Attention Part 2 Page 89 - 107

What Happens to Unattended Stimuli? Evidence from Neglect Patients. Shown some pictures to the non-neglected visual field and others to the neglected visual field. Later asked to identify the same pictures in a degraded version. They are just as fast with those that had been presented to the neglected as the non-neglected visual field (priming). cogch3 Attention

Neurological evidence also indicates that when the overall attentional load of a task was low, neglect patients showed increased brain activity to task irrelevant items presented in the neglected visual field (some processing is going on) even though the patients are not consciously aware of the stimuli. cogch3 Attention

Hemi neglect Patients Suffering From 'Hemi -neglect' Ignore Things On Their Left, But They See Them Nonetheless Click here to see Science Daily article (05/15/08.) This study demonstrates that in hemi-neglect the left part of the world is not a 'blind' region: in a way, patients read unconsciously what is there. However, the patients cannot make conscious use of this information cogch3 Attention

Attention as Capacity Factors effecting allocation of Attention Attention is the process of allocating mental resources to various cognitive tasks Factors effecting allocation of Attention Anxiety Salience and Distinctiveness Relevance Task demands cogch3 Attention

Cross- Modality Effects Ventriloquist Illusion Rubber Hand Illusion Phantom Limb Pain (begin at 13:00) Body Swap Illusion cogch3 Attention

Disorders of Visual Attention Hemi-neglect – (Historical note) President Woodrow Wilson after suffering two strokes developed hemi neglect. When colleagues came to visit him, he failed to respond to them until they were escorted to his right side. He denied he had a problem and planned to run for a third term as president until his wife finally intervened. cogch3 Attention

Spatial Extinction: can detect a single item in both the left and right visual fields but, under conditions of double simultaneous stimulation they fail to detect the item in the left field. Presented Perceived cogch3 Attention

When stimuli is presented in the neglected field but has no competition for attention from the non- neglected visual field, the image is perceived. When there is competition for attention from the non- neglected visual field, attention is given only to the non-neglected visual field. cogch3 Attention

Two Attention Systems (Corbetta) Goal directed system - preparing and applying goal-directed (top-down) selection for stimuli and responses. Effected by expectations, knowledge and/or intentions. Stimulus driven – (bottom-up) specialized for the detection of behaviorally relevant stimuli, particularly when they are salient or unexpected. Circuit breaker . cogch3 Attention

The area were the two attention systems combine is in the parietal lobe. There is competition for attention from the two attentional systems. Hemi- neglect can occur due to impairment in either the goal-directed or the stimulus driven systems. Results in a failure to activate the parietal cortex enough to capture attention to that visual filed. Hemi-neglect is a disorder of Attention – not of perception. cogch3 Attention

Reducing Neglect: Physiotherapy Hemi-neglect patients when asked to point straight ahead – point several degrees to the left. Prism glasses that shift the visual field 10 degrees to the right allow patients to use the Goal-directed (top-down) processes to direct more attention to the neglected left visual field. cogch3 Attention

Demonstration I will show you a scene quickly. Report first the black numbers. Report what you see at each of the 4 locations. Mask +++

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Report first the black numbers. Report what you saw at each of the 4 locations.

Illusionary conjunctions We tend to put different features from different objects together. Some brain damaged patients (parietal lobe) show illusionary conjunctions even when the patients were allowed to view the stimuli for 10 seconds.

Feature Integration Theory Find the Green X X O X X X X X X X X X X X X X X Feature search Conjunction search Treisman & Gelade 1980

Which is more difficult? Find

Which is more difficult? Find

Typical Findings & interpretation Feature targets pop out flat display size function Conjunction targets demand serial search non-zero slope

Feature integration theory Attention is the “glue” that combines the information from the what and where systems.

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Multi-tasking Ophir et al (2009) Correlation between multitasking and distractibility. When asked to do two tasks at once, participants who reported being multitaskers performed less well on the main task than did non- multitaskers. Perhaps multi-taskers are just less able to focus attention. cogch3 Attention

Cell Phone Use Hyman et al (2009) Cell phone users less likely (25%) than non-users (51%) to notice a unicyling clown!!! cogch3 Attention

Practice and Dual Task Performance Spelke, Neisser et al (1976) Two subjects read short stories while writing lists of words at dictation. After some weeks of practice, they were able to write words, discover relations among dictated words, and categorize words for meaning, while reading for comprehension at normal speed. The performance of these subjects is not consistent with the notion that there are fixed limits to attentional capacity. cogch3 Attention

Automatic vs. Controlled Automatic Processes Fast and efficient Unavailable to consciousness Unavoidable Unintentional Controlled Processes Slow and less efficient Available to consciousness Controllable Intentional

Attention as executive control In contrast to capacity theories (which see attention as a limitation) considering it as executive control of possibly conflicting multiple goals makes attention instead a source of efficiency Evidence: Psychological Refractory Period

Psychological Refractory Period 2 stimuli and 2 responses Light: press button Tone: press foot pedal Varying SOAs At short SOAs, response to task 2 takes longer Varying stimulus processing difficulty Lengthening processing of stimulus 1 slows RT to stimulus 2 Lengthening processing of stimulus 2 does not slow response to stimulus 2!!

PRP: Surprising Results Processing Of Stimulus Central Executive Response to Stimulus S1 R1 S2 R2 S1 R1 S2 R2 Central Executive: response selection process S1 R1 S2 R2