{"id":1623,"date":"2014-11-21T13:30:22","date_gmt":"2014-11-21T18:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/?p=1623"},"modified":"2020-02-07T09:39:53","modified_gmt":"2020-02-07T14:39:53","slug":"whats-the-number-to-9-1-1-a-study-on-inattentional-blindness-and-how-exercise-helps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/2014\/11\/21\/whats-the-number-to-9-1-1-a-study-on-inattentional-blindness-and-how-exercise-helps\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s the number to 9-1-1? A study on inattentional blindness and how exercise helps."},"content":{"rendered":"

Girl Falls in Mall Water Fountain While Texting: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=2wDBaV-mQyw<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Screen<\/a><\/p>\n

([wtfhub], 2011)<\/p>\n

Watch the video above.  Notice the woman falling flat on her face?  Psychologists refer to instances, such as this epic camera-caught face-plant, as results of inattentional blindness.  Inattentional blindness refers to an individual\u2019s failure to notice unexpected objects or events when she is focusing her attention on something else (Kellog, 2007).  The widely accepted attenuation model of selective attention provides evidence for inattentional blindness.  According to the attenuation model of selective attention, a person who does not attend to an object in her visual field likely does not perceive that object due to an attenuation filter.  The attenuation filter functions to turn down the signal intensity from unattended stimuli in the environment while letting attended stimuli pass through it onto a perceptual channel, resulting in conscious awareness of the stimuli a person attends to (Kellog, 2007). In this video, the woman clearly was not paying attention to the fountain within her field of vision, so the information regarding the fountain in her sensory memory was tuned out via the attenuation filter, and the presence of the fountain never reached her conscious awareness.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

To further investigate inattentional blindness, two psychology researchers, Huttermann and Memmert, designed two experiments to test how inattentional blindness varies for participants under different physical conditions because numerous tasks in life require people to focus their attention while physically moving (Huttermann, 2012).  Huttermann and Memmert theorize that exercise-induced activation of the central nervous system improves cognitive performance; although, it deteriorates at high work capacities.  When people exercise, their blood flow is facilitated throughout the cerebral region, allowing the neurotransmitters to enhance cognitive resources. In this case, exercise would have enhanced one\u2019s ability to focus attention.  However, when people exercise too hard, there is a decrease of oxygen in the blood flow and that can negatively impact the neurotransmitters leading to a decrease in available cognitive resources (Huttermann, 2012).  This may explain why athletes have such quick reflexes; they can easily spot a stimulus, such as a basketball coming towards them.<\/p>\n

In the first experiment, the researchers tested males and females with normal vision who participate in sports on a regular basis.  Each participant was tested across one of three conditions: one at rest, another at 50% physical load of maximum heart rate, and another at 70% physical load of maximum heart rate.  Participants were then told to watch a video of two teams\u2014one in while, one in black\u2014playing basketball, and count the number of passes within the white team. During the game, a gorilla\u2014the unexpected stimulus\u2014walked right through the basketball scene.  After the video, participants were asked to record the number of counted passes and to report if they had seen anything unexpected; if they reported that they had seen something unexpected, they were told to describe the object in detail (Huttermann, 2012).<\/p>\n

\"gorilla\"<\/a>\"greenmachine01-1375122292058\"<\/a><\/p>\n

(Simons, 1999)                                                                              (Honda, 2011)<\/p>\n

When participants were asked to focus on the passes between the white team, they essentially ignored the black team.  Because the black gorilla is a similar stimulus to the black-colored basketball team, the participants did not attend to it, meaning they did not usually perceive it; therefore, they rarely noticed the gorilla walk right through their field of vision.<\/p>\n

Knowing how easy it is for people to miss information right in their field of vision is quite scary.  If you have wandered through big cities like New York City, you have probably unknowingly witnessed a crime take place.  Perhaps you were focusing on the street signs to prevent yourself from getting lost, as you walk right by a person slipping drugs to another person.  Say you were rushing to catch a train and decided to jog to the station; would you be more or less likely to catch this deal on the side of the road if you were jogging rather than walking?<\/p>\n

Maybe you are at college enjoying yourself at a party, and you set your drink on the table in front of you while talking with friends only to miss someone spike your drink.  If you were dancing instead of talking with your friends, would you be more or less likely to notice the person spike your drink?<\/p>\n

To investigate this topic in more detail, Huttermann and Memmert designed another experiment to test inattentional blindness when the unexpected stimulus is presented within a person\u2019s focus of attention and when the unexpected object is presented outside a person\u2019s focus of attention.  In this case, each participant was asked to focus his or her attention on a specific location on the screen and stimuli would be presented within this range of focus or outside of it through various trials.  Again, the participants would report details on what they saw after each trial.  To test the effect of physical activity on the participant, each participant was tested across one of three conditions: one at rest, another at 60% physical load of maximum heart rate, and another at 70% physical load of maximum heart rate (Huttermann, 2012).<\/p>\n

\"HGOT107_spiked-drink-GHB_FS\"<\/a>\"drug<\/a><\/p>\n

(WikiHow, 2012)                                                          (Cropper, 2008)<\/p>\n

Relating back to the examples presented earlier\u2026<\/p>\n

Imagine you have wandered through the city streets and you focused your attention on the street signs and missed the illegal drug deal occurring within your field of vision as you walked\/jogged by.  Would you be more likely to notice the crime if the people were directly below the street sign or if they were in your peripheral vision?<\/p>\n

If you are at the college party and you set your drink down right in front of you as opposed to setting it down on the table to the right or left of you (within peripheral vision), would you be more likely to catch the person spike your drink?<\/p>\n

How can these experiments teach us about the way we navigate through our stimulus-filled world?  The results from the first experiment show that people engaging in moderate physical exercise are less likely to miss something unexpected entering their field of vision than people at rest or people exercising at 70% load of maximum heart rate.  The results from the second experiment show that when the stimulus moved closer to the range of attentional focus, participants were more likely to notice the stimulus.  The participants under moderate physical stress were even more likely to see the stimulus within this attentional focal range than participants at rest or participants exercising at 70% load of maximum heart rate.  However, when the stimulus was far from the region of attentional focus, the moderate exercise did not seem to benefit the detection of unexpected stimuli.  Regardless of the specifics of these findings, these studies show that we miss out on a lot of information in our environment just by choosing to attend to particular stimuli (Huttermann, 2012).<\/p>\n

While this study shows us the effects of inattentional blindness, it also indicates that there are ways to increase cognitive performance.  This experiment shows that while participating in moderate exercise, one decreases his chances of missing out on stimuli in his environment.  Is this because he is more alert due to activation of the central nervous system as Huttermann and Memmert suggested?  If so, there are most likely other ways to increase alertness, such as drinking caffeinated beverages.  However, the key finding here is that cognitive performance can be improved; whether it be by exercise or some other form, one can enhance his ability to attend to stimuli in the environment.  This could be the cognitive enhancement that enables you to spot the person spiking your drink at the party or the drug deal in the city.<\/p>\n

To read more about alertness and how caffeine effects it, visit: http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/2014\/05\/03\/does-caffeine-help-academic-performance\/<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Works cited<\/strong><\/p>\n

[wtfhub]. (2011, January 16). Girl Falls in Mall Water Fountain While Texting <\/em><\/p>\n\n

.  Retrieved from https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=2wDBaV-mQyw.<\/p>\n

Hutttermann, S., & Memmert, D. (2012). Moderate movement, more vision: Effects of physical exercise on inattentional blindness<\/em>.  Retrieved November 17, 2014 from http:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/23362673.<\/p>\n

Kellog, R. T. (2007). Fundamentals of Cognitive Psychology, <\/em>1st Ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.<\/p>\n

Simons, Daniel. (1999). The famous invisible gorilla experiment of 1999 displayed the phenomenon of inattentional blindness <\/em>[image file]. Retrieved November 17, 2014.<\/p>\n

WikiHow. (2012). Avoid spiked drinks, step 8. <\/em>[image file]. Retrieved November, 17, 2014.<\/p>\n

Cropper, Edward. (2008). [image file]. Retrieved November 17, 2014.<\/p>\n

Honda, Stan. (2011). [image file]. Retrieved November 17, 2014.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Girl Falls in Mall Water Fountain While Texting: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=2wDBaV-mQyw ([wtfhub], 2011) Watch the video above.  Notice the woman falling flat on her face?  Psychologists refer to instances, such as this epic camera-caught face-plant, as results of inattentional blindness.  Inattentional blindness refers to an individual\u2019s failure to notice unexpected objects or events when she is focusing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5566,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[80216],"tags":[129793],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1623"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5566"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1623"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1623\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5426,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1623\/revisions\/5426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/cogblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}