Psychology
Cognitive psychology
Perception
Visual perception
Object recognition
Face recognition
Pattern recognition
Attention
Attention
Memory
Aging and memory
Emotional memory
Learning
Long-term memory
Language
Language
Thinking
Concepts
Reasoning
Decision making
Problem solving

Attention is the cognitive process of selectively concentrating on one aspect of the environment while ignoring other things. Psychology (from Greek grc ψῡχή psȳkhē, "breath life soul" and grc -λογία -logia) is an Academic and Cognitive psychology is a branch of Psychology that investigates internal mental processes such as problem solving memory and language In Psychology and the Cognitive sciences perception is the process of attaining awareness or understanding of sensory Information. In Psychology, visual perception is the ability to interpret information from Visible light reaching the Eyes The resulting Perception is also Object recognition in Computer vision is a task of finding given object in an image or video sequence Face perception is the process by which the Brain and Mind understand and interpret the Face, particularly the human face Pattern recognition is a sub-topic of Machine learning. It is "the act of taking in raw data and taking an action based on the category of the data" In Psychology, memory is an organism's ability to store retain and subsequently retrieve information One of the key concerns of older adults is the experience of Memory loss, especially as it is one of the hallmark symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. Emotion can have a powerful impact on Memory. Numerous studies have shown that the most vivid autobiographical memories tend to be of emotional events which In the fields of Neuropsychology, Personal development and Education, Learning is one of the most important Mental function of humans Long-term memory ( LTM) is Memory that can last as little as a few days or as long as decades A language is a dynamic set of visual auditory or tactile Symbols of Communication and the elements used to manipulate them A language is a dynamic set of visual auditory or tactile Symbols of Communication and the elements used to manipulate them Thought and thinking are mental forms and Processes respectively ("thought" is both The term "concept" is traced back to 1554–60 ( l conceptum - something conceived but what is today termed "the classical theory of concepts" is the theory of Aristotle Reasoning is the cognitive process of looking for Reasons for beliefs conclusions actions or feelings Decision making can be regarded as an outcome of mental processes ( cognitive process) leading to the selection of a course of action among several alternatives Problem solving forms part of thinking. Considered the most complex of all intellectual functions problem solving has been defined as higher-order Cognitive Cognition is a concept used in different ways by different disciplines but is generally accepted to mean the process of awareness or thought Examples include listening carefully to what someone is saying while ignoring other conversations in a room (the cocktail party effect) or listening to a cell phone conversation while driving a car. The cocktail party effect describes the ability to focus one's listening attention on a single talker among a mixture of conversations and background noises ignoring other conversations ^[1] Sometimes attention shifts to matters unrelated to the external environment, a phenomenon referred to as mind-wandering or "spontaneous thought". See also Daydreaming and Attention. Mind-wandering (sometimes referred to as task unrelated thought) is a topic in Experimental psychology Attention is one of the most intensely studied topics within psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Psychology (from Greek grc ψῡχή psȳkhē, "breath life soul" and grc -λογία -logia) is an Academic and Cognitive neuroscience is an academic field concerned with the scientific study of biological substrate underlying Cognition, with a specific focus on the neural substrates

William James, in his monumental Principles of Psychology (1890), remarked:

History of the study of attention

1850s to 1900s

In James' time, the method more commonly used to study attention was introspection. Introspection is the self-observation and reporting of Conscious inner Thoughts desires and Sensations It is a conscious mental and usually However, as early as 1858, Franciscus Donders used mental chronometry to study attention and it was considered a major field of intellectual inquiry by such diverse authors as Sigmund Freud, Walter Benjamin, and Max Nordau. Franciscus Cornelis Donders ( Tilburg, May 27, 1818 - Utrecht, March 24, 1889) was a Dutch Ophthalmologist Mental chronometry is the use of response time in perceptual-motor tasks to infer the content duration and temporal sequencing of cognitive operations Sigmund Freud (ˈziːkmʊnt ˈfʁɔʏt born Sigismund Shlomo Freud (May 6 1856 &ndash September 23 1939 was an Austrian Psychiatrist who founded Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin ( July 15, 1892 &ndash September 27, 1940) was a German - Jewish Marxist Max Simon Nordau ( July 29, 1849 - January 23, 1923) born Simon Maximilian Südfeld, Südfeld Simon Miksa in Pest One major debate in this period was whether it was possible to attend to two things at once (split attention). Walter Benjamin described this experience as "reception in a state of distraction. " This disagreement could only be resolved through experimentation.

1950s to present

In the 1950s, research psychologists renewed their interest in attention when the dominant epistemology shifted from positivism (i. Mental health professional A psychologist is a practitioner of Psychology, the systematic investigation of the mind including Behavior, Cognition, e. , behaviorism) to realism during what has come to be known as the "cognitive revolution" ^[3] The cognitive revolution admitted unobservable cognitive processes like attention as legitimate objects of scientific study. Contemporary philosophical realism is the belief in a Reality that is completely Ontologically independent of our conceptual schemes linguistic practices beliefs The " cognitive revolution " is the name for an intellectual movement in the 1950s that began what are known collectively as the Cognitive sciences It began in the modern

Colin Cherry and Donald Broadbent, among others, performed experiments on dichotic listening. Donald Eric Broadbent ( Birmingham, 1926 - April 10 1993) was an influential English experimental psychologist. In Cognitive psychology, dichotic listening is a procedure commonly used to investigate Selective attention in the Auditory system. In a typical experiment, subjects would use a set of headphones to listen to two streams of words in different ears and selectively attend to one stream. Headphones (also known as earphones, earbuds, stereophones, headsets) are a pair of small Loudspeakers or less commonly a single The ear is the sense organ that detects Sounds The Vertebrate ear shows a common biology from Fish to Humans with variations After the task, the experimenter would question the subjects about the content of the unattended stream.

During this period, the major debate was between early-selection models and late-selection models. In the early selection models (first proposed by Donald Broadbent and Anne Treisman), attention shuts down or attenuates processing in the unattended ear before the mind can analyze its semantic content. Donald Eric Broadbent ( Birmingham, 1926 - April 10 1993) was an influential English experimental psychologist. Anne Treisman FRS (born September 2, 1935 in Wakefield, Yorkshire) is a Psychologist, working currently at Princeton In the late selection models (first proposed by J. Anthony Deutsch and Diana Deutsch), the content in both ears is analyzed semantically, but the words in the unattended ear cannot access consciousness. Diana Deutsch is a perceptual and cognitive Psychologist, born in London England. This debate has still not been resolved.

Anne Treisman developed the highly influential feature integration theory^[4]. Anne Treisman FRS (born September 2, 1935 in Wakefield, Yorkshire) is a Psychologist, working currently at Princeton The feature integration theory, developed by Treisman, a professor at Princeton University 's Department of Psychology, and Gelade since the early 1980s According to this model, attention binds different features of an object (e. g. , color and shape) into consciously experienced wholes. Although this model has received much criticism, it is still widely accepted or held up with modifications as in Jeremy Wolfe's Guided Search Theory. ^[5]

In the 1960s, Robert Wurtz at the National Institutes of Health began recording electrical signals from the brains of macaques who were trained to perform attentional tasks. "NIH" redirects here For other meanings of NIH see NIH (disambiguation. The macaques (məˈkæk constitute a genus ( Macaca, /məˈkækə/ of Old World monkeys of the subfamily Cercopithecinae. These experiments showed for the first time that there was a direct neural correlate of a mental process (namely, enhanced firing in the superior colliculus). A neural correlate of a content of experience is any bodily component such as an electro-neuro-biological state or the state assumed by some biophysical subsystem The superior colliculus ( Latin, higher hill) is a paired structure that is part of the Brain 's tectal area.

In the 1990s, psychologists began using PET and later fMRI to image the brain in attentive tasks. Positron emission tomography ( PET) is a Nuclear medicine imaging technique which produces a three-dimensional image or map of functional processes in the Functional MRI or functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI is a type of specialized MRI scan Because of the highly expensive equipment that was generally only available in hospitals, psychologists sought for cooperation with neurologists. Pioneers of brain imaging studies of selective attention are psychologist Michael I. Posner (then already renown for his seminal work on visual selective attention) and neurologist Marcus Raichle. Michael I Posner (born September 12, 1936) is the editor of numerous cognitive and Neuroscience compilations and is an eminent researcher in Their results soon sparked interest from the entire neuroscience community in these psychological studies, which had until then focused on monkey brains. With the development of these technological innovations neuroscientists became interested in this type of research that combines sophisticated experimental paradigms from cognitive psychology with these new brain imaging techniques. Neuroscience is a field devoted to the scientific study of the nervous system Cognitive psychology is a branch of Psychology that investigates internal mental processes such as problem solving memory and language Although the older technique of EEG had long been to study the brain activity underlying selective attention by cognitive psychophysiologists, the ability of the newer techniques to actually measure precisely localized activity inside the brain generated renewed interest by a wider community of researchers. Psychophysiology (from Greek grc ψῡχή psȳkhē, "breath life soul" grc φύσις physis, "nature origin" and grc -λογία The results of these experiments have shown a broad agreement with the psychological, psychophysiological and monkey literature.

Current research

Attention remains a major area of investigation within education, psychology and neuroscience. Education encompasses both the Teaching and Learning of Knowledge, proper conduct, and technical competency Psychology (from Greek grc ψῡχή psȳkhē, "breath life soul" and grc -λογία -logia) is an Academic and Neuroscience is a field devoted to the scientific study of the nervous system Many of the major debates of James' time remain unresolved. For example, although most scientists accept that attention can be split, strong proof has remained elusive. And there is still no widely accepted definition of attention more concrete than that given in the James quote above. This lack of progress has led many observers to speculate that attention refers to many separate processes without a common mechanism.

Areas of active investigation involve determining the source of the signals that generate attention, the effects of these signals on the tuning properties of sensory neurons, and the relationship between attention and other cognitive processes like working memory. Neuronal tuning refers to the property of brain cells to selectively represent a particular kind of sensory motor or cognitive information Neurons (ˈnjuːɹɒn also known as neurones and nerve cells) are responsive cells in the Nervous system that process and transmit information Working memory (also referred to as Short term memory, depending on the specific theory is a theoretical construct within Cognitive psychology that refers to the A relatively new body of research is investigating the phenomenon of traumatic brain injuries and their effects on attention. Traumatic brain injury (TBI also called intracranial injury, occurs when Physical trauma injures the Brain. TBIs are a fairly common occurrence in a significant segment of the population and often result in diminished attention.

Clinical model of attention

Clinical models frequently differ from investigation models. Neuropsychology is the applied scientific discipline that studies the structure and function of the Brain related to specific psychological processes and overt behaviors A brain-computer interface (BCI sometimes called a direct neural interface or a brain-machine interface, is a direct communication pathway between a human or animal Traumatic brain injury (TBI also called intracranial injury, occurs when Physical trauma injures the Brain. Anatomical regions of the brain are listed vertically following hierarchies that are standard in Neuroanatomy. Clinical neuropsychology is a sub-specialty of clinical Psychology that specialises in the diagnostic assessment and treatment of patients with Brain injury or Cognitive neuroscience is an academic field concerned with the scientific study of biological substrate underlying Cognition, with a specific focus on the neural substrates The human brain controls the Central nervous system (CNS by way of the Cranial nerves and Spinal cord, the Peripheral nervous system (PNS Neuroanatomy is the science for localizing function in the Human brain. Neurophysiology (from Greek grc νεῦρον neuron, "nerve" grc φύσις physis, "nature origin" and grc -λογία Phrenology (from Greek: φρήν phrēn, "mind" and λόγος Logos, "knowledge" is a defunct field of study once The human brain controls the Central nervous system (CNS by way of the Cranial nerves and Spinal cord, the Peripheral nervous system (PNS Wikipedia articles related to Brain Function Visual system Auditory system Olfactory system Arousal is a physiological and psychological state of being awake Consciousness has been defined loosely as a constellation of attributes of Mind such as Subjectivity, Self-awareness, Sentience, and the Decision making can be regarded as an outcome of mental processes ( cognitive process) leading to the selection of a course of action among several alternatives The executive system is a theorized Cognitive system in Psychology that controls and manages other cognitive processes In the Philosophy of language, a natural language (or ordinary language) is a Language that is spoken or written in phonemic-alphabetic or phonemically-related In the fields of Neuropsychology, Personal development and Education, Learning is one of the most important Mental function of humans In Psychology, memory is an organism's ability to store retain and subsequently retrieve information Gross motor coordination addresses the Gross motor skills walking running climbing jumping crawling lifting one's head sitting up etc In Psychology and the Cognitive sciences perception is the process of attaining awareness or understanding of sensory Information. Planning in Organizations and Public policy is both the organizational process of creating and maintaining a Plan; and the psychological process of Problem solving forms part of thinking. Considered the most complex of all intellectual functions problem solving has been defined as higher-order Cognitive Thought and thinking are mental forms and Processes respectively ("thought" is both David Joseph Bohm ( December 20 1917, Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania – October 27 1992, London) was an American António Rosa Damásio, GOSE, pron. ɐ̃'tɔniu dɐ'maziu (ɐ̃'tɔniu dɐ'maziu (b Phineas P Gage (July 9? 1823 – May 21? 1860 was a railroad worker now remembered for his incredible survival of a Traumatic brain injury which destroyed one or both of Norman Geschwind (1926-1984 can be considered the father of modern Behavioral neurology in America Elkhonon Goldberg (b 1946 Riga, Latvia) is a Neuropsychologist and Cognitive neuroscientist known for his work in hemispheric specialization Donald Olding Hebb ( July 22, 1904 &ndash August 20, 1985) was a Canadian Psychologist who was influential in the area of Neuropsychology Kenneth M Heilman is an American Behavioral neurologist. Biography Early life and career Kenneth Heilman was born and raised in Brooklyn Muriel Deutsch Lezak is an American neuropsychologist best known for her book Neuropsychological Assessment, widely accepted as the standard in the field Benjamin Libet ( April 12, 1916 - July 23, 2007) was a researcher in the Physiology department of the University of California Rodolfo R Llinás (b Bogotá, Colombia in 1934 is the Thomas and Suzanne Murphy Professor of Neuroscience and Chairman of the department of Physiology & Neuroscience Alexander Romanovich Luria Александр Романович Лурия ( July 16, 1902 - August 14, 1977) was a famous Soviet Dr Brenda Milner CC FRS (born 15 July 1918, Manchester England) has contributed extensively to the research literature Karl H Pribram (born February 25, 1919 in Vienna Austria) is a professor at Georgetown University and George Mason University Oliver Wolf Sacks, CBE (born July 9, 1933, London is a British Neurologist residing in the United States who has written popular books about Roger Wolcott Sperry ( August 20, 1913 – April 17, 1994) was a neuropsychologist, neurobiologist and Nobel laureate who KC (Also known as Patient KC) is a famous patient in Neuropsychology who suffers from Anterograde amnesia and temporally graded Retrograde amnesia Neuropsychological tests are specifically designed tasks used to measure a psychological function known to be linked to a particular Brain structure or pathway The Bender Visual Motor Gestalt Test, or simply the Bender-Gestalt test, is a Psychological test first developed by child Neuropsychiatrist Lauretta The Benton Visual Retention Test (or simply Benton Test) is an individually administered test for ages 8-adult that measures Visual perception and Visual memory The Clinical Dementia Rating or CDR is a numeric scale used to quantify the severity of Symptoms of Dementia (i A Continuous Performance Task/Test, or CPT, is a Psychological test which measures a person's sustained and selective Attention and impulsivity The Glasgow Coma Scale or GCS, sometimes also known as the Glasgow Coma Score is a neurological scale which aims to give a reliable objective The Hayling and Brixton tests are Neuropsychological tests of Executive function created by psychologists Paul W The lexical decision task is a procedure used in many Psychology and Psycholinguistics experiments The mini-mental state examination ( MMSE) or Folstein test is a brief 30-point questionnaire test that is used to assess Cognition. Demonstration Say aloud the colors of each of these words as fast Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS is a general test of intelligence ( IQ) published in February 1955 as a revision of the Wechsler - Bellevue test The Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST is a Neuropsychological test of "set-shifting" i A Johari window is a cognitive psychological tool created by Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham in 1955 in the United States used to help people better understand This is the case of attention models. One of the most used models for the evaluation of attention in patients with very different neurologic pathologies is the model of Sohlberg and Mateer. ^[6] This hierarchic model is based in the recovering of attention processes of brain damage patients after coma. Brain damage, or Acquired brain injury, is the destruction or degeneration of Brain cells. In Medicine, a coma (from the Greek koma, meaning deep sleep is a profound state of Unconsciousness. Five different kinds of activities of growing difficulty are described in the model; connecting with the activities that patients could do as their recovering process advanced.

• Focused attention: This is the ability to respond discretely to specific visual, auditory or tactile stimuli.
• Sustained attention: This refers to the ability to maintain a consistent behavioral response during continuous and repetitive activity.
• Selective attention: : This level of attention refers to the capacity to maintain a behavioral or cognitive set in the face of distracting or competing stimuli. Therefore it incorporates the notion of "freedom from distractibility"
• Alternating attention: it refers to the capacity for mental flexibility that allows individuals to shift their focus of attention and move between tasks having different cognitive requirements.
• Divided attention: This is the highest level of attention and it refers to the ability to respond simultaneously to multiple tasks or multiple task demands.

This model has been shown to be very useful in evaluating attention in very different pathologies, correlates strongly with daily difficulties and is especially helpful in designing stimulation programmes such as APT (attention process training), a rehabilitation programme for neurologic patients of the same authors.

Overt and covert attention

Attention may be differentiated according to its status as 'overt' versus 'covert' ^[7]. Overt attention is the act of directing sense organs towards a stimulus source. Senses are the physiological methods of Perception. The senses and their operation classification and theory are overlapping topics studied by a variety of fields Covert attention is the act of mentally focusing on one of several possible sensory stimuli. Covert attention is thought to be a neural process that enhances the signal from a particular part of the sensory panorama.

There are studies that suggest the mechanisms of overt and covert attention may not be as separate as previously believed. Though humans and primates can look in one direction but attend in another, there may be an underlying neural circuitry that links shifts in covert attention to plans to shift gaze. For example, if individuals attend to the right hand corner field of view, movement of the eyes in that direction may have to be actively suppressed.

The current view is that visual covert attention is a mechanism for quickly scanning the field of view for interesting locations. This shift in covert attention is linked to eye movement circuitry that sets up a slower saccade to that location. A saccade is a fast movement of an eye, head or other part of an animal's body or device

Executive attention

Inevitably situations arise where it is advantageous to have cognition independent of incoming sensory data or motor responses. There is a general consensus in psychology that there is an executive system based in the frontal cortex that controls our thoughts and actions to produce coherent behavior. This function is often referred to as executive function, executive attention, or cognitive control. ^[8]

No exact definition has been agreed upon. However, typical descriptions involve maintaining behavioral goals, and using these goals as a basis for choosing what aspects of the environment to attend to and which action to select.

Neural correlates of attention

Most experiments show that one neural correlate of attention is enhanced firing. A neural correlate of a content of experience is any bodily component such as an electro-neuro-biological state or the state assumed by some biophysical subsystem If a neuron has a certain response to a stimulus when the animal is not attending to the stimulus, then when the animal does attend to the stimulus, the neuron's response will be enhanced even if the physical characteristics of the stimulus remain the same.

In a recent review, Knudsen^[9] describes a more general model which identifies four core processes of attention, with working memory at the center:

• Working memory temporarily stores information for detailed analysis. Working memory (also referred to as Short term memory, depending on the specific theory is a theoretical construct within Cognitive psychology that refers to the Working memory (also referred to as Short term memory, depending on the specific theory is a theoretical construct within Cognitive psychology that refers to the
• Competitive selection is the process that determines which information gains access to working memory.
• Through top-down sensitivity control, higher cognitive processes can regulate signal intensity in information channels that compete for access to working memory, and thus give them an advantage in the process of competitive selection. Through top-down sensitivity control, the momentary content of working memory can influence the selection of new information, and thus mediate voluntary control of attention in a recurrent loop.
• Bottom-up saliency filters automatically enhance the response to infrequent stimuli, or stimuli of instinctive or learned biological relevance.

Neurally, at different hierarchical levels spatial maps can enhance or inhibit activity in sensory areas, and induce orienting behaviors like eye movement.

• At the top of the hierarchy, the frontal eye fields (FEF) on the dorsolateral frontal cortex contain a retinocentric spacial map. The frontal eye fields (FEF is a region located in the Premotor cortex, which is part of the frontal cortex of the primate Brain. The frontal lobe is an area in the Brain of Mammals It is located at the front of each Cerebral hemisphere and positioned anterior to (in front of the Microstimulation in the FEF induces monkeys to make a saccade to the relevant location. A saccade is a fast movement of an eye, head or other part of an animal's body or device Stimulation at levels too low to induce a saccade will nonetheless enhance cortical responses to stimuli located in the relevant area.
• At the next lower level, a variety of spacial maps are found in the parietal cortex. The parietal lobe is a lobe in the Brain. It is positioned above (superior to the Occipital lobe and behind (posterior to the Frontal lobe. In particular, the lateral intraparietal area (LIP) contains a saliency map and is interconnected both with the FEF and with sensory areas.
• Certain automatic responses that influence attention, like orienting to a highly salient stimulus, are mediated subcortically by the superior colliculi. The superior colliculus ( Latin, higher hill) is a paired structure that is part of the Brain 's tectal area.
• At the neural network level, it is thought that processes like lateral inhibition mediate the process of competitive selection.

References

See also

• Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder
• Attention versus memory in prefrontal cortex
• Binding problem
• Cognitive control
• Change blindness
• Dot-probe paradigm
• Emotion and memory
• Feature integration theory
• Inattentional blindness
• Neural mechanisms behind shifts of attention
• Split attention effect
• Visual Search
• Weapon focus

Further reading