Attention - mechanisms and processes

Question 1

What is inattentional blindness?

Answer 1

Failure to notice a change in the environment that is in plain sight due to a lack of attention and not due to a problem with the visual system

Question 2

Describe Broadbent’s theory of attention as an information filler

Answer 2

1) Selective filter - one input is selected for further processing based on its physical characteristics
2) Higher level processing - extracts meaning from the input ie what does this sound/image/smell
Unattended information cannot pass through the filter. No meaning is given to ignored inputs

Question 3

Describe Treisman’s attenuation theory of attention

Answer 3

1) Attenuating filter - filters inputs for further processing based on their physical characteristics
Bottleneck unattended inputs still pass through, but only weakly
2) Dictionary unit - higher level processing based on meaning/language/physical characteristics
ALL inputs that make it through the filter are given a threshold value, determines if they capture attention

Question 4

Describe attention as a spotlight - Posner

Answer 4

More attentional resources to the centre and more attention processing to the periphery

Question 5

Describe endogenous cueing

Answer 5

Symbolic of a target location, indicates where a target may appear, can voluntarily follow the cue, centrally presented

Question 6

Describe exogenous cueing

Answer 6

Automatically captures attention
Appears in the location of a target
Peripherally presented

Question 7

Endogenous vs Exogenous

Answer 7

Endogenous - voluntary, slow, driven by internal goals
Exogenous - automatic, rapid, driven by external events in the environment

Question 8

Describe inhibition of return

Answer 8

Short delay between the cue and appearance of the target - quicker to find the target, but what happens when it is longer
Long delay - moved our attention away from the target location –> inhibition of return delays attention returning to previous locations

Question 9

What is the result of no return of inhibition?

Answer 9

Less efficient

Question 10

What did the stroop task show structurally?

Answer 10

Developmental fMRI study of the stroop colour word task
- +ve correlation between age and stroop related activation in;
- Left parietal and parieto-occipital cortices (developed by adolesence)
- Left lateral prefrontal cortex (developed by adulthood)
Left anterior cingulate

Question 11

What are parallel search tasks?

Answer 11

Searching for one feature

Question 12

What is a conjunction search task?

Answer 12

Searching for more than one feature

Question 13

What are the results from the visual search task results?

Answer 13

Parallel search - can rapidly detect.
Conjunction search - slower to detect items from more than one feature, slower reaction times

Question 14

What is local processing?

Answer 14

Small, fine details. Narrow attentional spotlight

Question 15

What is global processing?

Answer 15

Large scale/big picture. Broaden your attentional spotlight