chapter 4: attention

Attention

Focusing on specific features, objects, or locations or on certain thoughts or activities.

attentional capture

A rapid shifting of attention, usually caused by a stimulus such as a loud noise, bright light, or sudden movement.

Attenuation model of attention

model of selective attention that proposes that selection occurs in two stages. In the first stage, an attenuator analyzes the incoming message and lets through the attended message—and also the unattended message, but at a lower (attenuated) strength.

attentional warping

Occurs when the map of categories on the brain changes to make more space for categories that are being searched for as a person attends to a scene.

Automatic processing

Processing that occurs automatically, without the person’s intending to do it, and that also uses few cognitive resources.

ballet’s syndrome

A condition caused by brain damage in which a person has difficulty focusing attention on individual objects.

binding problem

The problem of explaining how an object’s individual features become bound together.

binding

Process by which features such as color, form, motion, and location are combined to create perception of a coherent object.

change blindness

Difficulty in detecting changes in similar, but slightly different, scenes that are presented one after another.

change detection

Detecting differences between pictures or displays that are presented one after another.

cocktail party effect

The ability to focus on one stimulus while filtering out other stimuli, especially at a party where there are a lot of simultaneous conversations.

cognitive control

A mechanism involved in dealing with conflicting stimuli. Related to executive function, inhibitory control, and willpower.

conjunction search

Searching among distractors for a target that involves two or more features, such as “horizontal” and “green.”

continuity errors

In film, changes that occur from one scene to another that do not match, such as when a character reaches for a croissant in one shot, which turns into a pancake in the next shot.

covert attention

Occurs when attention is shifted without moving the eyes, commonly referred to as seeing something “out of the corner of one’s eye.”

detector

processes the information from the attended message to determine higher-level characteristics of the message, such as its meaning.

Dichotic listening

The procedure of presenting one message to the left ear and a different message to the right ear.

Dictionary unit

This processing unit contains stored words and thresholds for activating the words. The dictionary unit helps explain why we can sometimes hear a familiar word, such as our name, in an unattended message.

divided attention

The ability to pay attention to, or carry out, two or more different tasks simultaneously.

Dorsal attention network

A network that controls attention based on top-down processing.

early selection model

Model of attention that explains selective attention by early filtering out of the unattended message.

Effective connectivity

How easily activity can travel along a particular pathway between two structures.

executive attention network

A complex network that is involved in controlling executive functions.

Executive functions

A number of processes that involve controlling attention and dealing with conflicting responses.

feature integration theory

An approach to object perception, developed by Anne Treisman, that proposes a sequence of stages in which features are first analyzed and then combined to result in perception of an object.

Feature search

Searching among distractors for a target item that involves detecting one feature, such as “horizontal.”

filter

identifies the message that is being attended to based on its physical characteristics—things like the speaker’s tone of voice, pitch, speed of talking, and accent—and lets only this attended message pass through to the detector in the next stage.

filter model of attention

Model of attention that proposes a filter that lets attended stimuli through and blocks some or all of the unattended stimuli.

fixation

In problem solving, people’s tendency to focus on a specific characteristic of the problem that keeps them from arriving at a solution. In perception and attention, a pausing of the eyes on places of interest while observing a scene.

focused attention stage

second stage of Treisman’s feature integration theory. According to the theory, attention causes the combination of features into perception of an object.

high load tasks

A task that uses most or all of a person’s resources and so leaves little capacity to handle other tasks.

illusionary conjunctions

A situation, demonstrated in experiments by Anne Treisman, in which features from different objects are inappropriately combined.

Inattentional blindness

Not noticing something even though it is in clear view, usually caused by failure to pay attention to the object or the place where the object is located.

Inattentional deafness

Occurs when inattention causes a person to miss an auditory stimulus.

late selection models of attention

A model of selective attention that proposes that selection of stimuli for final processing does not occur until after the information in the message has been analyzed for meaning.

load theory of attention

Proposal that the ability to ignore task-irrelevant stimuli depends on the load of the task the person is carrying out. High-load tasks result in less distraction

low-load tasks

A task that uses few resources, leaving some capacity to handle other tasks.

mind wandering

Thoughts that come from within a person, often unintentionally. In early research this was called daydreaming.

overt attention

Shifting of attention by moving the eyes

Perceptual load

Related to the difficulty of a task. Low-load tasks use only a small amount of a person’s processing capacity. High-load tasks use more of the processing capacity.

Preattentive stage

The first stage of Treisman’s feature integration theory, in which an object is analyzed into its features.

Precueing

A procedure in which participants are given a cue that will usually help them carry out a subsequent task.

Processing capacity

The amount of information input that a person can handle. This sets a limit on the person’s ability to process information.

Saccadic eye movement

Eye movements from one fixation point to another.

Saliency map

Map of a scene that indicates the stimulus salience of areas and objects in the scene.

Same-object advantage

Occurs when the enhancing effect of attention spreads throughout an object, so that attention to one place on an object results in a facilitation of processing at other places on the object.

Selective attention

The ability to focus on one message and ignore all others

Shadowing

The procedure of repeating a message out loud as it is heard. Shadowing is commonly used in conjunction with studies of selective attention that use the dichotic listening procedure.

Stimulus salience

Bottom-up factors that determine attention to elements of a scene. Examples are color, contrast, and orientation.

stoop effect

originally studied by J. R. Stroop, using a task in which a person is instructed to respond to one aspect of a stimulus, such as the color of ink that a word is printed in, and ignore another aspect, such as the color that the word names.

Synchronization

Occurs when neural responses become synchronized in time, so positive and negative responses occur at the same time and with similar amplitudes.

Ventral attention network

A network that controls attention based on stimulus salience

Visual scanning

Movement of the eyes from one location or object to another.

Visual search

Occurs when a person is looking for one stimulus or object among a number of other stimuli or objects.

willpower

A mechanism involved in dealing with conflicting stimuli. Related to executive function, inhibitory control, and cognitive control.