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SUSS PSY 305 STUDY UNIT 3 ATTENTION (Selective Attention (BROADBENT’S…
SUSS PSY 305 STUDY UNIT 3 ATTENTION
Selective Attention
BROADBENT’S FILTER MODEL OF ATTENTION
Broadbent (1958) created a model of attention designed to explain how it is possible to focus on one message and why information isn’t taken in from the other message
he proposed that information passes through the following 4 stages
Broadbent’s model has been called a
bottleneck model
because the filter restricts information flow
This model is also known as an
early selection model
because the
filter
eliminates the unattended information right
at the beginning
of the flow of information
2. The Filter
The filter identifies the message that is being attended to based on its physical characteristics—i.e. tone of voice, pitch, speed of talking, and accent—and lets only this attended message pass through to the detector in the next stage.
All of the other messages
(noise) are filtered out
.
4. Short term memory
The output of the detector is sent to
short-term memory
, which holds information for 10–15 seconds and also transfers information into long-term memory , which can hold information indefinitely.
1.sensory memory
Sensory memory holds all of the incoming information for a fraction of a second and then transfers all of it to the filter
3. The detector
The detector processes the information from the attended message to
determine higher-level characteristics
of the message, such as its meaning. the detector processes all of the information that enters it.
Modifying Broadbent model: More early selection model
Treisman
proposed that selection occurs in two stages, and she
replaced Broadbent’s filter with an attenuator
. The attenuator analyzes incoming message in terms of
(1) its physical characteristics—whether it is high-pitched or low-pitched, fast or slow;
(2) its language—how the message groups into syllables or words; and
(3) its meaning—how sequences of words create meaningful phrases.
Note that the attenuator represents a process and is not identified with a specific brain structure
Treisman’s attenuation model of attention
Treisman’s idea that the information in the channel is selected is similar to what Broadbent proposed, but in Treisman’s attenuation model of attention ,
language and meaning can also be used to separate the messages
.
Treisman proposed that the
analysis of the message proceeds only as far as is necessary
to identify the attended message.
For example, if there are two messages, one in a male voice and one in a female voice, then analysis at the physical level (which Broadbent emphasized) is adequate to separate the low-pitched male voice from the higher-pitched female voice.
If, however, the voices are similar, then it might be necessary to use meaning to separate the two messages
The attenuator
According to Treisman’s model, once the attended and unattended messages have been identified, both messages pass through the attenuator,
but
the attended message emerges at full strength and the unattended messages are attenuated
— they are still present, but are weaker than the attended message.
Because at least some of the unattended message gets through the attenuator, Treisman’s model has been called
a “leaky filter” model.
The dictionary unit
After filtration,the message is analyzed by the dictionary unit
The dictionary unit
contains words, stored in memory, each of which has a threshold for being activated
.
A threshold is the smallest signal strength that can barely be detected.
Thus, a word with a low threshold might be detected even when it is presented softly or is obscured by other words
Message output According to Treisman
words that are common or especially important, such as the listener’s name, have
low thresholds
, so
even a weak signal in the unattended channel can activate
that word, and we hear our name from across the room.
Uncommon words or words that are unimportant to the listener have
higher thresholds
, so it
takes the strong signal of the attended message to activate these words
.
Thus, according to Treisman, the attended message gets through, plus some parts of the weaker, unattended messages.
Dichotic listening
Refers to the tuning/out of different stimuli in the left and right ears.
cocktail party effect
In an early dichotic listening experiment, Colin Cherry (1953) found that although his subjects could easily shadow a spoken message presented to the attended ear, and they could report whether the unattended message was spoken by a male or female, they couldn’t report what was being said in the unattended ear.
The
ability to focus on one stimulus
while
filtering out other stimuli
has been called the cocktail party effect.
McKay: late selection models of attention
This model proposed that most of the
incoming information
is
processed to the level of meaning
before the message to be further processed is selected
as reflected in his experiment, the meaning of the biasing word affected the subjects’ choices.
Nilli Lavie: processing capacity and perceptual load
According to Lavie,
two factors
affect a person’s ability to ignore distracting stimuli when they are trying to focus their attention on a task
Processing capacity
This refers to the
amount of information people can handl
e and sets a limit on their ability to process incoming information
Perceptual load
This is related to the
difficulty of a task
low-load tasks
(Easy tasks) use up only a
small amount
of the person’s processing capacity.
Tasks that are difficult and perhaps not as well practiced are
high-load tasks
and use
more of a person’s processing capacity
load theory of attention
with the
low-load task
, there is still processing capacity left.
This means that cognitive resources are
available to process the task-irrelevant stimulus
, and even though the person was told not to pay attention to the task-irrelevant stimulus, it gets processed and
slows down responding
.
In a
high-load task
(difficult task) all of a person’s processing capacity is being used.
When this occurs, no resources remain to process other stimuli, so irrelevant stimuli can’t be processed and they have little effect on performance of the task. Thus, if you are carrying out a hard, high-load task,
no processing capacity remains, and you are less likely to be distracted
Attention as Selection: Overt and Covert Attention
Overt
attention refers to perception that is achieved by paying attention to what is
captured through eye movements
.
For example, when you scan a crowd for a familiar face.
Covert
attention, on the other hand, refers to one’s ability to
direct attention without eye movements.
OVERT ATTENTION: SCANNING A SCENE WITH EYE MOVEMENTS
SCANNING BASED ON STIMULUS SALIENCE
SCANNING BASED ON COGNITIVE FACTORS
SCANNING BASED ON TASK DEMANDS
COVERT ATTENTION: DIRECTING ATTENTION
WITHOUT EYE MOVEMENTS
ATTENTION TO A LOCATION
ATTENTION TO OBJECTS
Divided Attention: Can We Attend to More Than One Thing at a Time?
divided attention refers to the distribution of attention among two or more tasks
Divided attention is
only possible when one of the two tasks being performed is processed automatically
,
the ability to divide attention depends on a number of factors, including
practice (Automatic processing) and
the difficulty of the task
DIVIDED ATTENTION CAN BE ACHIEVED WITH PRACTICE:
AUTOMATIC PROCESSING
As demonstrated by Schneider and Shiffrin practice resulted in
automatic processing
, a type of processing that occurs
(1)
without intention
(it happens automatically without the person intending to do it) and
(2) at a cost of
only some
of a person’s
cognitive resources.
i.e. driving or texting texting without attention
DIVIDED ATTENTION BECOMES MORE
DIFFICULT WHEN TASKS ARE HARDER
When experiencing a
challenging task
,
automatic processing is not possible
even with practice
For example: You may find it easy to drive and talk at the same time if traffic is light on a familiar road. But if you see a flashing “warning” sign you might have to stop your conversation to devote all of your cognitive resources to driving
What Happens When We Don’t Attend? research
has shown not only that we miss things that are out of our field of view, but that not attending can cause us to miss things even if we are looking directly at them.
INATTENTIONAL BLINDNESS
Inattentional Blindness is a phenomenon in which subjects are
unaware
of clearly visible stimuli
as a result of not directing their attention
to the stimuli.
For example, Simons and chabris’s gorilla in our midst experiment
CHANGE DETECTION
This refers to the
difficulty in detecting minor changes
in near similar pictures/scenes.
for example, Henderson & Hollingworth picture experiment