VISUAL ATTENTION

Selectively Processing the vast amount of

data in the visual field
What do we notice? What’s just
background?
Bottleneck of Visual Attention - If we watch
an overlapping movies, how much will we
notice?
NEURAL BASIS OF
VISUAL ATTENTION
 Brain - Spotlight - Directed towards a
particular location
SPOTLIGHT MODEL Enhances Processing where it is directed.
Other areas - NOT Darkened - just out of
focus - Peripherial Vision: 24*
Fixate on one part of the visual field -
attend to another part
shift of attention often precedes the
corresponding eye movement.

Exogenous: Bottom-up

ATTENTION
Endogenous:Top-down
Frontal Eye Fields (FEF): a role in
voluntary eye movements and
shifting our gaze.
Superior Parietal Lobule (SPL)
Involved in guiding attention based
on our goals.
Temporal Parietal Junction (TPJ): This
area shifts our attention towards
unexpected stimuli.
Pulvinar: A region in the thalamus,
which helps in filtering and relaying
sensory information.
The Dorsal Attention Network (DAN):
Primarily involved in directing voluntary
(top-down) attention.
The frontal eye fields (FEF) and the
parietal cortex.
The Ventral Attention Network (VAN): This
deals with involuntary (bottom-up) attention.
The right temporoparietal junction (TPJ)
and the superior temporal sulcus
The Default Mode Network (DMN): It's like
your brain's "idle" state.
When the DMN is active, attention
networks like DAN are usually less
active and vice versa.
 Enhances Alertness,, Rewaard
based attention, Selective
DOPAMINE attention

NEUROTRANSM Process Sensory Signal, Alertness

ITTERS NOREPINEPHRINE and Vigilance

Sustaining Attention, switching

ACETYLCHOLINE attention
 Imagine you're walking down a
nearly desserted street at night, and
suddenly you hear a strange noise
and a shadow in the lane What
would be your response? Freeze and
direct your attention to the source
of the sound.
What systems are at play here?
SACCADING: DANCING EYES

Think about reading.

Movements of the eye from one fixation to the next.
Brain can only process a small part of your visual field in
high resolution - Fovea
Rapidly consume vast amounts of visual information
Scan path: saccades and fixations
How is Social Media optimised for this?
 VISUAL SEARCH Perception of entire visual field

Process of actively looking for a

specific target Item within a visual
scene with numerous distractors Selective Attention

Searching and Scanning: Serial

Search and Parallel Search

Detection and Decision

 Feature Search:
Searching based on a
single feature

TYPES OF VISUAL
SEARCH Conjunction Search:
Searching based on a
combination of features

Pop-Out Effect
 THE BINDING
PROBLEM

How do we make sense of so much

data?

Different features and visual cues

processed in separate areas of the
brain - how does it integraate?

Attention influences how our brains

integrate information
 FEATURE INTEGRATION Proposed by Anne Treisman and
THEORY Garry Gelade

PREATTENTIVE STAGE: Cues processed separately

FOCUSSED ATTENTION Combination and perception

Neurons processing different features of the same object fire synchronously; In reality, both
mechanisms may play a role in perception, and their relative importance could vary depending
on the specific context and the features being integrated. Some researchers have proposed
that both bottom-up processes (like synchronous neural firing) and top-down processes (like
attention and cognitive control) may work in concert to solve the binding problem
 VISUAL FIELD

The visual field refers to the entire area of your

surroundings that you can see at any given moment
without moving your eyes or head.
Your visual field includes everything within your line of
sight, from objects directly in front of you to those at the
periphery of your vision.
OBJECT BASED ATTENTION
Refers to the tendency of our attention to be drawn to entire objects or regions
of space rather than just individual features or elements.
Object-based attention represents a shift in our understanding of attention,
recognizing that our attention isn't limited to spatial locations but can also be
directed toward meaningful objects or entities within our visual field
Early research on attention primarily focused on space because it was a
straightforward and accessible way to study attentional processes.
Space-based attention involves directing your attention to specific regions or
locations within your visual field. Researchers could easily manipulate and
measure attention by asking participants to look at or respond to stimuli in
different locations.
The study of spatial attention provided valuable insights into how our brains
allocate cognitive resources to different areas of the visual field and how
attention affects perceptual processing.
OBJECT BASED ATTENTION
In object-based attention, we prioritize attending to specific objects or features
in the scene, irrespective of their spatial location
This is especially relevant when we interact with our environment, as we often
focus on objects of interest rather than random locations.
This concept helps explain how we can efficiently process complex visual scenes
by prioritizing the relevant objects while filtering out irrelevant information.
Imagine you're at an art gallery looking at a painting with multiple objects and
details. Your visual field includes the entire painting, but your attention is object-
based. You might focus on a specific object within the painting, such as a vase of
flowers.While the vase is located within your visual field, your attention is not
driven solely by its spatial location. Instead, it's directed toward the meaningful
object—the vase—within the painting.
 VISUAL FIELD NEGLECT

HEMISPATIAL NEGLECT: Neuropsychological condition that often results from damage to the right
hemisphere of the brain, particularly in the parietal lobe. It is characterized by a person's inability to pay
attention to and process information from one side of their visual field or space, typically the left side.
Causes: stroke, traumatic brain injury, or other brain lesions affecting the right hemisphere. It can also
occur to a lesser extent with damage to the left hemisphere, although this is rarer.

Symptoms: Individuals with hemispatial neglect often fail to acknowledge or explore the left side of
space. For example, they may only eat the food on the right side of their plate, neglecting the food on
the left. They may also ignore people or objects on their left side.

Spatial Awareness: Hemispatial neglect affects spatial awareness, and it's not a result of sensory
deficits but rather an attentional deficit. The brain's ability to process information from the neglected
side is impaired.

Rehabilitation: Rehabilitation and treatment strategies for hemispatial neglect typically involve
techniques to encourage individuals to pay more attention to their neglected side. This might include
activities like drawing, reading, or eating with a focus on the left side.
 VISUAL FIELD NEGLECT

BLIND SPOT:
The blind spot is a small area in the visual field where the optic nerve exits the eye. It lacks
photoreceptor cells, such as rods and cones, which are responsible for detecting light and
transmitting visual information to the brain. Key points to understand about the blind spot:

Location: Each eye has a blind spot, and they are located slightly off-center in the visual field.
The brain usually compensates for this blind spot, so you don't notice a gap in your vision.

Perception: Despite having a blind spot, you typically do not experience a gap in your visual
perception. This is because the brain fills in the missing information from the surrounding visual
field, allowing you to perceive a continuous image.

Blind Spot Test: You can test your own blind spot by creating a simple diagram with a small
dot and a larger dot on a piece of paper. Close one eye and focus on the larger dot. Move the
paper closer or farther from your eye until the smaller dot disappears. This is where your blind
spot is located.
 VISUAL FIELD NEGLECT

Attentional Blindness:
a phenomenon where individuals fail to notice a stimulus or change in their visual field
because their attention is focused on something else. Key points:
Selective Attention: Attentional blindness occurs when your selective attention is
engaged by one task or stimulus, causing you to overlook other stimuli in your field of
view.
Inattentional Blindness: A related concept is inattentional blindness, where people fail
to notice a prominent object or event because they are focusing on something else.
Example: The famous "gorilla experiment" is an example of inattentional blindness.
Participants were asked to count the number of passes made by basketball players in a
video, and many failed to notice a person in a gorilla suit walking through the scene.
 VISUAL FIELD NEGLECT

Change Blindness:

Phenomenon where individuals do not notice relatively large changes in a visual scene,
typically during a disruption like a brief interruption or a change in focus. Key points:

Limited Attentional Capacity: Change blindness occurs because our attentional capacity is
limited, and we cannot process all the information in our visual field simultaneously.

Gradual Changes: Change blindness is often used in experiments to demonstrate that even
large changes can go unnoticed if they occur gradually or during a distraction.
 VISUAL FIELD NEGLECT
Cognitive Tunneling:

Cognitive tunneling is a cognitive bias or state in which an individual becomes overly

focused on a single aspect or task, to the exclusion of other important information or
tasks.
Narrowed Focus: When in a state of cognitive tunneling, a person narrows their cognitive
focus to the point where they may miss crucial details or context.
Stress and Overload: Cognitive tunneling often occurs during moments of high stress,
information overload, or when under time pressure. In such situations, people tend to
fixate on what they perceive as the most critical aspect of the task.
Risk of Errors: Cognitive tunneling can lead to errors, especially in fields where a broad
and comprehensive perspective is essential, such as aviation, healthcare, and emergency
response.
Mitigation: Training and awareness can help individuals recognize when they are in a
state of cognitive tunneling, allowing them to consciously broaden their focus and consider
the bigger picture