Wk 10 - Attention

Question 1

Describe attention (x3)

Answer 1

Concentration and focusing of mental effort
Selecting what is relevant from sensory input and processing it for appropriate action – the prioritising of cognitive operations, in order to allow response selection
Does not exist separately from cog processes – is an organiser of, in line with our goals

Question 2

Describe early vs late selection issues in attention (x2 plus 2)

Answer 2

Broadbent’s filter theory: perceptual features, eg voice etc, used to filter out irrelevant message; a structural model – filter stops info flow through system
No semantic processing of unattended info, but still bias outcomes, shown by: River bank/money bank experiment
Late selection theories: that everything is processed semantically, and then selection occurs
2 responses (tap and shadow) can’t be organised to 2 inputs at same time, so difficult to critically test theory

Question 3

Differentiate feature/conjunction search

Answer 3

Feature search used to distinguish target on 1 simple feature
Is pre-attentive: rapid, automatic, unconscious, parallel processing
Conjunction search used when object defined by number of features, eg Where’s Wally
Is focussed: slower, requires, attention, serial processing

Question 4

Outline FIT (feature integration theory) (x3)

Answer 4

Human visual search is result of two distinct search processes:
Pre-attentive (single feature) or focussed (conjunctions)
Serial is slow, but efficient in terms of enabling more complex processing than could be otherwise achieved given neural constraints on capacity to form automatic detector for every possible combo of features

Question 5

Describe evidence for endogenous control of visual attention in visual cuing tasks (x5)

Answer 5

Contingent capture Roger Remington
Not stimulus driven exogenous capture – what we see is what we’re set for
Spatial cue is given about location of upcoming target
If it’s defined as red, red cue captures attention even if not predictive of target position
Whereas a bright highlight (green) doesn’t capture

Question 6

What is the rationale of RSVP? (x6)

Answer 6

To examine temporal rather than spatial attention
One location, time pressured
Letters etc displayed after one another in same location, about 100ms/item
Ps asked to look for certain targets, then asked questions about them at the end
Conceptual/semantic processing shown even at this rate by Mary Potter
Post-target intrusions common (confusing features of target)

Question 7

Describe the AB (x5)

Answer 7

When the processing of task 1 causes interference with task 2 - a failure of awareness
Established through two-target RSVP
T1 and T2 will be flashed in amongst 13 other numbers/symbols
Find impairment at a few hundred ms
Out to about T1 + 6, but not seen at T1 + 1 – processed as one event

Question 8

What are three popular theories of the AB?

Answer 8

1. Chun and Potter 2 stage model:
2. Boost and bounce theory, Olivers and Meeter 2008
3. Wybel’s Episodic Simultaneous Type Serial Token – a computational model (mathematical expression)

Question 9

What are three key concepts of attention?

Answer 9

Capturing attention: out of our control/bottom-up; guided by expectations/top-down
Selective attention: responding to relevant/ignoring irrelevant
Divided attention: among concurrent tasks

Question 10

Describe Chun and Potter 2 stage model of the AB (x4)

Answer 10

Items matched with memory representation (conceptual processing)
Then consolidated in WM in order to report
AB due to limits on memory consolidation of T2 – as T1 not yet completed
Fits that more difficult T1 to process, harder T2 will be

Question 11

Describe Olivers and Meeter 2008 Boost and bounce theory of the AB

Answer 11

Boost increases the activation
Bounce inhibits distractor activation
AB due to lag in rise of boost and bounce
Distractor immediate after T1 gets some of the boost/accesses working memory
Then selection of distractor causes strong bounce which affects T2
So inhibition deployed to help target selection causes the AB
Doesn’t explain AB for sequential targets: even when no distractor to cause bounce, still get an AB - more capacity limits than strategic effect

Question 12

Describe Wybel’s Episodic Simultaneous Type Serial Token – a computational model (mathematical expression) of the AB (x4)

Answer 12

Type is representation used to ID something
Token is representation of particular occurrence of something
Combine to record stimulus occurrence in space/time – where/when
WM encoding suppresses attention to new distractors = AB

Question 13

Three explanations of attentional limitations are…

Answer 13

Structures – often shown using box and arrow models: bottleneck/reaction time models strongly predict behaviours; shut the gate – to exclude rest of info; stores for info retention
Processes: resources with capacities are specific but open to manipulation depending on task demand; divide resources to limit attentional costs etc; improve resources through training (maybe)
Strategic: developed strategies used to manipulate attention; limitations = coordinating action

Question 14

Describe the river bank/money bank experiment

Answer 14

Attended message had homograph (same written form but different meaning) – ‘they threw stones at the bank’
Unattended message had river or unrelated control word
Ps to choose sentences closest in meaning to the attended message
More likely to choose river meaning if ‘river’ occurred in unattended
Must have processed the meaning of river, although couldn’t say they’d heard it

Question 15

Endogenous control of attention is… (x4)

Eg (x1)

Answer 15

Shifting attention voluntarily
Directed by goals
Internal
Top-down
Tune out conversation to listen to another

Question 16

Exogenous control is… (x2)

Eg (x1)

Answer 16

Automatic response to important stimulus
Botton-up
Attention captured by hearing friend’s name in conversation

Question 17

Inattention blindnes is... (x1)
Eg experiment (x1)

Answer 17

A phenomena of endogenous control of attention
Gorilla experiment – looking for the gorilla makes you miss the curtains changing colour, and the team-member who leaves part way through

Question 18

Change blindness is... (x2)
Eg experiments (x2)

Answer 18

A phenomena of endogenous control of attention - related to inattention blindness
Failure to notice change of stimuli
Eg objects on a table (Nevin and Simons 1997), the interviewer’s appearance/gender after builders walk through with cladding sheet (Simons and Levin 1998

Question 19

Unilateral neglect is… (x1)
And results form… (x1)
Providing neurophysiological evidence for (x1)

Answer 19

Inattention to other side of space
Not just visual, but attentional deficit - joining contralateral objects with lines eliminates problem
Separate what vs where and when processing

Question 20

Limitations of the ‘spotlight’ concept of attention are highlighted by… (x3)
ie (x1)

Answer 20

Inattention and change blindness
Unilateral neglect
It’s not just where you look

Question 21

Debate over whether attention and consciousness are the same thing continues… (x2)

Answer 21

They’re separate: things get to awareness sometimes without attention; argument for evolved capacity to let important stuff break through
They’re involved, attention is gateway to consciousness, but no solid examples of things you don’t need to attend to in order for it to enter consciousness

Question 22

Dichotic listening tasks are used to identify… (x1)
And involve… (x6)
Results led to formation of… (x1)

Answer 22

The fate of unattended to info
Ps hear a different message in each ear concurrently, through headphones
Attend to 1 message, and shadow it (repeat aloud as heard)
Shadow ear – the one that’s attended to
Look at how the two messages interact, what they noticed: the physical features – speech vs music, and gender, pitch tone of voice
But not meaning – considered to be the end goal of processing
Can sometimes hear own names, but not accents or meaning of other messages
Early selection models of attention, eg Broadbent’s filter theory

Question 23

Nellie Lavie’s Load Theory of atterntion selection holds that is… (x1)

Answer 23

Depends on the cognitive load of task involved

Question 24

Debate over attentional control continues over whether it’s … (x2)
Evidence points at… (x1)

Answer 24

Resources (which could be changed) vs

Capacity (bottleneck supported by evidence)

Question 25

Kahneman, 1973 proposed attentional control as processing capacity based on processes rather than structures… (x3)

Answer 25

Attention as process of allocating resources to inputs
Concurrent tasks possible contingent on difficulty
Resources are increased under arousal (motivation)

Question 26

Capacity theory of attention control proposes… (x1)

And is tested through… (x2)

Answer 26

Limited general resources
Divided attention attention tasks
Concurrent task limits set by task difficulty

Question 27

Visual attention is assessed through… (x1)

Involving… (x4)

Answer 27

Visual search tasks
Identify the object among the distractors
Measure reaction time or accuracy – speed/accuracy trade-off
Response latency (RT) is primary DV: increases as identification, decision making or response selection get difficult
Accuracy a better DV for difficult/time-pressured tasks

Question 28

Two limitations of FIT…

Answer 28

Features don’t always pop-out – such as in change-blindness
Configural patterns can over-ride basic features
Heterogeneity (difference) or homogeneity (similarity) of distractors – much harder if all distractors are different

Question 29

Contingent capture is…(x1)
And involves… (x3)
That counters which theories? (x1)

Answer 29

A form of top-down control in visual search
What we see is what we’re set for
Spatial cue is given about location of upcoming target
If its defined as red, then red cue captures attention even if not predictive of target position, whereas a bright highlight (green) doesn’t capture
Exogenous/FIT theories

Question 30

Masking in vision is… (x1)

And pattern masks… (x2)

Answer 30

When two stimuli shown close together, one stimulus masks another
Interfere with target processing
Compete with targets to engage perceptual processing – they ensure brief stimuli don’t reach awareness

Question 31

Discriminating targets from distractors involves… (x2)

Answer 31

Attentional set: preparedness to select target features/reject distractors
Attentional engagement: locking attention onto targets

Question 32

Feature detectors are… (x1)

Which fit into which theory of visual attention?

Answer 32

Modules/processors each of which detects a colour, or shape (e.g., angle/line) whenever it appears in the processors location
Treisman’s FIT

Question 33

RSVP is… (x4)

Answer 33

Rapid Serial Visual Presentation - visual attention task, finds the AB
Stream of about 12 items – letters, digits, words, pictures – presented in a fixed location
Items occur one at a time, at about 100 ms per item
Position of T2 relative to T1 is varied – the lag
Ps report items at the end of each stream, need to ignore distractors

Question 34

The lag-dependent deficit in T2 accuracy in RSVP results is… (x3)

Answer 34

The AB
The fewer items between T1 and T2, the lower is T2 accuracy
Accuracy recovers by about lag 8 (T2 is the 8th item after T1)

Question 35

Lag-1 sparing in RSVP results is…

Answer 35

(about half the time)
T2 accuracy is unaffected at lag 1 (when immediately preceded by T1)
And then the AB deficit appears at lag 2

Question 36

What are the two main classes of theories regarding the AB?

Answer 36

Capacity: the brain is full

Attentional control is lost