Exam 2 Flashcards
Attention
The ability to focus on specific stimuli or locations
Selective attention
Attending to one thing while ignoring others
Distraction
One stimulus interfering with the processing of another stimulus
Attentional capture
A rapid shifting of attention usually caused by a stimulus such as a loud noise, bright light, or sudden movement
Visual scanning
Movement of the eyes from one location or object to another
How do people ignore distracting stimuli when they are trying to focus their attention on a task according to Lavie?
Processing capacity and perceptual load
Processing capacity
Refers to the amount of information people can handle and sets a limit on their ability to process incoming information
Perceptual load
Related to the difficulty of a task
Low-load tasks
Easy, well practiced tasks that use up only a small amount of the person’s processing capacity
High-load tasks
Difficult, not as well practiced tasks that use more of a person’s processing capacity
Why does the Stroop effect occur?
The names of the words cause a competing response and therefore slow responding to the target; the task-irrelevant stimuli are extremely powerful because reading words is highly practiced and has become so automatic that it is difficult not to read them
Central vision
The area you are looking at
Peripheral vision
Everything off to the side
Where on the eye do objects in central vision fall?
The fovea
Where on the eye do objects in peripheral vision fall?
The peripheral retina
Saccadic eye movement
A rapid, jerky movement from one fixation to the next
Overt attention
Shifting attention from one place to another by moving the eyes; we can see attentional shifts by observing where the eyes are looking
Attention can be influenced by a _________ process called _________
Bottom-up; stimulus salience
Stimulus salience
The physical properties of the stimulus, such as color, contrast, or movement
________ processing comes into play when scanning is influenced by ___________
Top-down; scene schemas
Scene schemas
An observer’s knowledge about what is contained in typical scenes
Covert attention
Shifting attention while keeping the eyes still
Why do we study covert attention?
A way to understand what is happening in the mind without the interference of eye movements
Precueing experiment (general principle)
To determine whether presenting a cue indicating where a stimulus will appear enhances the processing of the target stimulus
Precueing experiment
