Attention and Consciousness

Question 1

what is attention?

Answer 1

the narrowing of awareness to a particular part of the sensory environment

Question 2

what is consciousness more alike to?

Answer 2

awareness of awareness

Question 3

attention tends to be…

Answer 3

top-down and takes time to focus on a part of the sensory world

Question 4

consciousness provides…

Answer 4

a summary of all information that is relevant to the situation

Question 5

describe the 3 main points of automatic processes:

Answer 5

• can be performed with little focused attention and occur unconsciously
  -may be innate, or the result of training
  -bottom-up, driven by sensory input

Question 6

describe conscious operations:

Answer 6

-require focused attention
-top-down, requiring cognitive input and control

Question 7

given the different types of processing and input, what is likely about automatic and conscious processes?

Answer 7

it is likely that automatic and conscious processes rely on different brain circuitry, possibly including the circuits related to consciousness

Question 8

what are some examples of automatic visual search?

Answer 8

addition of a vertical line or the use of bold type

Question 9

what is true about searches that require a combination of multiple features?

Answer 9

slower, and require a serial search

Question 10

what is feature search?

Answer 10

a strategy for scanning the environment for an object with a specific combination of features

Question 11

within feature search, what takes place at the level of V1?

Answer 11

-object visually perceived in V1 is broken down into features, to be processed serially by higher visual areas

Question 12

in Treisman’s model of feature search, what are the 4 feature maps?

Answer 12

color, orientation, size, and stereo distance

Question 13

patients were able to identify ____ faces more rapidly than _______ faces

Answer 13

sad, happy. and this was true when the stimuli were right side up, upside down, or abstract representations of “sad”

Question 14

experiments to test the effects of focus of attention must what?

Answer 14

-use the same stimulus in all conditions

Question 15

what is the apparent division of the visual attention systems?

Answer 15

-one selecting stimuli and another selecting and directing movements

Question 16

what do priority maps do and where are these usually found?

Answer 16

-priority maps encode stimulus location in terms of the behavioural significance, and are found in frontal eye fields, lateral intraparietal area, and superior colliculus

Question 17

true or false, a neuron can learn to respond selectively to information in its receptive field.

Answer 17

true

Question 18

what is the downside to dividing attention between multiple tasks?

Answer 18

mental capacity is limited, so dividing attention between multiple tasks can divide that limited resource and cause all tasks to be performed with lower efficiency

Question 19

what is true about cells in V4?

Answer 19

can be selective about what they respond to

Question 20

what happens in V4 when animals discriminate between lines of similar orientation?

Answer 20

performance accuracy decreases, indicating the task is harder, and activity of cells in V4 increases and the cells become more selective in what they respond to

Question 21

what is the role of cells in the pulvinar?

Answer 21

they project throughout the cortex and may help direct the attentional spotlight

Question 22

what can the visual system do if there is only one object in the attentional spotlight?

Answer 22

visual systems can bind all the properties together

Question 23

what happens if multiple objects occupy the spotlight?

Answer 23

cells in area TE seem to process different objects in parallel to differentiate between them, but how this is done is not clear

Question 24

attention needs to be divided across _______ ________ for multisensory stimuli

Answer 24

sensory modalities

Question 25

what happens when attention is directed to one of the sensory modalities?

Answer 25

activity increases in the relevant cortical areas

Question 26

what happens when attention is divided between two modalities?

Answer 26

there are no changes in the individual sensory areas, but an increase in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex

Question 27

in a functional-brain-imaging study looking at attention, what happened when the patient attended to the moving light stimulus?

Answer 27

increased activity in the posterior parietal cortex

Question 28

in a functional-brain-imaging study looking at attention, what happened when the moving light was in the left or right visual fields respectively?

Answer 28

if in left: only right parietal cortex active if in right: bilateral parietal cortex was active

Question 29

a functional brain imaging study that had a selective attention condition and a divided attention condition found that....

Answer 29

different types of attention recruited different brain areas

Question 30

attentional tasks activate...

Answer 30

anterior cingulate, prefrontal cortex, and specific sensory areas

Question 31

in a shifting-attention condition, which part of the brain is activated when the stimulus is in the right visual field?

Answer 31

left parietal love

Question 32

in a shifting-attention condition, which part of the brain is activated when the stimulus is in either visual field?

Answer 32

the right parietal lobe

Question 33

the attentional system is distinct from what?

Answer 33

the sensory areas that process information

Question 34

what are the three different networks supporting attention?

Answer 34

alerting network, orienting network, and executive network

Question 35

which structures make up the alerting network?

Answer 35

locus coeruleus, frontal and parietal cortex

Question 36

what is the modulator of the alerting network?

Answer 36

norepinephrine

Question 37

which structures make up the orienting network?

Answer 37

superior parietal, temporal parietal junction, frontal eye fields, superior colliculus, pulvinar

Question 38

what is the modulator of the orienting network?

Answer 38

acetylcholine

Question 39

which structures make up the executive network?

Answer 39

anterior cingulate, anterior insula, and basal ganglia

Question 40

what is the modulator of the executive network?

Answer 40

dopamine

Question 41

what is the role of the ascending reticular activating system from the midbrain?

Answer 41

maintains alertness

Question 42

where doe noradrenergic neurons project from?

Answer 42

the locus coeruleus to the forebrain

Question 43

what is the role of the alerting network in attention?

Answer 43

alerts the prefrontal and posterior parietal cortex to rapidly process and respond to stimuli

Question 44

what does activity in the alerting network do?

Answer 44

suppresses processing in other cerebral networks

Question 45

what does the orienting network do?

Answer 45

prioritizes one sensory modality over the others or a particular location in space

Question 46

describe the dorsal orienting network:

Answer 46

-involves the frontal eye fields and intraparietal sulcus -strongly right lateralized -directs attention toward a specific object in a top-down process

Question 47

describe the ventral orienting network:

Answer 47

-involves the temporoparietal junction, ventral frontal cortex, and pulvinar -synchronizes activity with bottom-up incoming sensory information

Question 48

dorsal attention system is:

Answer 48

top down visuospatial

Question 49

ventral attention system is:

Answer 49

bottom -up reorienting

Question 50

frontoparietal control system is:

Answer 50

moment to moment task

Question 51

cingulo-opercular system is:

Answer 51

task set maintenance

Question 52

two executive networks work via top-down influences. what are those networks?

Answer 52

dorsolateral-prefrontal cortex-parietal network and anterior cingulate/medial frontal-anterior insula network

Question 53

when is the dorsolateral-prefrontal cortex-parietal network active?

Answer 53

at the beginning of a task

Question 54

when is the anterior cingulate/medial frontal-anterior insula network active?

Answer 54

throughout the duration of the task

Question 55

activity in areas within a network is...

Answer 55

highly correlated

Question 56

activity is ______ ______ between the two executive networks

Answer 56

not correlated

Question 57

controlling cognition and emotions is a form of...

Answer 57

self control

Question 58

self control is associated with activity where?

Answer 58

in the lateral prefrontal and cingulate regions

Question 59

what changes the structure and gene expression patterns of the prefrontal cortex?

Answer 59

stress

Question 60

what happens when stress changes the structure and gene expression patterns of the prefrontal cortex?

Answer 60

leads to deficits in cognitive control of emotion that are associated with neuropsychiatric conditions

Question 61

how does psychosocial stress impair the performance of medical students on attentional tasks?

Answer 61

by decreasing activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate, premotor, and posterior parietal cortices

Question 62

which disorders are associated with the alerting network?

Answer 62

aging, adhd

Question 63

which disorders are associated with the orienting network?

Answer 63

autism, ptsd, neglect

Question 64

which disorders are associated with the executive network?

Answer 64

anxiety disorders, depression, ocd, personality disorder, schizophrenia, and substance abuse

Question 65

what is one hypothesis of how the attention systems direct attention?

Answer 65

the attention system induces synchrony between neurons that assess the sensory signal, -the timing of APs is adjusted to have the input from two neurons arrive at the target at the same time and be summed, increasing the chance of an AP in the post-synaptic cell

Question 66

during an attention-demanding task, there was _______ ________ in the dorsal executive attention network and ______ ______ in the default network

Answer 66

increased activity, decreased activity

Question 67

what does attention increase within the brain?

Answer 67

synchrony

Question 68

when synchronous outputs from the same neurons summate on one, this leads to.....

Answer 68

larger EPSPs, which in turn leads to larger action potentials

Question 69

when distracted by a counting task, what % of people failed to notice a researcher in a gorilla suit walk through the middle of a basketball game?

Answer 69

70%

Question 70

what is change blindness?

Answer 70

when subjects routinely fail to notice changes in the environment if they are not expecting them

Question 71

in cases of change blindness, are the unattended items detected at all?

Answer 71

yes, detected by the sensory systems but are filtered out before conscious awareness

Question 72

patients with damage to what do not attend to the left side of space around them?

Answer 72

the right temporoparietal junction

Question 73

objects in the right visual field can be attended to by what?

Answer 73

the left or the right parietal lobe

Question 74

objects in the left visual field are attended to by what?

Answer 74

the right parietal lobe ONLY

Question 75

how can one improve their sensory neglect of the left side of space?

Answer 75

using a prism to shift objects from left visual field to the right

Question 76

what can consciousness be defined as

Answer 76

the level of responsiveness of the mind to impressions made by the senses

Question 77

when might conscious awareness of a movement occur?

Answer 77

only after the movement is complete

Question 78

is it possible to dissociate behaviour and conscious awareness?

Answer 78

yes

Question 79

what theory attempts to explain consciousness?

Answer 79

integrated information theory

Question 80

what are the points under integrated information theory?

Answer 80

-consciousness exists -consciousness is structured and composed of multiple distinctions between the phenomena we observe -consciousness is composed of specific information, and each experience is distinct from other experiences -consciousness is unified and cannot be broken up into multiple subparts -consciousness is made up of individual experiences that are separated from other conscious experiences by cause-and-effect relationships

Question 81

how has the integrated information theory been applied in practice?

Answer 81

to explain the different forms of consciousness in clinical patients

Question 82

what does conscious require the interaction of?

Answer 82

sensory areas, memory, and likely other systems such as emotion and executive function

Question 83

what does conscious include?

Answer 83

arousal, perception, attention, and working memory

Question 84

how does binding work and what is it important for?

Answer 84

thought to work by synchronizing the activity in the relevant networks for a short period of time (likely important to unify arousal, perception, attention and working memory)

Question 85

what do studies of perceiving and responding to faces show patterns of?

Answer 85

synchronous activity, followed by asynchronous activity, and finally synchronous activity

Question 86

what are the essential neural regions for consciousness

Answer 86

unknown at this time

Question 87

which areas of the brain are all inactive when a person is unconscious?

Answer 87

dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, medial frontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex, and posterior cingulate cortex

Question 88

what areas of the brain are active during a quiet resting conscious state?

Answer 88

a network of frontoparietal areas

Question 89

what have researchers found to be true of patients in a coma or vegetative state?

Answer 89

they still produce brain activity in response to verbal commands, such as imagining they are playing tennis or walking around their home

Question 90

what do studies of clinical patients and neuroimaging studies suggest?

Answer 90

that there is a bilateral region of the parietal lobe that is necessary for consciousness, but no necessary area in the frontal lobe

Question 91

what area of the brain is the region that some researchers think is responsible for binding information and why?

Answer 91

the claustrum, because it receives connections from nearly the entire cortex

Question 92

there is overlap in the brain regions associated with consciousness and those associated with self awareness. these regions are:

Answer 92

medial frontal cortex posterior cingulate cortex

Question 93

in what sort of experimental atmosphere can nonconscious emotions be demonstrated in?

Answer 93

fear conditioning

Question 94

what are some things that suggest that cognitive activity can occur on the nonconscious level?

Answer 94

blindsight, priming, dorsal-stream processing etc

Question 95

automatic processes use a system to generate...

Answer 95

rapid, nonconscious responses to that stimuli

Question 96

conscious processes use a system to produce...

Answer 96

slower, controlled responses based on relevant knowledge and experience