Attention Flashcards
What is attention
Selectively focusing cognitive resources on specific information in the environment, while withdrawing from other
How have models on attention changed throughout the years
Early models attempt to explain how we filter out irrelevant information. 70s-90s: controlled vs automatic attentional processing. 2000s focus on cognitive control in attention.
How did Broadbent come to the conclusion that we have limited capacity to process info?
- had noticed that radar operators in the war were able to focus on a single pilots’ voice and ignore other voices, investigated effects of noise on performance in applied situations.
- information bottleneck
What is the early filter model?
info enters the sensory register unfiltered; a selective filter is applied. Perception occurs after the filter – this predicts that we do not perceive unattended information that was filtered out.
How was dichotic listening used to test the early filter model?
- Moray (1959) found people notice if their name is spoken in the unattended channel (important words capture attention).
- Triesman (1960) showed that ppts would jump sensory input streams when the semantic information switched. (switched ears for the same topic). The participants were unaware that they had done this.
- This shows that word meaning is processed – not filtered at an early sensory stage.
What does the attenuation model (1963) Triesman suggest?
- info comes through the sensory system and is then attenuated (as it is never completely filtered out). All the info is processed perceptually but focus is on the attended channel. Our attentional system amplifies the channel that we’re interested in and turns down the volume on the ignored channel (but important info can still get our attention)
Strengths and limitations of attenuation model
Deutsch & Deutsch support: proposed an alternative model: move the filter to a later point in the cognitive process. All the signals are processed, and then a late filter is applied – before conscious awareness.
- Need to process all the info to see if it’s important (without causing a bottleneck)
Strengths and limitations of early filter models
- were able to explain the behavioural data
- single processing stream.
- but not the neuroimaging data. Scientists found that attentional processing is more complex and studying brain processing may help to understand it further.
Define visuo-spatial neglect
However what can be processes?
failure to attend to a part of the visual field.
-meaning of words presented in the unattended area. (late processing)
What did Posner (1980) find from studying covert attention (shifting attention without moving the eyes)
2 attentional systems to support different aspects of attention:
- Endogenous system: goal directed, intentionally move focus of attention, even when there’s nothing interesting there yet.
- Exogenous system: automatic, shifting attention towards a stimulus outside of the focus of attention.
Support for 2 attentional systems in brain
Cobetta and Shulman (2002) reviewed neuroimaging data and found evidence for two attentional systems in the brain. Called a “frontoparietal network” because it involves frontal and parietal lobes. Both systems are damaged in spatial neglect.
What is balint syndrome
not able to intentionally shift attention. Indicates that focused attention is object-based, rather than location based.
What is change blindness?
occurs when people are unaware of significant event changes that happen in full view. For items that are outside of the focus of attention, we make assumptions about what is likely going on – unaware of it, is outside of consciousness