Attention - Modern Attention Research Flashcards
What are the characteristics of attention?
Goal-directed
Varies in effort
Can be shifted
Can be zoomed
Selective
Limited
Can be captured
Can be divided
What does it mean that attention is “goal-directed”?
Deployed to achieve something
e.g. finding someone in a crowd
What does it mean that attention “varies in effort”?
Deploying attention can be very easy or very difficult (visual search)
Pop-out searches are very easy
Serial search tends to be much harder (Where’s Wally?)
What does it mean that attention “can be shifted”?
Light that follows someone round on a stage, keeping your focus and directing your attention - spotlight metaphor
In visual search, attention and eye movement often coupled to refocus attention
e.g. scanning left to right
What does it mean that attention “can be zoomed”?
Shift our focus to look at small patch of scene in detail
What does it mean that attention is “selective”?
Attention as a filter metaphor
e.g. deciding to focus on one conversation at a party while ignoring other things
Dominates early modern attention research
Attending to one thing means not attending to other things
What does it mean that attention is “limited”?
Attention as a resource metaphor
e.g. trying to listen to two people at the same time
Limited “amount of attention” and can “run out of” attention
What does it mean that attention “can be captured”?
Don’t have complete control of attention
Can control attention but only to a degree
e.g. searching for your friend with red hair who never sits in first row but attention still captured by other red-haired students in first row
What does it mean that attention “can be divided”?
e.g. between modalities - listening and seeing
What is modern attention research?
Started in 1950s following a paradigm shift from behaviourism to cognitivism - “cognitive revolution”
Cognitivism underlies most modern research
Donald Broadbent was one of the founding fathers
What was the stimuli in Broadbent’s (1952) experiment?
Grid with 5 locations
Different symbols in some locations
What was the task in Broadbent’s (1952) experiment?
Participants heard both
- “S-1 from G.D.O. Is there a heart on Position 1?”
- “S-2 from G.D.O. Is there a cross on Position 4?”
Recordings played simultaneously
Various conditions
- answer question for S-1 but ignore S-2
What were the results of Broadbent’s (1952) experiment?
Only about 50% of questions answered correctly
Task was very difficult even with limited number of possible alternatives
What was Cherry’s (1953) cocktail-party problem?
“how do we recognise what one person is saying when others are speaking at the same time?”
What was the first condition in Cherry’s (1953) cocktail-party problem experiment?
Two messages by same speaker played to both ears (you hear both messages in both ears)
Instruction - repeat one message and ignore the other (shadowing)
Result
- task is very difficult but possible after many repetitions
But only tested one participant
What was the second condition in Cherry’s (1953) cocktail-party problem experiment?
Two messages by the same speaker simultaneously played to different ears
Called dichotic listening
Participants instructed to shadow one speaker
Much easier to be able to attend to one ear
What happened to the irrelevant message in Cherry’s (1953) cocktail party problem experiment?
No words or semantic content reported
Change in language not noticed
Reversed speech was something recognised
Change from male to female or to pure tone recognised - suggest that basic physical characteristics processed
What were Cherry’s (1953) conclusions from his two experiments into the cocktail-party problem?
Very hard to attend to two messages that are not separable by physical cues (i.e. same speaker, same ear)
With physical cues (i.e. location of speaker) is much easier
We can attend to one message and report very little back about other message
What was Broadbent’s filter theory?
Senses -> short term store -> selective filter -> limited capacity channel (P system)
What is the nightclub analogy for Broadbent’s filter theory?
Limited capacity channel = nightclub
Selective filter = bouncers (prevent overcrowding)
Short-term memory store = the queue
How does the short-term memory store function in Broadbent’s filter theory?
Information from multiple sensory inputs enters short-term memory store
Simple physical stimulus properties (location, pitch, intensity) processed in parallel
How does the selective filter function in Broadbent’s filter theory?
Identifies information for further processing
Uses physical stimulus properties as basis for selection
How does the limited capacity channel store function in Broadbent’s filter theory?
Serial processer
Can only process one thing at a time so other things must wait
Current term - focus of attention in working memory
In Broadbent’s filter theory, what does selection/filters occur before?
Stimuli identified
Stimuli recognised
Stimuli fully analysed
Stimulus meaning fully analysed