Broadbents Filter Model of Attention vs Treismans Attenuation Model Theory - Essay Example

? How does Treisman’s Model of Attention differ from Broadbent’s? What evidence did Treisman Provide to Support his View? Date How does Treisman’s Model of Attention differ from Broadbent’s? What evidence did Treisman Provide to Support his View? Broadbent’s Filter Model of Attention The filter model of attention was first developed by Broadbent based on research work that had been conducted by Cherry. According to Goldstein (2007), Cherry had already shown that it was possible for a listener to be able to select and subsequently pay attention to only one message while ignoring all the other messages. This experiment by Cherry is often referred to as a cocktail phenomenon mainly due to the fact that it resembles the common characteristic and trend exhibited by people while at a noisy party. Broadbent proposed the filter model of attention in an attempt to try and describe exactly how this selection is achieved (Hayes, 2005). The theory proposed by Broadbent attempted to try and explain why it is not possible for people to be able to properly focus on two different streams of information that might be coming in simultaneously. A number of research studies and observations designed to focus on listening tasks have been able to show that although it is quite possible for people to be able to properly attend to one thing, people are however unable to attend to two different things at the very same time. It was this aspect of human nature that caused Broadbent to suggest that there might be the presence of an active filter that essentially serves to help us effectively block out any ignored information, and thereby allowing on the information that is currently being attended to be able to enter our awareness. The filter proposed by Broadbent works by only selecting some certain specific parts of information such-only the black items for example- and subsequently allows these items to be able to pass through and ensuring that it blocks out the rest (Friedenberg, 2012). The primary criteria employed in the selection of information as proposed in Broadbent’s filter model is primarily found to be any of several available sets of stimulus characteristics such as shape and color. The information that has been allowed by the filter to pass through it subsequently undergoes a process of pattern recognition once it has passed through the filter and after which it then travels through any established section mechanisms that might be present and passes into a short-term memory store. The information is then held for a relatively short period of time while it is in this store and is later on made available for any subsequent processing and response. Broadbent’s proposed filter selection model is variously referred to essentially being an early selection model as its filter functions by screening out information before this information can be recognized (Weisberg and Reeves, 2013). Treisman’s Attenuation Model Theory The Treisman Attenuation theory is found to have a number of similar aspects to the filter theory that had been initially developed by Broadbent. However, Anne Treisman developed the theory in as she did not agree with the filter theory in at least one respect. Anne Treisman proposed that as opposed to the unattended messages being completely blocked of by the individual, the filter tends to instead weaken or attenuate these messages. The process of message attenuation can be likened to having water equally running through two different faucets. These two faucets can be perceived to basically be constituting of two different information channels. While the faucet responding to the unattended channel would be set to be only partially open and as such only serving to allow a very little amount of water to pass through it, the faucet corresponding to the shadowed message would be set to be open all the way and thus allowing a considerably greater volume of water to pass through it (Friedenberg and Silverman, 2012). By using the attenuation theory, Treisman sought to try and explain exactly how the stimuli that happens to be unattended sometimes came to be thoroughly processed in a manner that can be deemed to be more vigorous than that which can sufficiently be accounted for in Broadbent’s filter model. By proposing that filters filtered information by using a process of attenuation as opposed to totally barring the information from being processed, the Attenuation theory is seen to fundamentally be causing filter theory proposed by Broadbent to become increasingly more complicated. By using this attenuation theory, it becomes quite possible for any number of unattended stimuli to be attenuated although this might possibly be achieved with some considerable degree of difficulty. If stimuli happens to still possess a sufficient degree of strength although this stimuli might have resulted from irrelevant input; it is still quite possible to extract meaningful information from this input (Friedenberg and Silverman, 2012). Treisman’s opposition to Broadbent’s Filter Wolfe and Robertson (2012), point out that the initial concept proposed by Broadbent Filter model had appeared to be too powerful that it was evidently certainly to go wrong. Broadbent’s early-selection filter model appeared to be quite straightforward and simple, with its view that perception actually had a very limited capacity and it was thus necessary for there to be an early attention filter to help protect this limited system from any possibility of experiencing any interference from irrelevant information or an overload. The filter theory proposed by Broadbent had at first appeared to help explain some of lab demonstrations that people normally fail to notice as they are perceived to be in the unattended channel although some of them might be as peculiar as speech being switched from German to English and subsequently back again or even being played backwards. Or even when someone might seem to fail to hear what you are saying as they read the newspaper. The simply, falsifiable and bold nature of Broadbent’s model was seen to be responsible for ultimately leading to its failure as its proposal of there being an attentional filter that effectively allowed all the information or none at all to pass through could not explain how it is possible to sometimes perceive unattended information beyond the level of simple physical features. A number of subsequent research projects also showed that it was at times possible in some circumstances to be able to perceive the semantic content of unattended information (Pashler and Yantis, 2002; Velmans and Schneider, 2007). Another key aspect of Treisman’s opposition to Broadbent’s filter model is that the filter model as developed by Broadbent did not in any way try to account for the time requirements of shifting attention. While Broadbent did indeed point out that both the external and internal stimuli can indeed cause attention shifts, he did not factor into consideration that both the externally and internally driven attention shifts can indeed have greatly differing time courses. It is to this end that Treisman opposed the filter theory by postulating that as opposed to having a filter, people essentially have an attenuator that serves to try and identify messages primarily based on either their higher level characteristic an example of which might be the meaning of the messages or even by the physical properties of the messages. While Broadbent’s filter theory proposed that unattended messages are effectively blocked by the filter and as such people could not be able to make meaningful connections using these blocked messages, Treisman’s attenuation theory postulates that these unattended messages can in essence be perceived but they are however perceived at a much lower strength and this primarily explains why people were able to at times make meaningful connections using these unattended messages (Wolfe and Robertson, 2012). According to Treisman, different words are seen to have varied chances of effectively making it through the unattended channel primarily due to its threshold effect with a threshold being the minimum amount of activation needs to be present so as to be able to produce any conscious awareness of a stimulus (Friedenberg and Silverman, 2012). Treisman’s Evidence in Support of the Attenuation Theory Treisman conduced an experiment where the subjects were supposed to make a make a tapping response to various target words in the stream while attempting to shadow all the words for mteh attended stream. The results of this experiment greatly supported Treisman’s postulations as as compared to the 8.1 percent of the target words detected in the non-shadowed stream, the participants were able to detect an impressive 86.5 percent of the target words that were in the main shadowed stream. It was thus clear that inattention to the non-shadowed stream as a result of focusing on the shadowed stream served to severely reduce the general availability of the target-defining stream. This can be seen to lend critical support to Treisman’s refined early-selection approach (Wolfe and Robertson, 2012). Bibliography Friedenberg, J. 2012. Visual Attention and Consciousness. Psychology Press. Friedenberg, J. and Silverman, G., 2012. Cognitive science : an introduction to the study of mind. Thousand Oaks, Calif. : SAGE,. Goldstein, B. E., 2007. Cognitive psychology : connecting mind, research and everyday experience. Australia ; Belmont, CA : Thomson/Wadsworth. Hayes, N., 2005. Foundations of psychology. London : Thomson learning. Pashler, H. and Yantis, S., 2002. Sensation and perception. New York, NY Wiley. Velmans, M. and Schneider, S., 2007. The Blackwell companion to consciousness. Malden, MA ; Oxford : Blackwell Pub. Weisberg, W. R. and Reeves, L., 2013. Cognition: from memory to creativity. Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons. Wolfe, M. J. and Robertson, C. L. 2012. From perception to consciousness : searching with Anne Treisman. Oxford ; New York, NY : Oxford University Press. Read More