Examples of selective attention phenomena

📚 Quick Study Guide

• 🧠 Selective attention is the cognitive process of selectively concentrating on one aspect of the environment while ignoring other things.
• 👓 It allows us to focus on what is important and filter out distractions.
• 🎤 Dichotic listening tasks are often used to study selective attention. Participants hear different messages in each ear and are instructed to attend to only one.
• 🚦 Broadbent's Filter Model proposes that attention acts as a filter, blocking out unattended information early in processing.
• 🧮 Treisman's Attenuation Model suggests that unattended information is not completely blocked but rather attenuated (reduced).
• ⚠️ Divided attention is the opposite of selective attention, where you try to focus on multiple things at once, often resulting in less efficient performance.
• 💡 Factors like relevance, expectations, and emotional significance can influence what we selectively attend to.

Practice Quiz

1. What is selective attention?
   1. The ability to focus on multiple tasks simultaneously.
   2. The process of ignoring all environmental stimuli.
   3. The cognitive process of focusing on one aspect of the environment while ignoring others.
   4. A complete lack of attention to anything.


2. Which of the following is a common method used to study selective attention?
   1. Random number generation tasks.
   2. Dichotic listening tasks.
   3. Taste preference tests.
   4. Visual acuity tests.


3. According to Broadbent's Filter Model, what happens to unattended information?
   1. It is amplified.
   2. It is completely blocked early in processing.
   3. It is consciously processed.
   4. It is stored in long-term memory.


4. Treisman's Attenuation Model proposes that unattended information is:
   1. Completely blocked.
   2. Attenuated (reduced).
   3. Amplified.
   4. Ignored and then suddenly remembered.


5. What is the opposite of selective attention?
   1. Inattentional blindness.
   2. Divided attention.
   3. Sustained attention.
   4. Focused attention.


6. Which of the following factors can influence what we selectively attend to?
   1. Random chance.
   2. The color of our clothing.
   3. Relevance, expectations, and emotional significance.
   4. The current weather.


7. Imagine you are driving and focusing on the road while tuning out the radio. This is an example of:
   1. Divided attention.
   2. Inattentional blindness.
   3. Selective attention.
   4. Sustained attention deficit.