeated items
Attenuation Model (Treisman)
Present a story in dichotic listening taskStory switches from attended ear to
unattended earParticipant mistakenly shadows from attended
ear to unattended ear
Attended Ear: Unattended Ear:She had peanut butter freaking laser beams
you keep using that word and jelly sandwiches
Problems with Early Models
Memory for unattended channel may depend on familiarity or importance Cocktail party effect
There are effects of practice There is implicit memory for the unattended
channel even when there isn’t explicit memory Shock study
People can shadow meaningful message that switch from ear to ear Treisman
Memory for unattended channel affected by similarity to attended channel
Context Effects
Attended ear:“They were standing near the bank”
Unattended ear:One of the following was presented
• “river”• “money”
Participants interpreted “bank” asa riverbank if they heard “river”a financial bank if they heard “money”
Problems with Late Models
Even if pertinence is controlled forWe are more likely to notice effects in the
attended channel (87%)We are less likely to notice effects in the
unattended channel (8%) If selection is late
Why do we feel like we’re consciously selecting early?
Neuro evidenceEnhanced neural processing at early stages
Recognition
Attenuation (Treisman):
DetectionInput Recognition
Late Filtering (Deutsch & Deutsch):Filter
Attenuator
DetectionInput
Filter
Recognition
Early Filtering (Broadbent):
Input Detection
Bottleneck Theories
All information gets into sensory register Somewhere along the way, information is
filtered or selected for attentionEarly
• at perceptual level
Late• at response level
Only selected information makes it into awareness and long-term memory
Divided Attention
Dual task experiments Get people to perform
multiple tasks and look at the effects on performance
Often find that performance suffers
• This breakdown of performance when two tasks are combined sheds light on the limitations and nature of the human information-processing system
Dual Task Performance
Divided attention is difficult when:Tasks are similarTasks are difficultWhen both tasks require conscious attention
Divided attention is easier when:Tasks are dissimilarTasks are simpleWhen at least one of the tasks does not
require conscious attentionTasks are practiced
Capacity Theories
Tasks take mental effort We have limited mental
effort to allocate to all demands on our attention Conscious control of
allocation Some tasks require more
attention than others
Resource Allocation Model (Kahneman)
What Affects Allocation?Resources
• Arousal• Available Capacity
Other Effects• Enduring Dispositions• Momentary Intentions
Different Processes
Some tasks are easier to perform than others and don’t seem to affect attentionEspecially tasks that are well practiced
Other tasks are tedious and require our conscious attention
Two types of processing:Automatic or pre-attentive processingControlled or attentive processing
Neely (1977)
Priming study, using a lexical decision task 4 primes
BIRD, BODY, BUILDING, XXX Manipulated expectancies of the target
BIRD - types of birdsBODY - building partsBUILDING - body partsXXX - bird, body parts, and building parts equally
often Short (e.g., 250ms) and long (e.g., 2,000ms) SOAs
Neely (1977) Results
BIRD (expect types of birds)BIRD - robin
• facilitation for bird targets at short and long SOAs
BODY (expect building parts)BODY - door
• facilitation for building targets at long SOAs, but not at short SOAs
BODY - heart• inhibition for body targets at long SOAs, but
facilitation at short SOAs
Automatic vs. Controlled
Automatic ProcessesFast and efficientUnavailable to
consciousnessUnavoidableUnintentional
Controlled ProcessesSlow and less efficientAvailable to
consciousnessControllableIntentional