Moray Flashcards
Background (Attention)
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
Background (Previous Research)
- 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.
Key Terms
Cocktail Party Effect
The concept originally suggested by Cherry in which we would hear it when our own name is said within a crowded room
Key Terms
Dichotic Listening
When headphones are worn by a participant and a different message is played to each ear
Key Terms
Shadowing
When a participant is told to focus on a passage of text and repeat it out loud as they hear it
Key Terms
Affective Instructions
When a person is asked to do something, preceded by their name being said
Key Terms
Non-affective Instructions
When a person is asked to do something, but their name is not used
Overall Aim
To test Cherry’s findings on the inattentional barrier more thoroughly
Apparatus
- Brenell Mark IV stereophonic tape recorder
- Headphones
Experiment 1
Sample
- Undergraduate students
- Male and female
- From Oxford University
Experiment 1
Procedure
- 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)
Experiment 1
Results
Average words /7 recognised from each passage:
* Shadowed - 4.9
* Rejected - 1.9
* Neither - 2.6
Experiment 1
Conclusions
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’
Experiment 2
Aim
This experiment wanted to find out if an affective cue (their name) would break the inattentional barrier
Experiment 2
Sample
- 12 Participants
- Undergraduate students
- Male and female
- From Oxford University
Experiment 2
Independent Variable
- Affective Instructions
- Non-affective Instructions
Experiment 2
Dependent Variable
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)
Experiment 2
Procedure
- Passages - Participants heard 10 passages of light fiction including both affective and non-affective instructions (repeated measures)
- Instructions - Participants were told to either change ear or to stop. They were told to make as few errors as possible
- Order - The instructions were at the start and/or the end of the passage
- Controls - Passages were ready at a steady monotone with a pace or 130 words per minute by a single male voice
Experiment 2
Results
Times participants followed affective or non-affective instructions:
* Affective - 20/39
* Non-affective - 4/36
Experiment 2
Conclusions
Affective messages (such as names) are able to break the ‘inattentional barrier’. This backs up the previous work by Cherry
Experiment 3
Aim
This experiment wanted to find out if pre-warning would help neutral material break the inattentional barrier
Experiment 3
Sample
- 28 Participants
- Undergraduate students
- Male and female
- From Oxford University
- Split into 2 groups of 14
Experiment 3
Independent Variable
- Warning - Participants were told they should memorise as many digits they heard as possible
- No warning - Participants were told they’d be asked questions at the end about the shadowed passage
Experiment 3
Dependent Variable
How many digits the participants were able to recall from the rejected message
Experiment 3
Procedure
- 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)
Experiment 3
Results
There was no significant difference between the groups in how many digits they were able to recall from the rejected passage
Experiment 3
Conclusion
Warnings do not help neutral information break the inattentional barrier. The information must be meaningful in order to do this
Overall Conclusions
- 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
Ethical Guidelines Kept
- Deception - Students had some the tasks clearly explained prior to participation
- Protection from Harm - No real stress to the tasks themselves
- Debrief - Most participants were debriefed
- Consent - Participants signed up and gave consent.
- Confidentiality - No names used or private information
Ethical Guidelines Broken
Deception
* One group not told about digits in experiment 3
* The participants are told to make as few errors as possible
Ethnocentrism
- Ethnocentric as only conducted in one culture (U.K)
- Perhaps not ethnocentric as attention is universal, it is a mental process and we all have the same brain process
Reliability
- Internal (HIGH) - Standardised procedures such as passages used, pace and voice of speaker, recognition task in experiment 1 etc.
- External (LOW) - Sample sizes very small (unknown, 12 and 28 split into two groups of 14)
Validity
- Internal/Construct (HIGH/LOW) - 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 (LOW/HIGH) - All students BUT both males and females
- Ecological (HIGH/LOW) - Realistic to hear multiple conversations at once BUT not isolated, wearing headphones and tested afterwards
