PSYC 2410 Chapter Notes - Chapter 4: Change Blindness, Dependent And Independent Variables, Handsfree

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 2410
• Professor: Anneke Olthof

Document Summary

Selective attention refers to the skill through which one focuses on one input or one task while ignoring other stimuli. Attention studies sometimes employ a task known as shadowing. Using headphones, different information is presented to each ear. The participant pays attention to the information presented to one ear (the attended channel) while ignoring information presented to the other (the unattended channel) Results from these studies suggest that unusual characteristics of the unattended channel go unnoticed. Similar effects happen in visual studies (ex. In a classic study, participants asked to count the number of basketball passes) There are some important exceptions, where certain pieces of information will be unnoticed even if the presented to the unattended channel. The participants own name, or any words of high personal significance, will be noticed even in the unattended channel. This pattern is observed in real-life situations and sometimes called the cocktail party effect.