Selective Attention Quiz

Study Notes

Moray's Study: Even when ignoring most aspects of an unattended message, participants frequently recognize their names in the unattended ear
Treisman's Attenuation Model: A filtering mechanism weakens (attenuates) the strength of stimuli other than the target
Late-Filter Model (Deutsch and Deutsch): Stimuli are filtered out only after they have been analyzed for physical & meaning properties
Early & Late Filter Models: Both propose an attentional bottleneck which only allows one source of information through at a time

Ulric Neisser (1967): Proposed two processes governing attention: pre-attentive and attentive/controlled
- Pre-attentive Processes: Automatic, rapid, parallel processing of sensory characteristics, but do not discern meaning or relationships
- Attentive/Controlled Processes: Occur later, are executed serially and consume time & attentional resources (e.g., working memory)
Shadowing Task: Listen to two simultaneous messages (dichotic presentation), repeat only one message as quickly as possible
- Results: Subjects successfully shadowed messages, but required significant concentration
- Unattended Message Changes: Subjects noticed physical, sensory changes in the unattended message but not semantic changes
  - ⅓ of Participants: Will switch attention if they hear their names, likely due to limited working memory capacity and being easily distracted

Distinctive sensory characteristics (e.g., pitch, pacing, rhythm) of a target's speech are the most important factor
Sound intensity (loudness) and location of the sound source also play roles

Core Concept: Explain how we can't attend to all sensory inputs simultaneously at the conscious level
Filter: Blocks some information, selecting a portion to pass through
Bottleneck: Slows down information passing through

Information is filtered immediately after being noticed at a sensory level
Sensory input channels reach an attentional filter, allowing only one to proceed to perception

Blocks out most sensory-level information but allows personally important messages to "break through"

Dichotic Listening Task: Different audio streams are presented to each ear, repeating one message as quickly as possible
- Results: Participants typically do not notice changes in the unattended message
- Personal Name: Noticed about one-third of the time

Failure to notice unexpected objects or events when attention is focused elsewhere
We seem to only process one stream of information at a time
Affects both auditory and visual perception

Participants viewed two overlapping videos and were asked to monitor one event
Results: Participants were unaware of events outside their focus of attention

Participants watched a video of two basketball teams and were tasked with counting passes by one team
A gorilla walked into the scene, thumped its chest, and walked off
Results: Half of the participants failed to notice the gorilla