Selective Attention
&
Transduction
(Module 16)
Sensation
• The process by which our sensory systems
(eyes, ears, and other sensory organs) and
nervous system receive/detect stimuli/info
from the environment
• A person’s awareness of the world through
their senses.
The Major Senses
• There are 6 major senses
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vision
hearing
touch
taste
pain
smell
• The list can be extended with balance (vestibular
sense), joint sense, body part position (kinesthetic
sense)
• Vision has been studied most extensively
Sensation uses
Bottom-Up Processing
• Information processing that focuses
on the raw material entering through
the eyes, ears, and other organs of
sensation
• How we process info when we have
NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE
Perception
• How you make sense of your sensory
information.
• The process of selecting, organizing and
interpreting sensory information
• Draws upon our experience & expectations
Perception uses
Top-Down Processing
• Information processing that focuses on
expectations and prior experiences in
interpreting incoming sensory information
Detection
Transduction
Interpretation
Bottom-Up vs. Top-Down Processing
Follow the directions carefully!
• Go to http://jeffmilner.com/backmasking.htm. Pick a song
from the list and listen to it normally (play forward).
• Now listen to it in reverse. DO NOT CLICK ON “SHOW
REVERSE LYRICS”
• Now listen to it in reverse again, this time “Show the
Reverse Lyrics”
• Can you hear the “secret” message?
• Why couldn’t you hear it the first time you listened in
reverse?
– You had no expectations. Just heard sounds. This is
Bottom-Up processing!
• Why could you make out the “hidden message” when you
could see the reverse lyrics?
– When told what to listen for the task becomes TopDown processing! You are using your expectations!
Selective Attention
• Focusing conscious awareness on a
particular stimulus to the exclusion of others
• The ability to focus on one thing at a time
• Allows a person to function in a world filled
with many stimuli/distractions
• People with ADHD have trouble doing this.
Cocktail Party Effect
• Demonstrates selective attention
• If talking to one person in a crowded noisy room
you will still notice if someone says your name.
• This demonstrates that even though you weren’t
paying attention to something your brain was still
monitoring other sensual information in the room
and alerting you when there was something you
needed to pay attention to.
Read the following words to yourself
•Did you notice that the word “the” was written twice?
•If not, it shows how your brain was selectively paying
attention to the meaning of what you were reading and
not what was actually written.
•Example of Top-Down Processing
Multitasking
• Are we good at Multitasking? NO!
• Try to do the following activity? How well
could you attend to the multiple stimuli at
once?
• The Stroop Effect
• NY Times Distracted Driving Simulator
Inattentive Blindness
• We are only able to pay attention to a tiny sliver of
visual stimuli. Things outside our attention we are
blind to
• Caused by our amazing focus on just some parts of
the environment.
• Change Blindness – Failure to notice changes in
the environment…sometimes obvious ones. Watch these Person Swaps
• Choice Blindness – Not noticing when your
preferred choice has changed – Jam Swap or Face
Swap
Selective Attention: An Example
• View this updated version of Neisser’s Selective
Attention Test basketball video clip below. Count
the number of passes made by the girls in white.
(click HERE to start)
Did you notice the lady walk across the room with the
umbrella? No! You were too busy watching & counting the
passes. Try these: http://www.dothetest.co.uk/