Lab Report On Search For Things On A Day

Attention is thought to be selective-focused on one subject at a time. Traditionally, it has been assumed that automatic processing is involuntary, it does not require attention, and is relatively fast; whereas, controlled processing is voluntary, does require attention, and is relatively slow. We can conclude from this that the more we repeat a certain material or tasks the more it becomes automatic and effortless to us.

Attention is considered to be a core cognitive process, it refers to how people actively process specific information in the environment. Attention refers to how people select from information and stimuli in the environment, facilitating processing of some of the stimuli and inhibiting processing of others. "Everyone knows what attention is, it is the taking possession by the mind in clear and vivid form, of one out of what seem several simultaneously possible objects or trains of thought...It implies withdrawal from some things in order to deal effectively with others, and is a condition which has a real opposite in the confused, dazed, scatterbrained state. “This definition of attention was proposed by psychologist William James (1890). This review will focus on literature that gives explanation to selective attention. Selective attention refers to the process where a person is able to select out of many stimuli and focus on the one they want and ignore other stimuli.

The results of Roediger and McDermott’s experiment were very significant. The participants recalled the critical distractor words 40% of the time compared to 14% recall of the normal distractor words. When they

Also, the findings were consistent with the suggestion that ‘the equal salience of the local and global targets increase sensitivity of stimuli to the effects of how we perceive’ Yovel (2001) cited in Ness et al. (2014).

Williams James used the paying attention method to demonstrate that in order to pay attention to one particular object completely, one must disregard all other objects within the same environment in order to concentrate.

Sana, Weston and Cepeda (2012) hypothesized that “participants who were seated in view of multitasking peers would have lower comprehension scores compared to participants who had minimal or no visual distraction from multitasking peers.” (p. 26) The independent variable was the assignment each student was given, which was they were either in view of a multitasking peer, or they were not in view of a multitasking peer. The dependent variable was, again, the test scores. The results of experiment 2 show that students who were in view of multitaskers scored lower on the tests than students who were not in view of the multitaskers (Sana, Weston, and Cepeda, 2012). This was also considered an experiment due to its use of independent and dependent variables, and also by the use of random assignment of the subjects of the

The types of technology I interact with throughout a typical day are: my phone, laptop, and TV. I use my phone at the start of the day (as an alarm clock), and then throughout the rest of the day I use it to communicate (text/call) with friends/family. Basically, my phone stays with my 24hours of the day. I use my laptop as much as I use my phone. Typically, I am on my laptop 70% of the day. This includes browsing the Internet, listening to music, and using word/ other applications to complete homework. I would say that the TV is only used for a short period of time, only to watch the news, or a show.

The binding problem is an term used to describe how the brain overcomes the challenge of integrating all incoming stimuli to create a cohesive representation. Research on the binding problem has shown that one crucial part of the solution is whether someone is paying attention or not. Meaning that in order for a person to create a cohesive mental representation they must be giving the incoming information their undivided attention. Other research has demonstrated that individuals who have problems with paying attention (such as children with ADHD) do not face difficulties with stimuli that have unique characteristics that make it stand out, however, they have difficulties with stimuli that have other distracting stimuli shown in conjunction

Overall this study provides some interesting insight into the field as it found that even in scenarios were the cues offer no insight into the next location of the target, the same IOR effect can be seen. This research found that trial validity appeared to have no effect on performance, implying that individuals do not simply shift attention to or from but rather do a complex combination of the

Early studies have widely researched attention with selective processing (Driver, 2001). Broadbent (1958) filter theory of attention states that certain information does not require focal attention. It is based on certain stimulus attributes such as colour and shape (Friedenberg, 2012). A previous study carried out by Treisman and Schmidt (1982) proposes that when attention is diverted from a display of several figures, the participants incorrectly combine the features of colour and shape therefore increases the illusory conjunctions portrayed by the participants (Tsal, 1989). Another study by Shaw (1978) found that reaction time of participant to identify targets varied with the probability that a target would appear in a particular display location. These results indicate that different amounts of attention towards the targets are distributed to different positions in the visual field. However, Houck and Hoffman (1986) found that the feature integration of colour and orientation can sometimes be accomplished without attention (James et al.,

The article by Avital-Cohen and Tsal (2016) discussed the flanker task experiment, which asserted that distractor interference happens unconsciously as a result of focused attention toward the target. The results from the original flanker task indicated that participants had slower responses for incongruent trials, since the distractors are inconsistent with the target and would require a different response (Avital-Cohen & Tsal, 2016). However, Avital-Cohen and Tsal (2016) questioned the findings from the flanker task experiment. They decided to challenge the idea that only the target stimuli receives top-down processing, and not the distractors (Avital-Cohen & Tsal, 2016). The first experiment aimed to test whether the distractor interference is purely bottom-up processing as claimed in the flanker task. The experiment manipulated participants’ expectations of the target using the context effect - a type of top-down processing - by changing the distractors to be either letters or digits (Psych 240 lecture, 9/21/16). Then, the researchers conducted a second experiment and eliminated the ambiguity of distractors. They wanted to test whether the result from experiment 1 was caused by an overall bias or the ambiguous distractors. In experiment 2, the researchers predicted that they would obtain similar results to the first experiment only if the results were due to an overall bias effect (Avital-Cohen & Tsal, 2016). This study allows us to deepen our understanding of available

This study serves to investigate the phenomenon of the congruency sequence effect (CSE), often called conflict adaptation. A substantial amount of literature in the field of cognitive neuroscience has been dedicated to investigate the underlying mechanisms behind the CSE. Currently there are two competing views that try to answer this phenomenon: selection for action and response inhibition. Selection for action suggests that the brain focuses more on the target to cope with distraction. Competing views, such as response inhibition, instead suggests that the brain ignores distractors. The current study uses a prime-probe word task to try to distinguish between the competing accounts. To differentiate between the two hypotheses, we have employed the technique of varying the time intervals separating the distracters from the target. This increased time interval virtually eliminates the overall congruency effect and allows us to examine the underlying mechanisms. By combining this unique methodological approach and accounting for various confounds, we observed a negative congruency effect after incongruent trials. We believe that the increased time intervals separating the distracters and targets are responsible for the subjects’ ability to fully inhibit the response activated by the distracter. These findings provide compelling evidence that support the control process of response inhibition in the absence of learning and memory confounds.

Therefore, the clinician will utilize the Test of Everyday Attention in order to determine the baseline data. However, since APT-3 is hierarchically organized, designed to stimulate isolated components of attention; the first objective will continue to target sustained attention to ensure stability at this level. Sustained attention is the ability to maintain a continuous response during a repetitive activity (Hux, 2011). During each activity, the APT-3 program will audibly instruct the client to respond, through the press of a button, to each of the designated stimulus across approximately 22 items per trial. Sample directions are as follows: you will hear a series of objects, your task is to press the button when you hear an item that is circular shapes (e.g., ball, clock). Other potential stimulus includes: clothing items, fruit, and circular shaped items. Once the client has obtained accuracy of 80% or greater in 4 out of the 5 trials across 2 consecutive sessions, objective one will have been met and he will then proceed with selective attention exercises. Selective attention refers to the ability to maintain a continuous respond to certain stimuli while faced with distracting or competing stimuli (Hux, 2011). Therefore, similar procedures will apply to selective attention exercise; however, the client will now encounter various distractions, such as background noise. Sample directions are as follows: You will hear a series of objects, you will also hear or see distractions in the background, try to ignore the distractions, your task is to press the button when you hear two rectangular shaped objects in a row, try to ignore the distractions and focus on the objects presented. After each activity, the client will be asked to rate how hard they had to work on a likert scale of 0 to 10, 0 = super easy, 5=had to

Compare and contrast early vs late selection models of attention. How well do they explain how we selectively attend to information?

Research carried out on attention has mainly been associated with the selective processing of incoming sensory information. It proposes, to some degree, our awareness of the world depends on what we choose to focus on and not simply the stimulation received by our senses. Attention is often linked to a filter that screens out most potential stimuli whilst allowing a select few to pass through into our conscious awareness, however, a great deal of debate has been devoted to where the filter is situated in the information processing chain (Martindale, 1991). Psychologists have made extensive contributions to this subject matter in the past century. Notable examples include Donald Broadbent's filter theory of attention (1958), which set the