moray

• background

  • cherry - cocktail party phenomenon, we can only attend to one voice in a crowd
  • broad bents attention model: sensory store - selective filter - higher level of processing - working memory

  
• aim - test cherrys dichotic listening findings in relation to the amount of information recognised, whether hearing ones name in the unattended message increases attention
• e1

  • method: repeated measures design
  • procedure: short list of words spoken 35 times in one ear rejected, or prose in the other shadowed. then completed 21 word recognition list
  • results: 5/7 words remembered in shadowed message, 2/7 in the rejected message
• e2

  • method: repeated md, iv - whether instructions in the message before or after name, dv - frequency in which the instruction was heard
  • sample - 12 researches and undergrads, opportunity sampling
  • procedure; shadowed prose, rejected list of instructions and name included, told to make as little mistakes as possible
  • results: the presence of the name can cause instructions to be heard as it broke through the attentional barrier
• e3

  • method: independent md, iv-manipulation of instructions given
  • sample: 28 (2x14) undergrads and researchers, opportunity sampling
  • procedure: prose shadowed, 1 group told they would be asked about the shadowed message, 1 group told they had to remember as many numbers as possible
  • results: no difference in number of digits remembered, digits do not break attentional barrier
• conclusions

  • when attention is directed to one ear, almost all verbal content is blocked in the other
  • subjectively important messages such as ones name can penetrate the barrier allowing us to hear instructions
  • difficult for neutral material to penetrate the barrier
• strengths

  • high mundane realism
  • population validity
  • heavily standardised
• weakness

  • low ecological validity
  • quantitative data produced