Chapter 4: External Attention Flashcards
Attention
The mental process that helps us choose, adjust, and maintain focus on important information for our actions
Capacity limited
Our attention is capacity limited
External attention
Focusing on and adjusting to SENSORY INFORMATION from the outside world (intensity/size/colour/movement)
Selection
Singling out certain pieces of information among the rest
Voluntary Attention
When you choose to focus on goal-relevant information
Reflexive attention
When something grabs your focus without you choosing to pay attention (e.g: a sudden loud sound)
Vigilance
Related to sustained attention, a state of heightened attentional anticipation that enables people to better respond to stimuli before they appear
Modulation
The process by which attention affects perception of a stimulus
Inattentional Blindness
When people dont notice something UNEXPECTED in in plain sight because their attention is focused elsewhere
Change Blindness
Not noticing large changes from one view to the next. When people fail to compare the two views of a stimulus in memory. People often recognise both the pre and post change even when they don’t realise the change has occured
Attentional Bias
When your brain decides to focus attention on one certain stimulus over the others
Attentional Bias modification
A therapy that helps people reduce harmful attention bias (Prof. Christa’s look for 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 game)
Emotion induced blindness
Difficulty noticing targets that appear right after emotional distractions
