Theories of Visual and Auditory Attention

2408 Words5 Pages

A popular subject within psychology is that of selective attention, particularly visual, auditory or visual and auditory attention (Driver, 2001). There are many theories of visual and auditory attention that provide us with a greater understanding of the ways in which humans attend to different stimuli (Driver, 2001), such as Broadbent’s (1958) filter theory of attention for example. This essay will compare and contrast theories of visual and auditory attention as well as discussing how well these theories explain how we attend to objects. The essay will consist of three auditory attention theories of Broadbent’s filter theory, Treisman’s (1964) attenuation theory, and Deutsch and Deutsch’s (1963) late selection model of attention; and two models of visual attention known as the spotlight model, such as Treisman and Gelade’s (1980) feature integration model, and the zoom-lens model of visual attention (see Styles, 2006).

Broadbent’s (1958) filter theory of attention proposes that there is a filter device between sensory identification and short-term memory. This filter is used as a buffer that allows an individual to manage several different forms of simultaneous stimuli where one stimulus is processed in the filter whilst the second stimulus is kept in the buffer to be processed at a later time (Broadbent, 1958). The extent to which this theory of attention can provide an effective explanation of how we attend to objects is questionable due to the fact that Broadbent’s filter theory is designed to explain auditory attention as opposed to visual attention. In this sense, Broadbent’s filter theory cannot explain how we attend to objects and thus provides no useful information for such attention. An object was making a sound co...

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...isual attention within and around the field of focal attention: A zoom lens model. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 40(4): 225-240.

Massaro, D. W. & Warner, D. S. (1977). Dividing attention between auditory and visual perception. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, 21(6): 569-574.

Muller, N. G., Bartelt, O. A., Donner, T. H., Villringer, A. & Brandt, S. A. (2003). A physiological correlate of the “zoom lens” of visual attention. The Journal of Neuroscience, 23(9): 3561-3565.

Shinn-Cunningham, B. G. (2008). Object-based auditory and visual attention. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12(5): 182-186.

Styles, E. A. (2006). The Psychology of Attention. (2nd Edition). East Sussex: Psychology Press.

Treisman, A. (1964). Monitoring and storage of irrelevant messages in selective attention. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behaviour, 3(6): 449-459.

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