HC 6 - Visual Attention & Distraction Flashcards
Definition of attention
Ability to maintain interest in a thought without getting distracted
3 types of attention
- Selective attention
- Divided attention
- Sustained attention
Selective attention
Definition
Process of DIRECTING awareness to RELEVANT stimuli, while IGNORING IRRELEVANT stimuli
Spotlight = attention
Topdown
-exo/endo?
- stimulus/goal driven?
- example
- Endogenous cues
- Goal driven
- looking for a friend in the crowd/Waldo
Bottom up
- exo/endo?
- stimulus/goal driven?
- example
- Exogenous/physical cues
- Stimulus driven
- red umbrella in a crowd of black ones
Attributes that guide attention
- DIFFERENT THAN SURROUNDING -> salient
- colour
- motion
- orientation
- size
guidance by stimulus salience (bottom-up)
Bottom or top distraction is salient?
Bottom - up! Caughts attention
2 fundamental rules of visual salience
(salience of target increases with:)
- target-distractor heterogeneity
- distractor-distractor homogeneity
Target-distractor heterogeneity
differences between target & distractor
Distractor - distractor homogeneity
Similarities of 2 disctractor
Van Gogh experiment
result child/adults bottom-top
Children: more bottom up strategy
Adults: more top down strategy -> driven by thoughts
3 items that attract more attention than others
- items relevant to survival (snakes)
- faces
- babies (human & puppies)
Biases:
Centre bias
Photographer bias
Viewing strategy
+ solution to biases
focus on the centre of an image
putting relevant salient items in the centre
-
focus less on centre!
definition Divided attention
- our brains ability to attend to two different stimuli at the same time -> multitasking
tasks compete for limited attentional resources
2 theories of capacity of attention
- central capacity theory
- 1 pool of attentional resources. Empty = distracted - multiple resource theory
- 3 pools of attentional resources: visual, auditory and other modality
- shifting between these 3!
Automaticity & attention
Well-practised tasks require fewer resources and are easier to perform
3 things that affect divided attention
- interfering tasks that involve similar activities
- tasks that share 1 sensory modality (listening to 2 people)
- extra: anxiety, arousal, task difficulty, skills
Driving + cell phone on performance
DIMINISHES performance
Slower reactions AND miss more things
inattentional blindness
failing to notice full-visible unexpected object because attention on other task/object
Switching costs
switching rapidly between tasks (distracted learning), that causes negative effects
- mental fatique, negative performance, tasks take longer to complete
WE NOT GOOD AT MULTITASKING
3 things to improve learning
- increase cognitive control abilities (exercise, meditation)
- managing distractions around/within you (increase metacognition, decrease accessability & boredom with planned distraction)
- strengthen your goals (set clear and achievable goals, implementation intention: WHAT and WHEN)
Sustained attention definition/other words
Vigilance/alertness
the ability to maintain focus of attention and remain alert to stimuli over prolonged time-period
It is hard!
4 main factors affecting vigilance and attention
- time on task
- limited ability -> performance declines after 30/15/5 minutes - rest to activity radio
- amount of rest when performing a task can strongly impact vigilance - sleeploss
- induces lapses, negative effects quickly seen
- noise has different effects: normal sleep + silence = best, most error when sleeploss AND silence - motivation
- intrinsic: internal factors, feedback
- extrinsic: external factors, reward punishment
- better performance on important recruitment taks than lab experiment
Reaction ability in automated system
No reaction OR extremely late!
