Chapter 4: Attention

• Process of concentrating on specific features of the environment or certain thoughts or activities

  Attention
• Ability to focus on one message and ignore all others; We do not attend to a large fraction of the information in the environment.; Filtering out some information and promoting other information for further processing.

  Selective Attention
• One message is presented to the left ear and another to the right ear.

  Dichotic Listening
• 3 Models of Selective Attention

  Early selection model, Intermediate selection model, and late selection model
• Filters message before incoming information is analyzed for meaning.

  Early-selection model
• Holds all incoming information for a fraction of a second; Transfers all information to next stage.

  Sensory memory
• Identifies attended messages based on physical characteristics.

  Filter
• Processes all information to determine higher-level characteristics of the message.

  Detector
• Receives output of detector; Holds information for 10-15 seconds and may transfer it to long-term memory.

  Short-term memory
• Attended messages can be separated from unattended messages early in the information-processing system.

  Intermediate-selection model
• Analyzes incoming messages in terms of physical characteristics, language, and meaning.

  Attenuator
• Contains words, each of which has thresholds for being activated.

  Dictionary unit
• The selection of stimuli for final processing does not occur until after information has been analyzed for meaning.

  Late selection models
• It is how much of a person's cognitive resources are used to accomplish a task.

  Task load
• In this, practice enables people to simultaneously do things that were difficult at first.

  Divided Attention
• The name of the word interferes with the ability to name the ink color; one cannot avoid paying attention to the meanings of the words.

  Stroop effect
• A stimulus that is not attended is not perceived, even though a person might be looking directly at it.

  Inattention blindness
• If shown two versions of a picture, differences between them are not immediately apparent.

  Change blindness
• Rapid movements of the eyes from one place to another.

  Saccades
• Short pauses on points of interest.

  Fixations
• Areas that stand out and capture attention.

  Stimulus salience
• Knowledge about what is contained in typical scenes.

  Scene schema
• Directing attention without moving the eyes.

  Precueing
• Moving attention from one place to another.

  Location-based
• Attention being directed to one place on an object.

  Object-based
• Inability to focus attention on individual objects.

  Balint's syndrome
• Serious developmental disorder in which one of the major symptoms is the withdrawal of contact with other people.

  Autism