Cognitive Psychology, Sixth Edition, Robert J. Sternberg Chapter 4 Chapter 4: Attention and Consciousness

Cognitive Psychology, Sixth Edition, Robert J. SternbergChapter 4

Chapter 4: Attention and

Consciousness


Some Questions of Interest

• Can we actively process information, even if we are not aware of doing so? If so, what do we do, and how do we do it?

• What are some of the functions of attention?


Some Questions of Interest

• What are some theories cognitive psychologists have developed to explain attentional processes?

• What have cognitive psychologists learned about attention by studying the human brain?


Attention Is…

• The means by which we actively process a limited amount of information


Main Functions of Attention

• Signal detection and vigilance• Search• Selective attention• Divided attention


• Measure sensitivity to a target’s presence

Signal Detection Theory (SDT)

Present Absent

Present HitFalse Alarm

Absent MissCorrect

Rejection

Decision

Signal


Vigilance and SDT

• Vigilance is attending to a set of stimuli over a length of time in order to detect a target signal

• Vigilance decreases rapidly over time (fatigue), thus misses and false alarms increase


Search

• Actively searching for a target • Number of targets and distracters

influence accuracy• Feature search versus conjunctive

search


Conjunctive Search

• Find the letter T–Which panel is

easier?


Feature Search

• Find the letter O–Easier or harder

than the previous one?


Feature-Integration Theory (FIT)

• Individual feature processing is done in parallel– Simultaneous processing is done on the whole

display and if feature is present, we detect it

• Conjunctive searching requires attention to the integration or combination of the features – Attention to particular combination of features

must be done sequentially to detect presence of a certain combination


Another Feature Search

T

T

T

TT

TT

Is there a red T in the display?

T

T

Target is defined by a single feature

According to featureintegration theory, the target should “pop out”

No attention required

T

T

T

T T

TT

T


Another Conjunction Search

X

T

T

X

T T

TIs there a red T in the display?

X

XTarget is defined by two features: shape and color

According to FIT, the features must be combined and so attention is required

Need to examine one by one

X

XT

XTT


Similarity Theory• Similarity between

targets and distracters is important, not number of features to be combined

– More shared features = more difficult to detect a target

– Find the letter R


Guided Search

• Cave & Wolf (1990)• All searches have two phases

–Parallel phase–Serial stage


Selectivity of Attention

• Cocktail party phenomenon–How are we able to follow one

conversation in the presence of other conversations?


Cherry’s Shadowing Technique

The lawyer defended his client as the trial began. He was able

The doctor went to the park to find the homeless man. He was

…..The doctor went to the park…..

Listen to two different conversations and repeat one of the messages; may be binaural or dichotic

Attended Ear: Unattended Ear:


Cherry’s Results

• Noticed in unattended ear–Change in gender–Change to a tone

• Did not notice in unattended ear–Changed language–Changed topic, same speaker– If speech was played backwards


Models of Selective Attention

• Do they have a filter?

• Where does the filter occur?


Broadbent’s Model

• We filter information right after we notice it at the sensory level


Broadbent’s Model

• Had trouble explaining–Why participant’s name gets through–Why participants can shadow

meaningful message that switches from one ear to another

–Effects of practice on detecting information in unattended ear (e.g., detect digit in unattended ear for naïve and practiced participants)


Treisman’s Attenuation Model

• Instead of blocking stimuli out, the filter weakens the strength of stimuli other than the target stimulus


Late Selection Theory(Deutsch & Deutsch, 1963)

• All stimuli is processed to the level of meaning• Relevance determines further processing and action


Neisser’s Synthesis

• Preattentive processes–Parallel–Note physical characteristics

• Attentive processes–Controlled processes occur serially–Occur in working memory


Divided Attention

• How many tasks can you do at once? – e.g., driving and talking, radio, phone...


Dual-Task Paradigm

• Task 1 may require a verbal response to an auditory stimulus

• Task 2 may require a participant to push a button in response to a visual stimulus

• Results indicate that responses to the second task are delayed


Capacity Models of Attention


Real-Life Dual Task

• Driving and–Cell phones–Adjusting music–Watching the scenery

• Almost 80% of crashes and 65% of near-crashes involved some form of driver inattention within three seconds of the event


Gauging Your Distraction During Driving

• http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/07/19/technology/20090719-driving-game.html

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/07/19/technology/20090719-driving-game.html




Strayer & Drews (2007)

• Naturalistic observation of cell phone use and driver behavior

Failed to stop

Stopped properly

On cell phone 82 28

No cell phone 352 1286


Strayer & Drews (2007) Results• Impact of hands-free cell-phone

conversations on simulated driving–Cell-phone conversation led to

inattentional blindness–Even if they looked at an object,

participant did not remember the object


Factors that Influence Our Ability to Pay Attention

• Anxiety• Arousal• Task difficulty• Skills


Three Subfunctions of Attention

• Alerting–Being prepared to attend to some

incoming event and maintaining this attention

– Involves right frontal and parietal cortexes as well as the locus coeruleus



• Orienting–The selection of stimuli to attend to–Needed when we perform a visual

search– Involves the superior parietal lobe,

the temporal parietal junction, the frontal eye fields, and the superior colliculus



• Executive attention–Processes for monitoring and

resolving conflicts that arise among internal processes

– Involves the anterior cingulate, lateral ventral, and prefrontal cortex as well as the basal ganglia


When Attention Fails Us

• ADHD• Change blindness and inattentional

blindness• Spatial neglect


Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

• Symptoms– Inattention– Hyperactivity – Impulsivity – Not everyone who is overly hyperactive,

inattentive, or impulsive has ADHD– Behavior must be demonstrated to a

degree that is inappropriate for the person’s age


Change Blindness

• An inability to detect changes in objects or scenes that are being viewed

http://viscog.beckman.uiuc.edu/djs_lab/demos.html




Inattentional Blindness

• People are not able to see things that are actually there

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20100713/sc_livescience/invisiblegorillatestshowshowlittlewenotice




Spatial Neglect

• Lesion on one side of brain causes person to ignore half of their visual field


Habituation

• Decrease in responsiveness when exposed to a repeated stimulus–People who smoke do not notice the

smell of cigarettes on their clothes, but nonsmokers do

–People get used to hearing the chiming of their clocks


Dishabituation

•Change in familiar stimuli causes one to notice it again–Smokers who quit suddenly notice

how much their clothes smell of smoke

– If clock breaks, owner suddenly notices the clock isn’t chiming


Habituation/Dishabituation Paradigm

• Allows psychologists to test abilities of infants and animals

• Measure subject’s arousal to see if a change occurs when pattern or sound changes – If animal or infant dishabituates to a

change, they can detect the change– If the animal or infant does not dishabituate

to a change in stimuli, they did not detect the change


Controlled vs. Automatic Processing

• Automatic processing–Requires no conscious control

• Controlled processing –Requires conscious control


Is Typing Automatic or Controlled for You?

• Do you type without thinking where your fingers are? Are you a search-and-peck typer?

• If you do type without using attention, what happens when you think about the letters as you are typing them?



Automatization: Two Explanations

• Integrated components theory: Anderson–Practice leads to integration; less and

less attention is needed

• Instance theory: Logan–Retrieve from memory specific

answers, skipping the procedure; thus less attention is needed


Effect of Practice on Automatization

• Rate of learning slows as amount of learning increases

Negative- acceleration curve


Stroop Effect

redyellowgreenblueredblueyellowgreenbluered

Say the color the words are printed in as quickly as you can

What errors do you make?

Reading interferes with your ability to state the color, and your reaction time is slower


Preconscious Processing

• Information that is available for cognitive processing but that currently lies outside conscious awareness–Priming–TOT phenomenon–Blindsight


BREAD

BUTTER

• How quickly do you process the second word?

• Faster if you have been primed with a related word

Priming

NURSE

DOCTOR

CAT

DOG


Marcel (1983)

Condition Subliminally Present Prime

Consciously Present Prime

Prime PALM PALM

Mask XXXX

Target PINE OR WRIST PINE OR WRIST

ResponseBody part or

plant?Body part or plant?

Reaction time How fast? How fast?


Marcel’s Procedure with Participants

PALM PALMXXXXPINE PINE

It’s a plant. Umm, it’s a plant.

Subliminal Condition Conscious Condition


Marcel (1983) Results

Condition Subliminally

Present Prime

Consciously Present Prime

Targets:PINE or WRIST

Found faster RT for both target words

Found faster RT for one of two target words, slower RT for the other target

Interpretation Both meanings were primed

Only one meaning is primed, the other inhibited


Priming Can Speed or Slow Processing

• Facilitative priming–Target stimuli (e.g., BUTTER) are

processed faster if preceded by a related word (e.g., BREAD)

• Negative priming effect–Target stimuli (e.g., PINE) is

processed slower if preceded by a word related to target’s alternate meaning (PALM relating to hand)


Bowers, Regehr, Balthazard, & Parker (1990)

Triad A Triad B

Basket Swan

Room Army

Foot Mask

Which of these triads is coherent?What is the 4th word that ties them together?

BALL


Bowers et al. (1990) Results

• Even if participants could not generate the 4th word, they still selected the coherent triad

• Results demonstrate preconscious processing


Tip-of-the-Tongue Experiences (TOT)

• You know you know the word, but you cannot fully retrieve the word

• Paradigms used to generate TOT–Show pictures of famous people or

politicians and have participants name them

–Ask general knowledge questions to generate TOTs


TOT Demonstration• What is the name of Dagwood

Bumstead’s dog?

• Who wrote Paradise Lost?

• What is a wheeled hospital cart called?

• Do any of these questions put the answer on the tip of your tongue?


Blindsight

• Person cannot consciously see a certain portion of their visual field but still behave in some instances as if they can see it

• Being aware of doing something is distinguishable from doing something


Visual Mind Reading

• Using fMRI to predict what people are paying attention to

INSERT VIDEO #23, Visual Mind Reading

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Cognitive Psychology, Sixth Edition, Robert J. Sternberg Chapter 4 Chapter 4: Attention and Consciousness