Lecture 3

Attention and Consciousness

Research methods in cognitive psychology

Controlled lab experiments

Psychobiology research

Self-reports

Case studies

Naturalistic observations

Computer simulations and AI

Key foci of cognitive psychology

Human intelligence

Language

Perception

Attention

Memory

Thinking and problem solving

Attention

Relates to our ability to actively process aspects of our environment by means of our senses and also our memories

Active process

Consciousness

Includes both the feeling of awareness and the content of awareness, some of which may overlap with attention

Not active process

Preconscious processing

Even though certain information is not the focus of our conscious awareness it can still be processed

Able to shift information from pre-conscious to conscious awareness

Priming studies

Used to investigate our ability to process preconscious information

Presentation of stimuli that affects the perception of subsequent stimuli

Priming in recognition conducted at a preconscious level

Level of consciousness

Automatic processes

Controlled processes

Automatic processes

Not available at a conscious level

Requires minimal attention resources

Quick and effortless

Controlled processes

Requires heightened level of consciousness and attention

Slow and deliberate

Automatization

Cognitive process shifts from being controlled to automatic - e.g. driving

Four stages of learning

1. You don’t know that you don’t know

2. You know that you don’t know

3. You know that you know

4. You don’t know that you know

Conscious attention comprises of four main functions

Signal detection

Search

Selective attention

Divided attention

Signal detection

Identification of target stimuli in the environment

Signal Detection Theory (SDT)

Divides responses into four categories:

1. Hits

2. False alarms

3. Misses

4. Correct

Search

Unlike vigilance (passive), search actively seeks out the target stimulus

Can be hampered by distractors which slow down the process

Selective attention

The cocktail party effect

Participants overhear something interesting (e.g. their name) while attending to something else

Selective attention - early selection theories

Broadbent’s model of selective attention

Treisman’s attenuation model of selective attention

Broadbent’s model of selective attention

Filtering occurs before information processing

Treisman’s attenuation model of selective attention

Filtering ‘attenuates’ (weakens) rather than eliminates information

Selective attention - Late selective theories

Deutsch and Norman → Parallel processing - all sensory input channels are analysed fully, simultaneously and in parallel

Neisser → Proposed a synthesis of early selection and later selection theories

→ Pre-attentive processes: automatic, rapid and occur in parallel

→ Attentive, controlled processes: Executed serially, effortful and consume attentional resources

Divided attention

Dual-task paradigm show that human processing resources are limited and shareable → multi-tasking and attention

Theories of divided attention

Automatization is important → resources allocated by 2 kinds of processing: controlled and automatic

Researchers describe two different aspects of our minds attend to stimuli:

1. Bottom-up processing

2. Top-down processing

Bottom-up processing

Attention is stimulus-driven, driven by the properties of the objects themselves

Can be volitional or non-volitional

Top-down processing

Attention is also goal driven, purposive, conscious and deliberative

related to executive functioning working memory