CHAPTER 4: ATTENTION AND CONSCIOUSNESS

THE NATURE OF ATTENTION AND CONSCIOUSNESS

Attention
• Is the means by which we actively select and process a limited amount of information
from all of the information captured by our senses, our stored memories, and our other
cognitive processes.
• Attention includes both conscious and unconscious processes.
Overt Attention
• The process of shifting attention from one place to another by moving the eyes.
Covert Attention
• Occurs when attention is shifted without moving the eyes, commonly referred to as seeing
something “out of the corner of the eye”.
Consciousness
• Includes both the feeling of awareness and the content of awareness, some of which may
be under the focus of attention.
• Attention and consciousness, therefore, form two partially overlapping sets.

Four Main Functions of Attention

1. Signal detection and vigilance
We try to detect the appearance of a particular stimulus.
2. Search
We engage in an active search for particular stimuli.
3. Selective attention
We choose to attend to some stimuli and ignore others.
4. Divided attention
We engage in more than one task at a time, and we shift our attentional resources to allocate
them as needed.
Signal Detection: Finding Important Stimuli in a Crowd
Signal-detection theory (SDT)
• Framework to explain how people pick out the important stimuli embedded in a wealth
of irrelevant, distracting stimuli.
Four possible outcomes when trying to detect a stimulus:
• Hits (true positives)
• False alarms (false positives)
• Misses (false negatives)
• Correct Rejections (true negatives)

SDT can be discussed in the context of attention, perception, or memory:

Attention
• Paying enough attention to perceive objects that are there.
Perception
• Perceiving faint signals that may or may not be beyond your perceptual range (such as a
high-pitched tone).
Memory
• Indicating whether you have or have not been exposed to a stimulus before.

Vigilance
• Refers to a person’s ability to attend to a field of stimulation over a prolonged period,
during which the person seeks to detect the appearance of a particular target stimulus of
interest.
Neuroscience and Vigilance
Both the amygdala and thalamus are involved in vigilance.

Search: Actively Looking

Search
• Refers to a scan of the environment for particular features—actively looking for something
when you are not sure where it will appear.
Distracters
• Nontarget stimuli that divert our attention away from the target stimulus.

TWO TYPES OF SEARCHES

1. Feature Search
We look for just one feature (e.g., color, shape, or size) that makes our search object
different from all others.
2. Conjunction Search
We have to combine two or more features to find the stimulus we’re looking for.

Feature-Integration Theory (Anne Treisman)

• Explains why it is relatively easy to conduct feature searches and relatively difficult to
conduct conjunction searches.
Similarity Theory
• The more similar target and distracters are, the more difficult it is to find the target.

Selective Attention
Cocktail Party Problem (Collin Cherry)
• The process of tracking one conversation while distracted by other conversations.
Dichotic Presentation
• Present separate message to each ear.

Shadowing
The shadowing procedure is used to ensure that participants are focusing their attention on the
attended message.

Theories of Selective Attention

Early Filter Model (Donald Broadbent)
• According to one of the earliest theories of attention, we filter information right after we
notice it at the sensory level.
 • Broadbent’s model has been called a bottleneck model because the filter restricts
information flow, much as the neck of a bottle restricts the flow of liquid.
Early filter model proposed that information passes through the follow proposed that information
passes through the following stages:
1. Sensory memory holds all of the incoming information for a fraction of a second and then
transfers all of it to the next stage.
2. The filter identifies the attended message based on its physical characteristics and lets only this
message pass through to the detector in the next stage.
3. The detector processes information to determine higher-level characteristics of the message,
such as its meaning.
4. Short-term memory receives the output of the detector.

Selective Filter Model (Moray Mcleod)

• Found that even when participants ignore most other high-level aspects of an unattended
message, they frequently still recognize their names in an unattended ear.

Attenuation Model (Anne Treisman)

• Once the attended and unattended messages have been identified, both messages are let
through the attenuator (filter), but the attended message emerges at full strength and the
unattended messages are attenuated—they are still present but are weaker than the
attended message.
• Because at least some of the unattended message gets through the attenuator, Treisman’s
model has been called a “leaky filter” model.

The attenuator analyzes the incoming message in terms of:

1. physical characteristics
2. language
3. meaning
The final output of the system is determined in the second stage, when the message is analyzed
by the dictionary unit. The dictionary unit contains stored words, each of which has a threshold
for being activated.
LATE SELECTION MODELS
Late-Filter Model
Deutsch and Deutsch (1963)
- They developed a model in which the location of the filter is even later in the process.
- They suggested that stimuli are filtered out only after they have been analyzed for both their
physical properties and their meaning.
✓ This later filtering would allow people to recognize information entering the unattended
ear.
Donald MacKay (1973)
- He listened to ambiguous sentences, such as “They were throwing stones at the bank,” that
could be taken more than one way. (In this example, “bank” can refer to a riverbank or to a
financial institution.)
These ambiguous sentences were presented to the attended ear, while biasing words were
presented to the other, unattended ear – in this case, either the word “river” or the word
“money” was being presented.
After hearing a number of the ambiguous sentences, participants were presented with pairs of
sentences such as the following:

• They threw stones toward the side of the river yesterday.

• They threw stones at the savings and loan association yesterday.
When they indicated which of these two sentences was closest in meaning to one of the
sentences they had heard previously, MacKay found that the meaning of the biasing word
affected the participants’ choice.
✓ McKay and other theorists to propose late selection models of attention, which proposed
that most of the incoming information is processed to the level of meaning before the
message to be processed is selected.

A SYNTHESIS OF EARLY FILTER AND LATE-FILTER MODELS

Ulric Neisser (1967)
- He synthesized the early filter and the late-filter models and proposed that two processes
govern attention:
(a) Preattentive processes: These automatic processes are rapid and occur in parallel. They
can be used to notice only physical sensory characteristics of the unattended message.
(b) Attentive, controlled processes: These processes occur later. They are executed serially
and consume time and attentional resources, such as working memory.
DIVIDED ATTENTION – is the distribution of attention among two or more tasks. (Sternberg)
Investigating Divided Attention in the Lab
Early work in the area of divided attention had participants view a videotape in which the display
of a basketball game was superimposed on the display of a hand-slapping game. Participants
could successfully monitor one activity and ignore the other. They had great difficulty, however,
in monitoring both activities at once.
Neisser and Becklen
- Hypothesized that improvements in performance eventually would have occurred as a result
of practice.
- They believed it not to be based on special cognitive mechanisms.

Spelke, Hirst, and Neisser (1976)

Dual-task paradigm – study divided attention during the simultaneous performance of two
activities: (1) reading short stories and (2) writing down dictated words.
✓ The researchers would compare and contrast the response time (latency) and accuracy of
performance in each of the three conditions. The higher latencies mean slower responses.
As expected, initial performance was poor for the two tasks when the tasks had to be
performed at the same time.
✓ They had their participants practice to perform these two tasks five days a week for many
weeks (85 sessions in all). To the surprise of many, given enough practice, the participants’
performance improved on both tasks.
✓ Eventually, participants’ performance on both tasks reached the same levels that the
participants previously had shown for each task alone.
✓ Spelke suggested that these findings showed that controlled tasks can be automatized so
that they consume fewer attentional resources.
An entirely different approach to studying divided attention has focused on extremely simple
tasks that require speedy responses.
✓ When people try to perform two overlapping speeded tasks, the responses for one or
both tasks are almost always slower.
✓ When a second task begins soon after the first task has started, speed of performance
usually suffers. This slowing is the psychological refractory period (PRP) effect, also called
attentional blink.
How well people can divide their attention also has to do with their intelligence.
 ✓ According to Hunt and Lansman, more intelligent people are better able to timeshare
between two tasks and to perform both effectively.

Theories of Divided Attention

To understand our ability to divide our attention, researchers have developed capacity models of
attention.
Two different kinds of models differ in terms of what the source of attention is:
(1) One model suggests that one single pool of attentional resources can be divided freely.
(2) Another model suggests multiple sources of attention are available, one for each
modality.

Divided Attention in Everyday Life

Some intriguing studies are based on our own everyday experiences. One widely used paradigm
simulates a driving situation (Strayer & Johnston, 2001; see also Fisher & Pollatsek, 2007).
✓ Researchers had participants perform a tracking task. The participants controlled a
joystick, which moved a cursor on a computer screen. The participants needed to keep
the cursor in position on a moving target. At various times, the target would flash either
green or red.
If the color was green, the participants were to ignore the signal. If the color was red,
however, the participants were to push a simulated brake. The simulated brake was a
button on the joystick.
In one condition, participants only had to accomplish this one task. In another condition,
participants were involved in a second task. This procedure created a dual-task situation.
✓ The participants either listened to a radio broadcast while doing the task or talked on a
cell phone to an experimental confederate.
✓ Results show that the probability of a miss in the face of the red signal increased
substantially (and reaction times were slower) when participants had a cell phone
conversation relative to when they were not talking on the phone. Listening to the radio,
 however, did not really impede their performance. Thus, use of cell phones appears to be
substantially riskier than listening to the radio while driving.

✓ Additional studies have analyzed data from real-world incidents. A study of 2,700 crashes
in the state of Virginia between June and November 2002 investigated causes of accidents
(Warner, 2004). Following are some of the main factors that resulted in accidents, with
the percentage of accidents for which each was responsible:
• rubbernecking (viewing accidents that have already occurred), 16%
• driver fatigue, 12%
• looking at scenery or landmarks, 10%
• distractions caused by passengers or children, 9%
• adjusting a radio or other media player, 7%
• cell phone use, 5%

✓ Other research has indicated that, when time on task and driving conditions are controlled
for, the effects of talking on a cell phone can be as detrimental as driving while
intoxicated (Strayer, Drews, & Crouch, 2006).
✓ Still other research has found that, compared with people not on a cell phone, people
talking on a cell phone exhibit more anger, through honking and facial expressions, when
presented with a frustrating situation.
✓ Increased aggression has been linked with increased accidents (Deffenbacher et al., 2003).
These findings, combined with those on the effects of divided attention, help to explain why an
increase in accidents is seen when cell phones are involved.
Maciej, Nitsch, and Vollrath (2011)
- Suggests that the presence of a passenger in the car actually makes driving safer than driving
alone.

✓ Another study indicated that the more people actually speak on the cell phone, the less
risky they perceive this behavior (Hallett, Lambert, & Regan, 2011).
✓ Another high-risk behavior during driving is texting.
DIVIDED ATTENTION CAN BE ACHIEVED WITH PRACTICE: AUTOMATIC PROCESSING (Goldstein)
Walter Schneider and Robert Shiffrin (1977)
- They required the participant to carry out two tasks simultaneously:
(1) Holding information about target stimuli in memory; and
(2) Paying attention to a series of “distractor” stimuli and determining if one of the target
stimuli is present among these distractor stimuli.
✓ The participant was shown a memory set consisting of one to four characters called target
stimuli.
✓ The memory set was followed by rapid presentation of 20 “test frames,” each of which
contained distractors.
✓ On half of the trials, one of the frames contained a target stimulus from the memory set.
✓ There is one target stimulus in the memory set, there are four stimuli in each frame, and the
target stimulus 3 appears in one of the frames.
✓ The targets and distractors were always from different categories, so the targets were
numbers.
o Schneider and Shiffrin called this way of presenting stimuli the consistent mapping
condition because even though the targets changed from trial to trial, the participants
always knew that the target would be numbers and the distractors would be letters.
✓ At the beginning of the experiment, the participants’ performance was only 55% correct, and
it took 900 trials for performance to reach 90%.
• Participants reported that for the first 600 trials, they had to keep repeating the target items
in each memory set in order to remember them.
• However, participants reported that after about 600 trials, the task had become automatic:
The frames appeared, and participants responded without consciously thinking about it.
- According to Schneider and Shiffrin, practice made it possible for participants to divide
their attention to deal with all of the target and test items simultaneously.
✓ Furthermore, the many trials of practice resulted in automatic processing – a type of
processing that occurs
(1) without intention (it happens automatically without the person intending to do it) and
(2) at a cost of only some of a person’s cognitive resources.

DIVIDED ATTENTION WHEN TASKS ARE HARDER: CONTROLLED PROCESSING

The following modifications that make it more difficult:
(1) The targets in the memory set and the distractors are both letters
(2) A target on one trial can be a distractor on the next trial.
For example, target stimulus P on trial 1 becomes a distractor on trial 2. Also, the target stimulus
T on trial 2 was a distractor on trial 1. – This is called the varied mapping condition because the
rules keep changing from trial to trial.
✓ The results shows that performance was worse in the varied mapping condition than in the
consistent mapping condition.
✓ Participants never achieved automatic processing. Schneider and Shiffrin describe the
processing used in the varied mapping condition as controlled processing—the participants
had to pay close attention at all times and had to search for the target among the distractors
in a much more focused and controlled way than in the consistent mapping condition.
✓ Divided attention is possible and can become automatic if tasks are easy or well-practiced.
Divided attention becomes difficult and can require controlled processing when the task is
made too hard.

FACTORS THAT INFLUENCES OUR ABILITY TO PAY ATTENTION

Many other variables have an impact on our ability to concentrate and pay attention. Here are
some of them:
(1) Anxiety
(2) Arousal
(3) Task difficulty
(4) Skills

▪ Neuroscience and Attention: A Network Model

The attentional system in the brain “is neither a property of a single brain area nor of the entire
brain.” - Posner
Michael Posner and Mary Rothbart
- They conducted a review of neuroimaging studies in the area of attention to investigate
whether the many diverse results of studies conducted pointed to a common direction.
✓ They found that what at first seemed like an unclear pattern of activation could be
effectively organized into areas associated with the three sub-functions of attention:
(a) ALERTING – is defined as being prepared to attend to some incoming event, and
maintaining this attention.
o The brain areas involved in alerting are the right frontal and parietal cortexes
as well as the locus coeruleus.
o The neurotransmitter norepinephrine is involved in the maintenance of
alertness.
✓ If the alerting system does not work properly, people develop symptoms of ADHD; in the
process of regular aging, dysfunctions of the alerting system may develop as well.
(b) ORIENTING – is defined as the selection of stimuli to attend to.
o The brain areas involved in the orienting function are the superior parietal
lobe, the temporal parietal junction, the frontal eye fields, and the superior
colliculus.
o The modulating neurotransmitter for orienting is acetylcholine.
o Dysfunction within this system can be associated with autism.
(c) EXECUTIVE ATTENTION – includes processes for monitoring and resolving
conflicts that arise among internal processes—thoughts, feelings, and responses.
- It is the final and highest order of attentional process.
 o The brain areas involved in this are the anterior cingulate, lateral ventral, and
prefrontal cortex as well as the basal ganglia.
o The neurotransmitter most involved in the executive attention process is
dopamine.
o Dysfunction within this system is associated with Alzheimer’s disease,
borderline personality disorder, and schizophrenia.

WHEN OUR ATTENTION FAILS US

Note:
- The real importance of attention becomes clear in situations in which we cannot
concentrate.
- Attention deficits have been linked to lesions in the frontal lobe and in the basal ganglia.
- Visual attentional deficits have been linked to the posterior parietal cortex and the
thalamus, as well as to areas of the midbrain related to eye movements.
- The right hemisphere seems to be dominant for maintaining alertness and that the
attentional systems involved in visual search seem to be distinct from other aspects of
visual attention.

Two Examples of Failing Attention:

▪ Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
▪ Change Blindness/Inattentional Blindness
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
▪ People with ADHD have difficulties in focusing their attention in ways that enable them to
adapt in optimal ways to their environment.
▪ People with ADHD have noted differences in the frontal-subcortical cerebellar
catecholaminergic circuits and in dopamine regulation.
▪ The condition was first described by Dr. Heinrich Hoffman in 1845.
Possible Causes of ADHD:
▪ It may be a partially heritable condition.
▪ Some evidence indicates a link to maternal smoking and drinking during pregnancy.
▪ Childhood exposure to lead also may be associated with ADHD.
▪ Brain injury is another possible cause.
▪ Food additives—in particular, sugar and certain dyes
▪ Various hypotheses have been put forward, including increased watching of fast-paced
television shows, use of fast-paced video games, additives in foods, and increases in
unknown toxins in the environment.
Three Primary Symptoms of ADHD:
▪ Inattention
▪ Hyperactivity
▪ Impulsiveness

Hyperactivity- Levels of activity that exceed what is normally shown by children of a given age.
Three Main Types of ADHD:
▪ Hyperactive-impulsive
▪ Inattentive
▪ Combination of hyperactive-impulsive and inattentive behavior.

Children with the inattentive type of ADHD show several distinctive symptoms:
• They are easily distracted by irrelevant sights and sounds.
• They often fail to pay attention to details.
• They are susceptible to making careless mistakes in their work.
• They often fail to read instructions completely or carefully.
• They are susceptible to forgetting or losing things they need for tasks, such as pencils or
books.
• They tend to jump from one incomplete task to another.

Note:
- Studies have shown that children with ADHD exhibit slower and more variable reaction
times than their siblings who are not affected by the disorder.
- ADHD typically first displays itself during the preschool or early school years.
Treatments and Medications:
- ADHD is most often treated with a combination of psychotherapy and drugs.
Drugs currently used to treat ADHD:
▪ Ritalin (methylphenidate)
▪ Metadate (methylphenidate)
▪ Strattera (atomoxetine)
Note: A number of studies have noted that, although medication is a useful tool in the treatment
of ADHD, it is best used in combination with behavioral interventions.

Multiple Intelligences- a theory of Gardner, which has proven to be especially helpful in the
treatment and support of children with ADHD. This theory distinguishes eight distinct
intelligences that are relatively independent of each other:
▪ Linguistic
▪ logical-mathematical
▪ naturalist
▪ interpersonal
▪ intrapersonal
▪ spatial
▪ musical
▪ bodily kinesthetic intelligences.

Change Blindness and Inattentional Blindness

Change Blindness- an inability to detect changes in objects or scenes that are being viewed.
Inattentional Blindness- which is a phenomenon in which people are not able to see things that
are actually there.
Spatial Neglect or hemineglect
- is an attentional dysfunction in which participants ignore the half of their visual field that is
contralateral to (on the opposite side of) the hemisphere of the brain that has a lesion.
- It is a result mainly of unilateral lesions in the parietal and frontal lobes, most often in the right
hemisphere.

Extinction
- When stimuli are present in both sides of the visual field, people with hemi-neglect suddenly
ignore the stimuli that are contralateral to their lesion.
- If the lesion is in the right hemisphere, they neglect stimuli in the left visual field.
Ipsilateral Field- the part of the visual field where the lesion is.
Note:
▪ A recent study found that people with spatial neglect also have trouble remembering
events from their past.
▪ Recent studies indicate that the posterior superior temporal gyrus, insula, and basal
ganglia, as well as the superior longitudinal fasciculus in the parietal lobe are most likely
connected with spatial neglect.

AUTOMATIC AND CONTROLLED PROCESSES IN ATTENTION

Attention is capable of processing only so many things at once. Attentional filters enable us to
process in depth what is important to us by filtering out irrelevant stimuli. To help us navigate our
environment more successfully, we automatize many processes so that we can execute them
without using up resources that then can be spent on other processes. Therefore, it is useful to
differentiate cognitive processes in terms of whether they do or do not require conscious control
(Schneider & Shiffrin, 1977; Shiffrin & Schneider, 1977).

Automatic and Controlled Processes

Automatic Processes
• Involve no conscious control. They are performed without conscious awareness, but you
may be aware that you’re performing them.
• Demand little to no effort or intervention.
• Some automatic processes easy to retrieve into consciousness and can be controlled
intentionally, whereas others are not accessible to consciousness or cannot be controlled
intentionally.
• Examples include carrying out familiar tasks such as writing, reading, playing a game, and
observing things.
Parallel Processes
• Multiple automatic processes that occur at once, or at least quickly, and in no particular
sequence.
• Examples are driving while listening to music, reading while sharpening a pencil, and
writing while listening.
Controlled Processes
• Conscious, intentional, and effortful method of information processing used when dealing
with novel or complex situations or learning new skill.
• Cognitive tasks and mental activities are done in full, active, conscious attention, and
effort.
 • It is typically used when facing unfamiliar or complex situations that require careful
consideration and logical reasoning to act most reasonably.
• Controlled processes occur sequentially, one step at a time. They take a relatively long
time to execute, at least as compared with automatic processes.
• Examples are learning to drive a car, solving math problems, and writing an essay.

Controlled vs Automatic Processes

Characteristics
Amount of intentional effort
Degree of conscious
awareness
Use of attentional resources
Type of processing
Speed of processing
Relatively novelty of tasks
Level of processing
Difficulty of tasks
Process of acquisition
Controlled Processes Automatic Processes
Require intentional effort Require little or no intention
or effort (and intentional
effort may even be required
to avoid automatic behaviors
Require full conscious Generally occur outside of
awareness conscious awareness,
although some automatic
processes may be available to
consciousness
Consume many attentional Consume negligible
resources attentional resources
Performed serially (one step Performed by parallel
at a time) processing (i.e., with many
operations occurring
simultaneously or at least in
no particular sequential
order)
Relatively time-consuming Relatively fast
execution, as compared with
automatic processes
Novel and unpracticed tasks Familiar and highly practiced
or tasks with many variable tasks, with largely stable task
features characteristics
Relatively high levels of Relatively low levels of
cognitive processing cognitive processing (minimal
(requiring analysis or analysis or synthesis)
synthesis)
Usually difficult tasks Usually relatively easy tasks,
but even relatively complex
tasks may be automatized,
given sufficient practice
With practice, many routine The amount of practice
and stable procedures may needed for automatization
become automatized, such
 that highly controlled increases for highly complex
processes may become partly tasks
or even wholly automatic

Automatization
• Tasks that started off as controlled processes that become automatic.
• When a skill, action, or behavior has been performed and practiced so much that it
becomes automatic requiring little or no conscious effort. The process has become
routine.
• For example, driving a car is initially a controlled process. But once we master driving, it
becomes automatic under normal driving conditions. Such conditions involve familiar
roads, fair weather, and little or no traffic.
• Another example is learning a new language. At first, you’ll have to translate word for
word. But once you get fluent in that language, it enables you to skip translating and
speaking it becomes automatic.

How Does Automatization Occur?

A person gradually combines individual effortful steps into integrated components that are
further integrated until the whole process is one single operation. This operation requires few or
no cognitive resources, such as attention. This view of automatization seems to be supported by
one of the earliest studies of automatization. This study investigated how telegraph operators
gradually automatized the task of sending and receiving messages. Initially, new operators
automatized the transmission of individual letters. Once the operators had made the transmission
of letters automatic, however, they automatized the transmission of words, phrases, and then
other groups of words.
An alternative explanation, called instance theory, was proposed by Logan (1998). Logan
suggested that automatization occurs because we gradually accumulate knowledge about specific
responses to specific stimuli. For example, when a child first learns to add or subtract, he or she
applies a general procedure, which is counting, for handling each pair of numbers. Following
repeated practice, the child gradually stores knowledge about particular pairs of particular
numbers. Eventually, the child can retrieve from memory the specific answers to specific
combinations of numbers. Nevertheless, he or she still can fall back on the general procedure
(counting) as needed.
Automatic processes generally govern familiar, well-practiced as well as easy tasks. Controlled
processes govern relatively novel as well as difficult tasks. Because highly automatized behaviors
require little effort or conscious control, we often can engage in multiple automatic behaviors.
But we rarely can engage in more than one labor-intensive controlled behavior.
Automatization in Everyday Life
Automatization of tasks such as reading is not guaranteed, even with practice. In the case of
dyslexia, for example, automatization is impaired. People who have dyslexia frequently have
difficulty completing tasks, in addition to reading, that normally are automated. Sometimes,
automatization in reading can work against us.

Stroop effect
In this figure, the colored ink matches the name of the color word.

Here, the colors of the inks differ from the color names that are printed with them.

Performing this task will probably be difficult. Each of the written words interferes with your
naming the color of the ink. The Stroop effect demonstrates the psychological difficulty in
selectively attending to the color of the ink and trying to ignore the word that is printed with the
ink of that color. One explanation of why the Stroop test may be particularly difficult is that, for
you and most other adults, reading is now an automatic process. It is not readily subject to your
conscious control. For that reason, you find it difficult not to read the words and instead to
concentrate on identifying the color of the ink
In some situations, however, automatic processes may be lifesaving. Therefore, it is important to
automate safety practices. This is particularly true for people engaging in high-risk occupations,
such as pilots, undersea divers, and firefighters. But in other situations automatization may result
in “mindlessness” and may be life threatening.
Mistakes We Make in Automatic Processes
An extensive analysis of human error shows that errors can be classified either as mistakes or as
slips. Mistakes are errors in choosing an objective or in specifying a means of achieving it. It
involve errors in intentional, controlled processes. Slips are errors in carrying out an intended
means for reaching an objective. Slips often involve errors in automatic processes.
Slips are most likely to happen when two circumstances occur. First is when we must deviate from
a routine and automatic processes inappropriately override intentional, controlled processes.
Second is when our automatic processes are interrupted. Such interruptions are usually a result
of external events or data, but sometimes they are a result of internal events, such as highly
distracting thoughts.
Automatic processes are helpful to us under many circumstances. They save us from needlessly
focusing attention on routine tasks, such as tying our shoes or dialing a familiar phone number.
We are thus unlikely to forgo them just to avoid occasional slips. Instead, we should attempt to
minimize the costs of these slips. How can we minimize the potential for negative consequences
of slips? In everyday situations, we are less likely to slip when we receive appropriate feedback
from the environment. If we can find ways to obtain useful feedback, we may be able to reduce
the likelihood that harmful consequences will result from slips. A particularly helpful kind of
feedback involves forcing functions. These are physical constraints that make it difficult or
impossible to carry out an automatic behavior that may lead to a slip.
Slips Associated with Automatic Processes
Capture errors - Intending to deviate from a routine activity we are implementing in familiar
surroundings, but at a point at which we should depart from the routine, we fail to pay attention
and to regain control of the process; hence, the automatic process captures our behavior, and we
fail to deviate from the routine.
Omissions - An interruption of a routine activity may cause us to skip a step(s) in implementing
the remaining portion of the routine.
Perseverations - After completing an automatic procedure, one or more steps of the procedure
may be repeated.
Description errors - An internal description of the intended behavior leads to performing the
correct action on the wrong object.
Data-driven errors - Incoming sensory information may override the intended variables in an
automatic action sequence.
Associative-activation errors - Strong associations may trigger the wrong automatic routine.
Loss-of-activation errors - The activation of a routine may be insufficient to carry it through to
completion.
CONSCIOUSNESS

Not everything we do, reason, and perceive is necessarily conscious. We may be unaware of
stimuli that alter our perceptions and judgments or may be unable to come up with the right
word in a sentence even though we know that we know the right word.

• Consciousness - includes only the narrower range of information that the individual is
aware of manipulating. But with our conscious awareness allowing us to monitor our
interactions with the environment, linking our past and present experiences and thereby
sense a continuous thread of experience, and to control and plan for future actions. That
is why we can actively process information at the preconscious level without being aware
of doing so.

The Consciousness of Mental Processes

“How conscious are we of our complex mental processes?”

Simon and his colleagues

• One view: People have good access to their complex mental processes.
• Using protocol analysis in analyzing people’s solving of problems, i.e chess problems and
crypt-arithmetic problems - one has to figure out what numbers substitute for letters in
a mathematical computation problem.

Nisbett and Wilson

• Second view: People’s access to their complex mental processes is not very good.
• In this view, people may think they know how they solve complex problems, but their
thoughts are frequently erroneous.
• You may believe you know why you made the decision, but that belief is likely to be flawed
• ESSENCE: People’s conscious access to their thought processes, and even their control
over their thought processes, is minimal.

• Thought suppression - As soon as you think of the person, you try to put the individual
out of your mind.
• One major problem: It often does not work. The more you try not to think about someone
or something, the more “obsessed” you may become with the person or object.

Preconscious Processing

Some information that currently is outside our conscious awareness still may be available to
consciousness or at least to cognitive processes.

• Information that is available for cognitive processing but that currently lies outside
conscious awareness exists at the preconscious level of awareness.
 • Preconscious information:
1. Stored Memories - we are not using at a given time but that we could summon when
needed.
2. Sensations - may be pulled from preconscious to conscious awareness.

Priming

• A given stimulus increases the likelihood that a subsequent related (or identical) stimulus
will be readily processed (e.g., retrieval from long-term memory)
• Participants are presented with a first stimulus (the prime), followed by a break that can
range from milliseconds to weeks or months. Then, the participants are presented with a
second stimulus and make a judgment (e.g., are both the first and the second stimulus
the same?) to see whether the presentation of the first stimulus affected the perception
of the second.

• Presentation of the first stimulus: may activate related concepts in memory that are then
more easily accessible.
• Most priming is positive which facilitates later recognition. But priming on occasion may
be negative and impede later recognition.

• Sometimes we are aware of the priming stimuli. However, priming occurs even when the
priming stimulus is presented in a way that does not permit its entry into conscious
awareness

Marcel

• observed processing of stimuli that were presented too briefly to be detected in conscious
awareness. The participants were presented with a prime that had two different
meanings e.g PALM, which can refer both to a body part and a plant.

The Dyad of Triads Task (test of intuition)

• Participants were presented with pairs (dyads) of three-word groups. One of the triads in
each dyad was a potentially coherent grouping. The other triad contained random and
unrelated words.
• Participants in the dyad of triads task were presented with two 3-word groups (triads).
One of those triads contained unrelated words; the other triad contained words that were
coherent in some way. After seeing the two triads, participants were presented with
another word and were asked to identify which triad was related to that word.
• Visual Priming

• Auditory Priming - Priming effects can be demonstrated using aural material as well.
Experiments exploring auditory priming reveal the same behavioral effects as visual
priming.
 • Patients Under Anesthesia - While under anesthesia, these patients were presented with
lists of words. They were asked yes/no questions and word-stem completion questions
about the words they heard

The Tip-of-the-Tongue Phenomenon

• You try to remember something that is stored in memory but that cannot readily be
retrieved.
• Another example of preconscious processing, which retrieves the desired information
from memory that does not occur, despite an ability to retrieve related information.

Brown and McNeill

• Participants were read a large number of dictionary definitions and were given the clue.
The subjects then were asked to identify the corresponding words having these meanings.
• Similar to the television show “Jeopardy”
• The results then indicate that a particular preconscious information, although not fully
accessible to conscious thinking, is still available to attentional processes.

• The tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon is apparently universal.

1. Bilingual people experience more tip-of-the-tongues than monolingual speakers, which
may be because bilinguals use either one of their languages less frequently than do
monolinguals
2. People with limited or no ability to read
3. Older adults have more tip-of-the-tongue experiences compared with younger adults

• anterior cingulate-prefrontal cortices - involved when one is experiencing the tip-of-the-

tongue phenomenon. This likely is due to high-level cognitive mechanisms being activated
to resolve the retrieval failure.

Blindsight

• traces of visual perceptual ability in blind areas, but when forced to guess about a stimulus
in the “blind” region, they correctly guess locations and orientations of objects at above-
chance levels
• Cortically Blind Participants - pre adjust their hands appropriately to size, shape,
orientation, and 3-D location of that object in the blind field. Yet they fail to show
voluntary behavior.

Case Study: Patient D.B.

• blind on the left side of his visual field as an unfortunate result of an operation. He
reported no awareness of any objects placed on his left side or of any events that took
place on this side, but despite his unawareness of vision on this side, there was evidence
of vision.
 1. forced- choice test - patient had to indicate which of two objects had been presented to
this side. He performed at levels that were significantly better than chance. In other
words, he “saw” despite his unawareness of seeing.

2. paired presentations of a visual stimulus with electric shocks

• After multiple pairings, the patient began to experience fear when the visual stimulus was
presented, even though he could not explain why he was afraid. Thus, the patient was
processing visual information, although he could not see.

The information from the retina is forwarded to the visual cortex, which is damaged in cortically
blind people. That is why, a part of the visual information bypasses the visual cortex and is sent
to other locations in the cortex.

The information from these locations is unconsciously accessible, although it seems to be

conscious only when it is processed in the visual cortex.

BS PSYCHOLOGY 3C
EUGENIO, Jeline Flor
ELIANG, Kyla
LAUIGAN, Klarhys Mae
MAIQUEZ, Laurice
MALLARI, April Joy