Cognitive psyc: ch 4 textbook

What is attention?

The ability to focus on specific stimuli or locations.

What is selective attention?

Focusing on one thing while ignoring others.

What is distraction?

When one stimulus interferes with processing another.

What is divided attention?

Paying attention to more than one thing at a time.

What is attentional capture?

A sudden shift in attention caused by a stimulus.

What can cause attentional capture?

Loud noises, bright lights, or sudden movements.

What is visual scanning?

Moving your eyes from one object or location to another.

What is the cocktail party effect?

Focusing on one conversation while ignoring others.

What is dichotic listening?

Presenting different messages to each ear.

What is shadowing?

Repeating aloud the message heard in the attended ear.

What is the attended ear?

The ear receiving the message a person focuses on.

What is the unattended ear?

The ear receiving the message a person ignores.

Was shadowing easy or difficult?

Easy for the attended message.

Could participants remember words from the unattended ear?

No.

What could participants identify in the unattended ear?

Physical characteristics, such as the speaker's gender.

What did Cherry's experiment demonstrate?

People can focus on one message while filtering out most unattended information.

What did Moray (1959) find about repeated words?

Participants did not notice a word repeated 35 times in the unattended ear.

What does Broadbent's filter model explain?

How we select one message and ignore others.

What type of selection model is Broadbent's?

Early selection.

What is early selection?

Filtering out unattended information before processing its meaning.

What determines which message passes through Broadbent's filter?

Physical characteristics, such as pitch, tone, or accent.

What is the first stage of Broadbent's model?

Sensory memory.

What does sensory memory do?

Briefly holds incoming information before sending it to the filter.

What does the filter do?

Allows the attended message through and blocks unattended messages.

What does the detector do?

Processes the attended message's meaning.

Where does information go after the detector?

Short-term memory, then potentially long-term memory.

What is the main limitation of Broadbent's model?

Unattended information can sometimes be processed for meaning.

What did Moray (1959) discover about hearing your own name?

About one-third of participants noticed their name in the unattended ear.

Why did Moray's name experiment challenge Broadbent?

It showed that meaningful unattended information can get through.

Who conducted the "Dear Aunt Jane" experiment?

Gray and Wedderburn (1960).

What happened in the "Dear Aunt Jane" experiment?

Participants combined words from both ears to hear a meaningful phrase.

What did participants report hearing?

"Dear Aunt Jane."

What did the "Dear Aunt Jane" experiment demonstrate?

Attention can switch between ears based on meaning.

What type of processing explains the "Dear Aunt Jane" results?

Top-down processing.

What is top-down processing?

Using prior knowledge and expectations to interpret information.

What did Treisman propose?

Unattended information is weakened rather than completely blocked.

What is Treisman's model called?

Attenuation model of attention.

What type of selection model is Treisman's?

Early selection.

Why is Treisman's model called a leaky filter model?

Some unattended information still passes through.

What is an attenuator?

A mechanism that weakens unattended messages.

What three characteristics can the attenuator analyze?

Physical characteristics, language, and meaning.

What happens to attended messages?

They pass through at full strength.

What happens to unattended messages?

They pass through at reduced strength.

What is the dictionary unit?

A system containing stored words with different activation thresholds.

What is an activation threshold?

The minimum signal strength needed to recognize a word.

What does a low threshold mean?

A word can be recognized even with a weak signal.

What does a high threshold mean?

A word requires a stronger signal to be recognized.

Why is your own name easily detected?

It has a low activation threshold.

Which words usually have low thresholds?

Common or personally important words.

Which words usually have high thresholds?

Uncommon or unimportant words.

What is early selection?

Selecting information before fully processing its meaning.

What is late selection?

Processing information for meaning before selecting what receives further attention.

Which models support early selection?

Broadbent's and Treisman's models.

Which researchers proposed late selection models?

Deutsch and Deutsch; Norman.

What did MacKay (1973) investigate?

Whether unattended words could influence the meaning of ambiguous sentences.

What sentence did MacKay use?

"They were throwing stones at the bank."

What words were presented to the unattended ear?

"River" or "money."

What happened when participants heard "money" in the unattended ear?

They were more likely to interpret "bank" as a financial institution.

What did MacKay's experiment demonstrate?

Unattended information can be processed for meaning.

What is priming?

When earlier exposure to information influences a later response.

What is the main difference between early and late selection?

Early selection filters before meaning; late selection filters after meaning.

Is attention always selected early or late?

No. It depends on the task and stimuli.

Who introduced the load theory of attention?

Nilli Lavie.

What is processing capacity?

The amount of information a person can process at once.

What is perceptual load?

The amount of processing required by a task.

What is a low-load task?

An easy task that uses few processing resources.

What is a high-load task?

A difficult task that uses more processing resources.

Which tasks leave more capacity for distractions?

Low-load tasks.

Which tasks leave less capacity for distractions?

High-load tasks.

Why are low-load tasks more affected by distractions?

Unused processing capacity is available to process distractions.

Why are high-load tasks less affected by irrelevant distractions?

Most processing capacity is already being used.

Who conducted the 2008 perceptual load experiment?

Forster and Lavie.

What was the task in Forster and Lavie's experiment?

Identify an X or N as quickly as possible.

What made the easy condition easy?

The target was surrounded by small O's.

What made the hard condition difficult?

The target was surrounded by different letters.

What happened when a distracting cartoon character appeared?

Reaction times increased more for the easy task.

What did Forster and Lavie's experiment demonstrate?

Low-load tasks are more vulnerable to irrelevant distractions.

What happens to reaction time as task difficulty increases?

Reaction time generally increases.

Which model completely blocks unattended information?

Broadbent's filter model.

Which model weakens rather than blocks unattended information?

Treisman's attenuation model.

Which model processes most incoming information for meaning before selection?

Late selection model.

Which experiment demonstrated that people can hear their own name in an unattended message?

Moray (1959).

Which experiment demonstrated switching between ears based on meaning?

Dear Aunt Jane experiment.

Which experiment showed that unattended words influence interpretation?

MacKay (1973).

Which experiment demonstrated the effects of perceptual load on distraction?

Forster and Lavie (2008).

What is the difference between a filter and an attenuator?

A filter blocks information; an attenuator weakens it.

What is the relationship between perceptual load and distraction?

Higher perceptual load generally reduces processing of irrelevant distractions.

What is Lavie's load theory of attention?

Attention depends on how much processing capacity a task uses.

What happens during a low-load task?

Unused processing capacity allows distractions to be processed.

What happens during a high-load task?

Most or all processing capacity is used, making distractions less likely.

Which task is more affected by irrelevant distractions?

Low-load tasks.

What did Forster and Lavie (2008) investigate?

How task difficulty affects distraction and reaction time.

What was the easy condition in Forster and Lavie's experiment?

Identifying X or N surrounded by small O's.

What was the hard condition?

Identifying X or N surrounded by other letters.

What happened when a distracting cartoon appeared?

Reaction time increased more for the easy task.

What is endogenous attention?

Voluntary, goal-directed attention.

What is exogenous attention?

Involuntary attention captured by an external stimulus.

What is the Stroop effect?

Difficulty naming ink colors when the written words conflict with those colors.

Why does the Stroop effect occur?

Automatic word reading interferes with naming the ink color.

What is central vision?

The center of the visual field, where we see fine details.