Core study five Moray-cognitive area

Question 1

Background

Answer 1

Attention is a limited resource. When our attention is focused on certain things, a ‘barrier’ is put up that stops us from focusing on other things.

Cherry (1953) was interested in how people put up an inattentional barrier at a party with multiple conversations going on.
This is where you only listen to the conversation you’re participating in and not the conversations around you.
The cocktail party effect is when this barrier can be broken only by the sound of your name.

Question 2

Cocktail party effect

Answer 2

The concept originally suggested by Cherry in which we would hear it when our own name is said within a crowded room

Question 3

Dichotic listening

Answer 3

When headphones are worn by a participant and a different message is played to each ear

Question 4

Shadowing

Answer 4

When a participant is told to focus on a passage of text and repeat it out
loud as they hear it

Question 5

Affective instruction

Answer 5

When a person is asked to do something,
preceded by their name being said

Question 6

Non-affective instructions

Answer 6

When a person is asked to do something, but their name is not used

Question 7

Overall Aims (experiment one aim)

Answer 7

To test Cherry’s findings on the intentional barrier more thoroughly.

Question 8

Experiment one sample

Answer 8

Undergraduate students
Both genders
From Oxford University

Question 9

Experiment one procedure

Answer 9

Participants had to shadow a piece of prose that they could hear in one ear. This is the attended message because participants were focusing on it.
In the other ear (the message that they were NOT paying attention to) a list of simple words was repeated 35 times. This is the rejected message.
At the end of the task, participants completed a recognition task. Participants had to indicate what they recognised from a list of 21 words (7 from the shadowed passage, 7 from the rejected passage and 7 similar words that were in neither passage).

Question 10

Results of experiment one

Answer 10

Shadowed passage: Participants recognized on average 4.9/7 words from the shadowed passage
Rejected passage: Participants recognised on average 1.9/7 words from the rejected passage
Similar words: Participants recognised on average 2.6/7 words that were in neither passage

Question 11

Conclusions of experiment one

Answer 11

Participants are much more able to recognise words from the shadowed passage. Almost none of the words from the rejected message are able to break the ‘inattentional barrier’.

Question 12

Aim of experiment two

Answer 12

This experiment wanted to find out if an affective cue (their name) would break the inattentional barrier.

Question 13

Sample of experiment two

Answer 13

12 Undergraduate students
Both genders
From Oxford University

Question 14

IV of experiment two

Answer 14

Affective instructions- (When a person is asked to do something, preceded by their name being said) or a non-affective- (instruction When a person is asked to do something, but their name is not used.)

Question 15

DV of experiment two

Answer 15

Whether participants were more likely to hear an instruction in a message they’re not paying attention to if it is preceded by their name. (either by reporting so or following the instruction).

Question 16

Procedure of experiment two

Answer 16

1. Passages- Participants heard 10 passages of light fiction including both affective and non-affective instructions (repeated measures)
2. Instructions- Participants were told to either change ear or to stop. They were told to make as few errors as possible.
3. Order- The instructions were at the start and/or the end of the passage
4. Controls- Passages were ready at a steady monotone with a pace or 130 words per minute by a single male voice

Question 17

Results of experiment two

Answer 17

Affective instructions- Participants heard/followed the instructions preceded by their name 20/39 times

Non-affective instructions- Participants heard/followed the instructions not preceded by their name 4/36 times

Question 18

Conclusions of experiment two

Answer 18

Affective messages (such as names) are able to break the ‘inattentional barrier’. This backs up the previous work by Cherry.

Question 19

Reflections from experiment two

Answer 19

Warning-Participants were given a warning in passages 8 and 10.
Effect- There was a slight increase in how many times the rejected message instruction was heard.
Interested- Moray was interested whether pre-warning could help break the inattentional barrier

Question 20

Aim of experiment three

Answer 20

This experiment wanted to find out if pre-warning would help neutral material break the inattentional barrier.

Question 21

Sample of experiment three

Answer 21

28 Undergraduate students
Both genders
From Oxford University
Split into 2 groups of 14

Question 22

Independent variable of experiment three

Answer 22

Warning (Participants were told they should memorise as many digits they heard as possible.) or no warning (Participants were told they’d be asked questions at the end about the shadowed passage.)

Question 23

Dependent Variable of experiment three

Answer 23

How many digits the participants were able to recall from the rejected message.

Question 24

Experiment three procedure

Answer 24

Participants were asked to shadow one message
The messages sometimes contained digits towards the end
The digits were sometimes only in the shadowed passage, sometimes only in the rejected passage, sometimes in both and sometimes there were no digits (control)

Question 25

Results of experiment three

Answer 25

There was no significant difference between the groups in how many digits they were able to recall from the rejected passage.

Question 26

Conclusions of experiment three

Answer 26

Warnings do not help neutral information break the inattentional barrier. The information must be meaningful in order to do this.

Question 27

Overall conclusions

Answer 27

Almost none of the verbal content from a rejected message penetrates a block when attending to another message.

‘Important’ messages like names can penetrate the barrier.

A short list of simple words cannot be remembered even when repeated several times.

It is difficult to make ‘neutral’ material (e.g. digits) important enough to break the inattentional barrier.

Question 28

Validity

Answer 28

Internal validity or construct validity: Controlled (e.g passages used, pace and voice of speaker, recognition task in experiment 1) BUT results may have been down to understanding of the passages, hearing ability etc and not attention

Population validity: All students from a single area and occupation BUT both males and females

Ecological validity: Realistic to hear multiple conversations at once BUT not isolated, wearing headphones and tested afterwards

Question 29

Reliability

Answer 29

Internal reliability: The internal reliability is high as a standardised produce was used because the same monotone voice (male) at the same pace. They shadowed the same passage this means that the produce was standardised as consistent across all participants.

External reliability: The study had low external reliability because there was a small number of participant’s in experiment one and two there was twelve participants and in experiment three it was fourteen people per condition. The sample was too small to establish consistent effects could be a fluke.

Question 30

Ethics

Answer 30

Informed consent: Students had the tasks clearly explained prior to participation, they knew the aim was to break the intentional barrier.

No psychological harm: No real stress to the tasks themselves, all they had to do was read a passage which does not cause high level of stress

The participants were kept confidential: the names were not reaved in experiments two all we know is that they were oxford undergratudes.

Deception was broken in experiment three as the control group as they were not told about the questions on the digits as they were informed the questions would only be on the shadowed passage.

Question 31

Ethnocentrism

Answer 31

It could be seen as ethnocentric because it was only done in the UK which a western culture and attention could be different in other cultures which we cannot assume.

It could not be seen ethnocentric because of the ability to process bit of information is universal due to attention being a limited rescore.

Question 32

What area does Moray link to

Answer 32

Moray’s study falls within the cognitive area because it is investigating the cognitive process of attention. Specifically it aimed to investigate selective attention by trying to find out whether (and what types of) ‘unattended’ material could break through the attentional barrier that is set up when a person focuses their listening on a spefic task.