Attention and Consciousness Flashcards

1
Q

what is attention?

A

the narrowing of awareness to a particular part of the sensory environment

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2
Q

what is consciousness more alike to?

A

awareness of awareness

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3
Q

attention tends to be…

A

top-down and takes time to focus on a part of the sensory world

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4
Q

consciousness provides…

A

a summary of all information that is relevant to the situation

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5
Q

describe the 3 main points of automatic processes:

A
  • can be performed with little focused attention and occur unconsciously
    -may be innate, or the result of training
    -bottom-up, driven by sensory input
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6
Q

describe conscious operations:

A

-require focused attention
-top-down, requiring cognitive input and control

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7
Q

given the different types of processing and input, what is likely about automatic and conscious processes?

A

it is likely that automatic and conscious processes rely on different brain circuitry, possibly including the circuits related to consciousness

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8
Q

what are some examples of automatic visual search?

A

addition of a vertical line or the use of bold type

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9
Q

what is true about searches that require a combination of multiple features?

A

slower, and require a serial search

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10
Q

what is feature search?

A

a strategy for scanning the environment for an object with a specific combination of features

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11
Q

within feature search, what takes place at the level of V1?

A

-object visually perceived in V1 is broken down into features, to be processed serially by higher visual areas

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12
Q

in Treisman’s model of feature search, what are the 4 feature maps?

A

color, orientation, size, and stereo distance

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13
Q

patients were able to identify ____ faces more rapidly than _______ faces

A

sad, happy. and this was true when the stimuli were right side up, upside down, or abstract representations of “sad”

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14
Q

experiments to test the effects of focus of attention must what?

A

-use the same stimulus in all conditions

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15
Q

what is the apparent division of the visual attention systems?

A

-one selecting stimuli and another selecting and directing movements

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16
Q

what do priority maps do and where are these usually found?

A

-priority maps encode stimulus location in terms of the behavioural significance, and are found in frontal eye fields, lateral intraparietal area, and superior colliculus

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17
Q

true or false, a neuron can learn to respond selectively to information in its receptive field.

A

true

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18
Q

what is the downside to dividing attention between multiple tasks?

A

mental capacity is limited, so dividing attention between multiple tasks can divide that limited resource and cause all tasks to be performed with lower efficiency

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19
Q

what is true about cells in V4?

A

can be selective about what they respond to

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20
Q

what happens in V4 when animals discriminate between lines of similar orientation?

A

performance accuracy decreases, indicating the task is harder, and activity of cells in V4 increases and the cells become more selective in what they respond to

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21
Q

what is the role of cells in the pulvinar?

A

they project throughout the cortex and may help direct the attentional spotlight

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22
Q

what can the visual system do if there is only one object in the attentional spotlight?

A

visual systems can bind all the properties together

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23
Q

what happens if multiple objects occupy the spotlight?

A

cells in area TE seem to process different objects in parallel to differentiate between them, but how this is done is not clear

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24
Q

attention needs to be divided across _______ ________ for multisensory stimuli

A

sensory modalities

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25
Q

what happens when attention is directed to one of the sensory modalities?

A

activity increases in the relevant cortical areas

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26
Q

what happens when attention is divided between two modalities?

A

there are no changes in the individual sensory areas, but an increase in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex

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27
Q

in a functional-brain-imaging study looking at attention, what happened when the patient attended to the moving light stimulus?

A

increased activity in the posterior parietal cortex

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28
Q

in a functional-brain-imaging study looking at attention, what happened when the moving light was in the left or right visual fields respectively?

A

if in left: only right parietal cortex active
if in right: bilateral parietal cortex was active

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29
Q

a functional brain imaging study that had a selective attention condition and a divided attention condition found that….

A

different types of attention recruited different brain areas

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30
Q

attentional tasks activate…

A

anterior cingulate, prefrontal cortex, and specific sensory areas

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31
Q

in a shifting-attention condition, which part of the brain is activated when the stimulus is in the right visual field?

A

left parietal love

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32
Q

in a shifting-attention condition, which part of the brain is activated when the stimulus is in either visual field?

A

the right parietal lobe

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33
Q

the attentional system is distinct from what?

A

the sensory areas that process information

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34
Q

what are the three different networks supporting attention?

A

alerting network, orienting network, and executive network

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35
Q

which structures make up the alerting network?

A

locus coeruleus, frontal and parietal cortex

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36
Q

what is the modulator of the alerting network?

A

norepinephrine

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37
Q

which structures make up the orienting network?

A

superior parietal, temporal parietal junction, frontal eye fields, superior colliculus, pulvinar

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38
Q

what is the modulator of the orienting network?

A

acetylcholine

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39
Q

which structures make up the executive network?

A

anterior cingulate, anterior insula, and basal ganglia

40
Q

what is the modulator of the executive network?

A

dopamine

41
Q

what is the role of the ascending reticular activating system from the midbrain?

A

maintains alertness

42
Q

where doe noradrenergic neurons project from?

A

the locus coeruleus to the forebrain

43
Q

what is the role of the alerting network in attention?

A

alerts the prefrontal and posterior parietal cortex to rapidly process and respond to stimuli

44
Q

what does activity in the alerting network do?

A

suppresses processing in other cerebral networks

45
Q

what does the orienting network do?

A

prioritizes one sensory modality over the others or a particular location in space

46
Q

describe the dorsal orienting network:

A

-involves the frontal eye fields and intraparietal sulcus
-strongly right lateralized
-directs attention toward a specific object in a top-down process

47
Q

describe the ventral orienting network:

A

-involves the temporoparietal junction, ventral frontal cortex, and pulvinar
-synchronizes activity with bottom-up incoming sensory information

48
Q

dorsal attention system is:

A

top down visuospatial

49
Q

ventral attention system is:

A

bottom -up reorienting

50
Q

frontoparietal control system is:

A

moment to moment task

51
Q

cingulo-opercular system is:

A

task set maintenance

52
Q

two executive networks work via top-down influences. what are those networks?

A

dorsolateral-prefrontal cortex-parietal network and anterior cingulate/medial frontal-anterior insula network

53
Q

when is the dorsolateral-prefrontal cortex-parietal network active?

A

at the beginning of a task

54
Q

when is the anterior cingulate/medial frontal-anterior insula network active?

A

throughout the duration of the task

55
Q

activity in areas within a network is…

A

highly correlated

56
Q

activity is ______ ______ between the two executive networks

A

not correlated

57
Q

controlling cognition and emotions is a form of…

A

self control

58
Q

self control is associated with activity where?

A

in the lateral prefrontal and cingulate regions

59
Q

what changes the structure and gene expression patterns of the prefrontal cortex?

A

stress

60
Q

what happens when stress changes the structure and gene expression patterns of the prefrontal cortex?

A

leads to deficits in cognitive control of emotion that are associated with neuropsychiatric conditions

61
Q

how does psychosocial stress impair the performance of medical students on attentional tasks?

A

by decreasing activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate, premotor, and posterior parietal cortices

62
Q

which disorders are associated with the alerting network?

A

aging, adhd

63
Q

which disorders are associated with the orienting network?

A

autism, ptsd, neglect

64
Q

which disorders are associated with the executive network?

A

anxiety disorders, depression, ocd, personality disorder, schizophrenia, and substance abuse

65
Q

what is one hypothesis of how the attention systems direct attention?

A

the attention system induces synchrony between neurons that assess the sensory signal,
-the timing of APs is adjusted to have the input from two neurons arrive at the target at the same time and be summed, increasing the chance of an AP in the post-synaptic cell

66
Q

during an attention-demanding task, there was _______ ________ in the dorsal executive attention network and ______ ______ in the default network

A

increased activity, decreased activity

67
Q

what does attention increase within the brain?

A

synchrony

68
Q

when synchronous outputs from the same neurons summate on one, this leads to…..

A

larger EPSPs, which in turn leads to larger action potentials

69
Q

when distracted by a counting task, what % of people failed to notice a researcher in a gorilla suit walk through the middle of a basketball game?

A

70%

70
Q

what is change blindness?

A

when subjects routinely fail to notice changes in the environment if they are not expecting them

71
Q

in cases of change blindness, are the unattended items detected at all?

A

yes, detected by the sensory systems but are filtered out before conscious awareness

72
Q

patients with damage to what do not attend to the left side of space around them?

A

the right temporoparietal junction

73
Q

objects in the right visual field can be attended to by what?

A

the left or the right parietal lobe

74
Q

objects in the left visual field are attended to by what?

A

the right parietal lobe ONLY

75
Q

how can one improve their sensory neglect of the left side of space?

A

using a prism to shift objects from left visual field to the right

76
Q

what can consciousness be defined as

A

the level of responsiveness of the mind to impressions made by the senses

77
Q

when might conscious awareness of a movement occur?

A

only after the movement is complete

78
Q

is it possible to dissociate behaviour and conscious awareness?

A

yes

79
Q

what theory attempts to explain consciousness?

A

integrated information theory

80
Q

what are the points under integrated information theory?

A

-consciousness exists
-consciousness is structured and composed of multiple distinctions between the phenomena we observe
-consciousness is composed of specific information, and each experience is distinct from other experiences
-consciousness is unified and cannot be broken up into multiple subparts
-consciousness is made up of individual experiences that are separated from other conscious experiences by cause-and-effect relationships

81
Q

how has the integrated information theory been applied in practice?

A

to explain the different forms of consciousness in clinical patients

82
Q

what does conscious require the interaction of?

A

sensory areas, memory, and likely other systems such as emotion and executive function

83
Q

what does conscious include?

A

arousal, perception, attention, and working memory

84
Q

how does binding work and what is it important for?

A

thought to work by synchronizing the activity in the relevant networks for a short period of time (likely important to unify arousal, perception, attention and working memory)

85
Q

what do studies of perceiving and responding to faces show patterns of?

A

synchronous activity, followed by asynchronous activity, and finally synchronous activity

86
Q

what are the essential neural regions for consciousness

A

unknown at this time

87
Q

which areas of the brain are all inactive when a person is unconscious?

A

dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, medial frontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex, and posterior cingulate cortex

88
Q

what areas of the brain are active during a quiet resting conscious state?

A

a network of frontoparietal areas

89
Q

what have researchers found to be true of patients in a coma or vegetative state?

A

they still produce brain activity in response to verbal commands, such as imagining they are playing tennis or walking around their home

90
Q

what do studies of clinical patients and neuroimaging studies suggest?

A

that there is a bilateral region of the parietal lobe that is necessary for consciousness, but no necessary area in the frontal lobe

91
Q

what area of the brain is the region that some researchers think is responsible for binding information and why?

A

the claustrum, because it receives connections from nearly the entire cortex

92
Q

there is overlap in the brain regions associated with consciousness and those associated with self awareness. these regions are:

A

medial frontal cortex
posterior cingulate cortex

93
Q

in what sort of experimental atmosphere can nonconscious emotions be demonstrated in?

A

fear conditioning

94
Q

what are some things that suggest that cognitive activity can occur on the nonconscious level?

A

blindsight, priming, dorsal-stream processing etc

95
Q

automatic processes use a system to generate…

A

rapid, nonconscious responses to that stimuli

96
Q

conscious processes use a system to produce…

A

slower, controlled responses based on relevant knowledge and experience