Attention Flashcards
What is attention?
Set of processes that increase or decrease the priority of information (sensory or internal)
Basic Properties of Attention?
Attention controls our mental environment by choosing the events that will enter our consciousness
Limited - able to focus on a limited number of activities for a fixed period of time
Selected - we must be selective in our attention by focusing on some events to the detriment of others
Attention is a filter? Dichotic listening task (Cherry, 1953)
- Two different messages, one in each ear
- Shadow one channel/ear
Attention is directed toward one message only, attention is filtering which information is being processed. Some things are still getting though the unattended message, like hearing one’s name, change in volume, or change in gender of speaker.
Attention is a filter? - Selection
Early selection filter: Eliminate info early
Late selection filter: Eliminate info later
Broadbent’s Filter Model?
Early-selection model:
Filters message before incoming information is analysed for meaning
Sensory memory:
Holds all incoming information for a fraction of a second and transfers everything to next stage
Input -> Sensory memory -> Filter (selects a subset of the info -> Detector -> Memory
Treisman’s Attenuation Theory - Intermediate-selection model?
- Attended message can be separated from unattended message early in the information-processing system
- Selection can also occur later
Input -> Attenuator -> Attended message & Unattended message -> Dictionary unit -> Memory
Attenuator?
–Analyzes incoming message in terms of physical characteristics, language, and meaning
–Attended to message = full strength
–Unattended message = much weaker strength
Dictionary Unit?
Something in the mind that contains things we know, but all things have a threshold to get picked up by the higher level dictionary unit.
“Leaky fileter model”
Example, your name is a very low threshold in order to be detected.
Feature search?
Find something with a particular feature, it is easy to find a singular feature.
- Targes defined by only one feature (colour, shape, orientation, intensity)
- Target found fast and automatically “pop-out”
- Parallel search, attending to the whole image
- Preattentive, happens before we allocate our conscious directed attention
Conjunction Search?
More difficult than single feature search, more object = more information, more dimensions of information to filter
- Targets defined by differences in two or more features
- Targets found slowly
- Search is serial (one at a time)
- Requires conscious & effortful attention (focused or controlled processing)
Feature Integration Theory? Will be on the exam!
Object -> Preattentive Stage, analyse the object (any different single feature will “poppet”) -> Focused attention stage (Serial search, combine features) -> Perception
Attention is selective and limited?
Preattentive processing/stage (of visual search):
Ability to hone in on a relevant event to the exclusion of all else so rapidly that you may be unaware of all the stimuli that have been excluded
- Explains the orienting reflex, hearing your name -> instantly direct our attention
Focused attention processing/stage
- Features are combined
- Slow
Load Theory of Attention? Processing capacity
Processing capacity –how much can you handle in a given moment
Low perceptual load?
- Easy tasks
- Use less processing capacity
- Leaves resources available for processing task-irrelevant stimuli
Divided Attention (Schneider & Schiffrin, 1977)?
Divide attention between remembering target and monitoring rapidly presented stimuli
Primary task -> Memory set: one to four target stimuli (new set for every trial) example; number 3
Secondary task -> Test frames: target (for half of trials), distactors example; did you see number 3 in the raid display?
For the first ~600 trials, had to repeat memory set, response accuracy 50%
Task eventually became automatic (consuming few cognitive resources)
Cell phone use?
Stimulated driving: use cell phone & apply the brakes as quickly as possible in response to a red light
Missed x2 as many red lights
Took longer to apply the breaks
Very bad outcomes!
Illusory conjunctions?
Conjoin features that are not correct. Example, you thought you saw a blue triangle even though there was not one (blue square, red triangle)
Late selection (MacKay)? MacKay’s Ambitious Sentence Experiment
Meaning of words are always processed even if unattended
MacKay’s Ambitious Sentence Experiment:
- In attended ear, participants hear ambiguous sentences (e.g. “throwing stones at the bank”)
- In unattended ear, participants hear words that resolve the ambiguity (e.g. “Money, teller”)
The meaning of the words in the unattended ear resolved the ambiguity in the attended ear, even though participants could not consciously report them. Meaning of unattended words was processed without attention and conscious awareness.
Selection Theories Review? + Which theory is dominant with limited processing capacity
Early selection
- Broadbent’s (1958) Filter Theory
Intermediate selection
- Treisman’s(1964) AttentuationTheory
Late selection
- MacKay’s (1973) late selection study
- Deutsch & Deutsch (1963) theory
There is support for all these theories, but early selection becomes dominant when there is limited processing capacity (high perceptual load)
Processing capacity?
how much can you handle in a given moment
Perceptual load?
The difficulty of a task
- Load consumes limited processing capacity
Load Theory of Attention? 3 statements Distraction…
- Distraction is less likely when engaged in tasks with high perceptual load
- Distraction is very likely in low-load tasks
- Distraction (deviation from controlled attention) is very likely when automatic attention captures occurs
Two Attention Systems? (not the same as perception!)
Top down (controlled)
- Deliberate
- Conscious
- Towards our goals
Bottom Up (automatic)
- Involuntary
- Captures attention
- Despite our goals
Dorsal and Ventral Attention Networks?
Dorsal Attention Network - Top-down
- Guiding where you are looking
- Actively directing your attention
Ventral Attention Network - Bottom-up
- Something interesting captures your attention, such as a striking light
Attention and Eye Movements?
- Attention is usually at foveal vision (centre of sight-picture)
Moving attention - Overt attention?
The eye moves to focus on the object of attention
WITH THE EYES
Moving attention - Covert attention?
- You attend to an area of space but the eye does not move
- Object of attention is in your peripheral vision
(Precueing)
WITH THE MIND
Attention is a spotlight?
- Cognitive ability to focus in or sharpen attention toward one thing or one location
- Can refer to visual or auditory stimuli
- Takes time to shift spotlight from one thing to another
Would suggest attention is limited in time and space
Spatial Cueing Task? (Posner precueing)
- Reaction times were fastest when attention was precued to target location
- According to Posner, reaction times are longest in invalid trials because of difficulty disengaging attention from cued area of space (ADS try to grab your attention first!)
- Shifting attention comes with a cost!
Controlled Attention?
- Disengaging and Shifting require effortful attentional override of habitual response to the cue -> Requires controlled attention
- Controlled attention = “top-down” attention
- Controlled attention is resource limited
- Important when you need to override habit
Spotlight vs. Filter? Spatial Attention & Feature-based Attention
Spatial Attention: Selective attention to an area of space - WHERE?
Feature-based Attention: Selective attention to the features of an object - WHAT?
Attention as a filter: Attentional Sets?
- Mental templates that allow us to selectively attend to a certain category of stimulus before it appears
- Involve holding in mind features or location of the object you’re expecting
Emotional Attentional Bias?
When emotionally relevant information captures attention more readily than neutral information
Emotionally salient: pops out because of emotional relevance or meaning
Hemineglect?
- Disorder of attention orienting, usually caused by damage to the parietal lobe (dorsal orienting network)
- Patients cannot voluntarily direct attention to one half of the sensory fields (visual, auditory, tactile)
- Patients also do not show bottom-up attention capture in neglected field
- Symptoms include eating food on one side of the plate, brushing teeth only on one side (usually left side is neglected)
- Hemineglect patients still show precueing advantage in neglected filed in the Posner cueing test
What does it suggest that Hemineglect patients still show precueing advantage in neglected filed in the Posner cueing test?
- Suggests that patients can still attend to neglected field, only if there is noting in the dominant side
- Seems to be a disorder of attentional disengagement
Is attention constant?
We experience attention as seamless
But we know there are gaps
- “I didn’t see it coming”
- “They were right in front of me!”
Inattentional bildness
(Gorilla video)
Failure to see things due to controlled attention deployed to other things
Attentional Blink?
- Temporal limitation
- When people are looking for two things, they fail to notice the second after seeing the first
- Attention capture comes with a cost
- 180-450 milliseconds after seeing the target, “top-down selection fails to operate, possibly bacuse of lower level attentive mechanism are suppressing input”
- Attentional systems lapse despise eye looking directly at important information
Emotion Reduces the Attentional Blink?
Emotional Sparing:
Reduced blink when T2 is high in emotional arousal (Anderson, 2005)
Change Blindness?
Things change in the environment all the time, and these changes (motion, or blinking) usually draw attention
Sometimes changes cannot draw attention
- Such as changes during eye movements, or eye blinks
- Multiple changes at one time
Attention is limited in its capacity to alert to change
Controlled attention is usually required to see change, and can still fail even when changes are expected
The changes are easier to identify when they are central to attentional spotlight
How Fast is the Attentional Spotlight?
Recent research suggests that shifts in attention is slow (~500 milliseconds)
How Fast is the Attentional Spotlight? - Ward et al. (1996) study suggests a hybrid search mechanism
- Attentional spotlight moves slowly
- At each location, a fast (but limited capacity) conduction search occurs in parallel
Mind Wandering?
- Shift of attention away from external environment to internal thoughts
- “Decoupling,” daydreaming, zoning out
- Brain activity, Default mode network
- Very common: some estimates suggest almost 50%
- Low working memory capacity predicts more mind
wandering
Mind Wandering Content and Mood?
- Content tends to be future-oriented and usually related to individual current concerns
- Potentially used for planning future personal goals
- Overall: more positive mood when on task
- If mind wondering episode was interesting and useful, then MW mood not worse than on task mood
Spotlight of attention/Selective interaction (preferred term)
Low-level features such as colour and orientation are “integrated” in the spotlight
Preattentive salienceor preattentive pop-out?
Attention is guided from the bottom up by contrast in the density of low-level features
- Brightness (contrast)
- Colour
- Length/width/size/shape
- Orientation
- Texture
- Motion or blinking
Lighting level or coercion by lighting?
Attention is naturally drawn to well-lit areas
Configural focus?
Attention is guided toward intersections
Example, intersection point
Centre of gravity?
Attention naturally follows the centre of mass of an object or group of objects
High-level interest?
Attention is drawn to things that are interesting or unexpected
Automatic attention to eyes?
Attention is automatically drawn by eyes
Automatic attention to meaningful words?
Attention is automatically drawn to words with important or emotional meaning, such as names, or emotionally charged language
Automatic guidance by directives?
Attention guided by shapes that have directional meaning
