PSYCH 1X03 Lecture Notes - Mike Posner, Emergency Vehicle, Dazed
Document Summary
Attention allows you to navigate through a crowded world brimming with information and distractions. Without the ability to focus your limited processing resources, you wouldn"t be able to carry on a meaningful conversation, enjoy a piece of music, understand a joke or learn new things. William james defines attention as, everyone knows what attention is. Attention also refers to our conscious ability to attend to the information that is relevant to our goals. i. e. walking thru a grocery store you are actively selecting where to focus your attention. We are remarkably adept at distinguishing the relevant from the irrelevant information in the environment. i. e. driving thru busy traffic becomes more difficult as you talk on the phone. After practice it is easy to operate a vehicle to the point where some people report to have. Automatic driving experiences where they plan to go one place but accidently end up somewhere else.