Lecture 18: Attention

Question 1

Attention

Answer 1

• ‘A person’s ability to exert deliberate mental effort on what is most important in any given situation’
• Attention is generally perceived as cruicial for sports performance
• ‘Taking possession of the mind’
• ‘It is difficult to conceive of any aspect that is more central to enhancement of skill learning & expert performance than attention’

Question 2

Concentration (as similar concept)

Answer 2

a) focusing on relevant cues
b) maintaining that focus
c) situational awareness
d) shifting attention when necessary

Question 3

Goal-directed vs. stimulus-driven attention

Answer 3

• Goal-directed = willfulling focusing on something

- Stimulus-driven = attend to cues that protect us for survival -> things that grab our attention

Question 4

Attentional focus

Answer 4

• Optimal depends on task, person + expertise
• Internal vs. external
• Associative vs. dissociative

Question 5

Optimal focus depends on skill level

Answer 5

1. Verbal-cognitive stage = high cognitive load (much attention required)
   = little attention available to monitor external cues
2. Associative-motor stage = lower demand on conscious control as separate components of skill execution are combined
3. Autonomous stage = low cognitive load (little attention required)
   = much attention available to monitor external cues etc.

Question 6

How to discover key visual info in task?

Answer 6

1. Subjective experience
2. Visual occlusion = temporal & spatial
3. Eye tracking

Question 7

Experts show better attentional control

Answer 7

• Quiet eye = final fixation directed to a single location/object during critical phase of motor task
  = increase with expertise and proficiency

Question 8

Distraction

Answer 8

• External distractors = visual & auditory

- Internal distracters = mind wandering, performance pressure, fatigue

Question 9

Losing focus

Answer 9

• Relevant functions of the central executive:
  = inhibition (resisting distraction by task-irrelevant stimuli
  = shifting (voluntary control over attention)
  = updating (retrieving + storing of info)
• Attentional capacity is limited
• Difference in attentional demand = novices affected more than experts
  = novices need WM more to perform skills
  = distracters may prevent experts focusing on movement (which is bad ) so therefore could be beneficial for them

Question 10

Memory

Answer 10

Central executive -> articulatory loop & visuospatial sketchpad -> episodic buffer -> long-term memory

Question 11

Fatigue -> associative focus

Answer 11

• Increase fatigue = increase associative (shift from associative to dissociative, increase in oxygen consumption)
• Fatigue reduces attentional control = shorter fixations on target

Question 12

Regaining focus: self talk

Answer 12

• Types = position (motivational), negative, instructional (attention)
• Meta analysis = positive effect of self talk, especially instructional for fine motor tasks

Question 13

Attention training

Answer 13

• Constraining vision

- Cueing vision

Question 14

Training attention control

Answer 14

• Concentration grid = non-representative
• Attention control training should be integrated inpractice = inhibition, shifting, in usual env.
• Representative practice: include distracters? e.g. training with anxiety
  = increase performance and quiet eye period (Vine & Wilson, 2010)