Attention Study Guide

Attention ___________________________________________ 1. Define attention (as best we can) in terms of where it fits in the cognitive system and what it does. 2. Outline the questions that define the study of attention. 3. Describe the four functions of attention • Vigilance • Search • Selection • Division 4. Discuss how attention selects relevant stimuli and ignore irrelevant stimuli. 5. Explore the limits of attention: automaticity. 6. Examine the literature on the influence of subliminal stimuli on behavior. Definitions of Attention ___________________________________________ Attention as Activity (Selection) How do we direct our mental energy to a particular object, concept, thought, etc.? Attention as Fuel (Processing) How do we utilize our mental energy to achieve some goal? The problem is that it's hard to separate these definitions. They are circular. Q: How do you increase attentional fuel? A: Q: What happens if more items are selected? A: Key Questions ___________________________________________ 1) Is attention limited? 2) How much and what limits it? 3) What happens to "unselected" stimuli? 4) How does something become "automatic"? Where does Attention fit into the Process? ___________________________________________ (Unconsciousness) Consciousness Sensation & Perception Attention Preconscious Processing Learning & Memory Four functions (forms) of attention ___________________________________________ a) Vigilance (may or may not be there) b) Search (actively pursuing a target) c) Selective Attention d) Divided Attention "One thing at a time and not very well." ~ Hilda S. Schulkind Vigilance ___________________________________________ The ability to attend to a field of stimulation over a prolonged period of time in which your goal is to detect the appearance of some target stimulus. Factors that affect Vigilance 1) Fatigue Affects criterion, not sensitivity Subjects notice target, but aren't sure if it was real or imagined. 2) Limited field Accuracy over a small spatial area Varying views on shape of attentional field 3) Onset of target Things that appear suddenly are well detected; evolutionary advantage? 4) Expectation/Practice Search ___________________________________________ Difference between search and vigilance a) Time b) Definitiveness of target Big Question: Is search serial or parallel? Feature Model of Search ___________________________________________ 1) Analyze the target in terms of its features. 2) Activate all stimuli in the field that contain the critical features. 3) Search activated stimuli for the target. 4) Positive features easier to detect than negative ones. ___________________________________________ Visual Search Reaction Time (ms) 3000 2500 2000 Conj. Absent Conj. Present Feat. Absent Feat. Present 1500 1000 500 0 4 16 # of Distractors 64 Selective/Divided Attention ___________________________________________ The problem: You are at the  kegger and it’s raucous - people hanging from chandeliers -when in walks this cutie. You make your way over there and begin to chat. How do you ignore the festivities and focus in on charming the cutie? (selective attention) The other problem: Let’s face it, we’re young and we don’t want to prematurely limit our options. What if our cutie has a significant other? What if the cutie doesn't fancy us (yeah, right)? What if an even cuter cutie arrives at the party? Can we maintain a conversation with the cutie without totally losing contact with the rest of the scene? (divided attention) Dichotic Listening Experiments: Bringing the  kegger into the lab ___________________________________________ Subjects hear two distinct messages; one in each ear. Must “shadow” one of the messages. Like when you were six. What subjects DO notice about the unattended message Gender of the speaker What subjects FAIL to notice about the unattended message Content of the message (i.e., what the story is about) Changes in Volume Changes from English to a foreign language Switch to backwards speech Change in gender of the speaker Non-Speech sounds Notice a pattern? Conclusions - Bottleneck Theory ___________________________________________ Attention serves as a filter that selects what information gets passed on; sometimes called the Early-Selection Theory Sensory Registers Attentional Control Perceptual Processes Consciousness Problems for Bottleneck Theory a) Cocktail party effect b) New car effect One Solution: Late Selection Models ___________________________________________ Sensory Registers Perceptual Processes Attentional Control Consciousness Problem: Difficult to disprove Key piece of evidence: Some streams are not processed for meaning. But is failure due to: a) Lapse of attention? b) filter earlier in the system? Other Solution: Attenuation Theory ___________________________________________ Many messages come in, all are processed, but for one message, the volume is turned up EX:Visiting Pete in college ___________________________________________ Left Ear Once upon a time there were three little Right Ear How much wood could a woodchuck… Switch chuck, if a woodchuck could chuck wood. bears. Papa Bear, Mama Bear and Baby Bear. Attenuation Theory: Schematically ___________________________________________ Sensory Registers Perceptual Processes Attentional Control Consciousness Problems: a) How? b) Subjects follow meaning, not channel c) Unattended Speech Effect One last possibility: Schema Theory ___________________________________________ Schema theory 1. Consciousness selects a goal; 2. Expectations and the environment choose the path Taxi-Cab Analogy EX: a) Neisser's work with visual scenes b) Jones' work with music c) Speaking roles Relation to dichotic listening data: a) Cherry’s Data b) Channel switching data (Treisman) c) Maybe rapid shifting of attention is involved Inhibition ___________________________________________ Kind of like negative attention. Instead of bringing information into consciousness, inhibition is a process that actively keeps information out of consciousness. Evidence: 1) Negative Priming studies AJ =======> DF LD =======> DF (control set) (NP set) 2) High-Cloze sentence completion She ladeled the soup into her ____________. Lexical decision task Aside: Pronounced Age Differences Divided Attention ___________________________________________ Limited Pool of Resources No Capacity left for Task C. Modality-Specific Strayer & Johnston (2001) ______________________________________________ Theoretical Question: Empirical question: Intro: • Survey data: cause and effect conclusions? o Self-selection o Precipitating factors for cell phone use o P(Cell|A) tells us nothing about P(A|Cell) ▪ What about: P(`A|Cell), P(A|’Cell), P(`A|’Cell)? (Bayes Theorem) • DUI vs. DWC Method: • Pursuit tracking and response to traffic signals • While listening to a book on tape (comprehension) • Word shadowing or generation task in easy or difficult driving condition. Strayer & Johnston (2001): Experiment 1 ______________________________________________ Results: • Subjects worse while talking than while listening • Hands free did not matter • Book on tape (radio) did not influence performance Strayer & Johnston (2001): Experiment 2 ______________________________________________ Results: • Dual task only affected performance on difficult course Implications: • Attention required to engage in conversation o Not manipulation of the phone o Not comprehension Strayer & Johnston (2001): Discussion ______________________________________________ 1. Why might you argue that the conversational tasks in this experiment should not have interfered with performance on the driving tasks? 2. Imagine that you are a libertarian. How might you attack this study and/or its conclusions? a. Difficulty b. Predictability c. Ecological validity 3. What do you think about the methodology that Strayer and Johnston (2001) used? 4. Should we ban radios, iPods, and/or conversations of any kind with passengers in the car? Automaticity ___________________________________________ What are some behaviors that you do ‘automatically’? a) Slamming my foot on the clutch b) What is 3 + 2? c) Frequency of occurrence judgments? d) Some time estimation judgments? Posner’s definition of automaticity a) processes concealed from consciousness b) unintentional c) consume few attentional resources i.e., no dual task cost Continuum view difference of degree How does a task become automatic ___________________________________________ 1) Consolidation view Steps become aggregated with practice 2) Instance theory of Gordon Logan Racehorse model algorithm versus memory retrieval Which is right? a) consolidation view seems to be more general b) Instance view applies more to specialized stimuli/responses EX: simple math problems Spelke, Hirst & Neisser (1976) ___________________________________________ Introduction: Theoretical question: Empirical Question: • First wave: two simultaneous tasks o Dangers of introspection • Next wave: dichotic listening experiments o Tested ‘unattended’ stream in/directly • What was Spelke, et al.’s approach? Method: Spelke, Hirst & Neisser (1976) ___________________________________________ Results: Baseline: Reading OR dictation Dual-task: Reading AND dictation • Were they paying attention to both? • Why were Mary's experimental stories used as John's control stories? Switch to categorized lists, sentences, rhymes. Discussion: 1. Why do Spelke, Hirst, and Neisser (1976) argue that rapid switching of attention cannot explain their results? 2. How do Spelke, Hirst, and Neisser (1976) define automaticity? o How does their definition differ from older ones? o Do John and Diane exhibit automatic behavior according to the old/new definition? 3. Could John and Diane learn to take dictation of another story? 4. Are consciousness and attention the same thing? 5. What are the ‘limits’ of attention? Automaticity…the dark side ___________________________________________ Capture Continuation of an automatic behavior in a familiar but inappropriate setting Omission Interruption causes us to skip steps in an evolving behavior Perseveration Repeating one or more steps in an evolving behavior Description Performing an intended action on the wrong object Data-driven Incoming sensory information overrides a planned activity Associative-Activation High expectations regarding an activity might result in inappropriate response Loss-of-Activation Activation of a routine process is too weak to sustain behavior Preconscious Processing ___________________________________________ What do we mean by pre-conscious? Vast Storehouse of knowledge EX: Freudian word associations Subliminal processing outside the lab EX: Information buried in rock albums Commercials Subliminal processing inside the lab? EX: Priming Nurse ===> Doctor Butter ========> Doctor Marcel Subliminal Priming Experiments ___________________________________________ Target word: PALM Don’t see the word Full Exposure in Context Subliminal Exposure Classification Task: Is PALM a body part? or Is PALM a type of tree? 800 600 Body Tree 400 200 0 Baseline Problems: Full Exp Sublim 1) Is effect sub-threshold? Identification vs. recognition 2) Time course of the effect Sub-liminal effects outside the Laboratory ___________________________________________ 1) Popcorn / Coke Initial studies seemed to indicate an effect But…confounding variable Literature runs 3:1 against. 2) Embedding "Sex" in an Advertisement EX: Disney’s Lion King 3) Backward messages People can detect… a) gender b) speaker c) language People cannot detect… a) question vs. statement b) paraphrase c) content category nursery, porn, religious 4) Self-Help tapes (Friends episode) Placebo effect