Flashcards
Focused Attention
Cards in this deck (25)
- 1Typical questions concerning attentionHow do we focus on one goal and ignore distractors?
Vast info available to us - how can we choose what interests us?
Why is it hard to take notes in a lecture and understand the content?
Can we only process one source of info at a time?
What happens to unattended material? - 2Two perspectives of attentionFocused and Divided Attention
- 3Main Questions regarding focused attentionHow well can we select a certain input?
How does that selection come about?
What happens to non-selected info? - 4Cocktain Party Problem (1953)How can we be at a party and focus on what one person is saying despite there being people talking all around
- 5Dichotic Listening TaskParticipants are given two hearing stimuli, but the second is given while they're being asked to repeat what was said in the first, so they tend to shut out the second voice and not tune in (unless the gender of fthe voice changed)
- 6Shadowing taskPeople are generally not able to remember the attended message well (the unattended message evn worse) because it hasn't been stored in long-term memory. (Cherry, 1953) the only times where the unattended message was actually noticed was when it said their name or when a sexual reference was made
- 7Theories of AttentionBottleneck theory of Attention
Broadbendt's Filter Theory (1958) - 8Bottleneck theories of attentionBroadbent's, Treisman's, and Deutsch and Deutsch Models of Attention are all bottleneck models because they predict we cannot consciously attend to all of our sensory input at the same time.
- 9Broadbendt's Filter TheoryThe existene of a sensory buffer that blocks out certain information in order to focus on what's most important
- 10Treisman's Attenuation TheorySimilar to Broadbent's theory in that the filter exists early on, except that the filter attenuates rather than eliminates; like turning down the tv and the radio so you can hear the person you're speaking to bette. We are therefore still processing unattended sound on some level. Also disagreed with Broadbent's location of the filter as he argued it was
- 11Evalutation of Treisman's Attenuation Theory (1960)1. Treisman's Model overcomes some of the problems associated with Broadbent's Filter Model, e.g. the Attenuation Model can ACCOUNT for the 'Cocktail Party Syndrome'.
2. Treisman's model does not explain how exactly semantic analysis works.
3. The nature of the attenuation process has never been precisely specified.
4. A problem with all dichotic listening experiments is that you can never be sure that the participants have not actually switched attention to the so called unattended channel. - 12Early bottlneck theory V Late Bottleneck theoryBroadbendt and Terisman - Early bottlenecks
Deutsch and Deutsch (1963) later filter - 13Deutsch and Deutsch (1963)Argued that having a delay wasn't a good measure for the study
- 14Johnston and Heinz (1978)(1978) Argued that there was more flexibility to cognitive selection
More processing pre selection = more cost
Selection occurs as early as possible - 15Johnston and Wilson (1980)Ps hear a word in each ear - need to identify targets e.g. clothes
Targets are ambiguous words - socks
Simultaneous word biases meaning - punches or smelly
Ps sometimes knew which ear targets will arrive at - sometimes don’t
Only in latter condition does simultaneous word have an effect - 16Johnston and Wilson 1980
- 17Evaluating All modelsATTENUATION captures data better than FILTER
Deutsch & Deutsch seems unlikely - full analysis is so costly
However, rigidity of all these models does not capture fluency of cognition
Multimode model like Johnston & Heinz lets attention be determined by task demands - 18Focused Visual AttentionRecent research looks at VISUAL attention
Easier to conduct experiments
Visual attention present in everyday life
- VISUAL SEARCH
Look for book in library, friend in bar
Visual search has been studied in lab - 19Spotlight Zoom LensDifferent metaphor from auditory research
Posner (1980) suggests SPOTLIGHT
All in small region of visual field is clear
Items beyond spotlight beam less clear
Attention is shifted by moving spotlight
Eriksen & St James (1986) ZOOM-LENS
Area of focal attention increased/decreased - 20LeBerge (1983)Probe would either be in the middle of a letter or a word.
Concluded that the spotlight width in the letter tasks is one letter space, and the spotlight width in the word task is typically five spaces. - 21Juola et al. 1991Zoom lens (Egly and Homa, 1984) vs Ring Model (LaBerge and Brown, 1989)
Target in one ring
Ps fixate on centre
Cued to a ring - mostly correct
Ps should be fastest to inner ring
But actually best to cued ring
Visual attention can have 0-shape - 22Neisser & Becklen (1975)superimpose two video scenes
Ps can attend to one and ignore other
People can attend to targets in terms of both SPATIAL LOCATION and OBJECT IDENTITY - 23Conjuncyion and Pop-out searchesDepending on the type to of visual search, attention and reaction time vary. Conjunction (target is very similar to surrounding items) Pop-out (Target immediately pops out)
- 24Disorder to Attention 1Neglect
- brain damage to right parietal lobe
Fail to notice or respond to items on left
Still perceive left side - Marshall & Halligan (1988) Burning house example
Neglect patients often show EXTINCTION
Can see a single stimulus on either side of visual field
But if 2 stimuli presented together - don’t see one furthest from site of damage
Posner might propose problem with disengagement - 25Disorder of Attention 2Balint’s syndrome - lesions in both hemis
Patients show: fixed gazing, gross misreaching of objects, simultagnosia
SIMULTAGNOSIA - only one object can be attended at a time
Posner’s approach might explain simultagnosia in terms of problems of disengaging
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- University Undergraduate Biological and General Psychology Flashcards on Focused Attention, created by sarahderveeuw on 28/04/2015.
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