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Noise and attentional selectivity: A reproducible phenomenon?
Author(s) -
Forster Peter M.,
Grierson Arthur T.
Publication year - 1978
Publication title -
british journal of psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.536
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8295
pISSN - 0007-1269
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1978.tb02126.x
Subject(s) - psychology , masking (illustration) , noise (video) , task (project management) , selective attention , audiology , auditory masking , psychoacoustics , selectivity , cognitive psychology , perception , neuroscience , cognition , computer science , chemistry , artificial intelligence , medicine , art , biochemistry , image (mathematics) , economics , visual arts , catalysis , management
It has been suggested that loud noise increases attentional selectivity. Hockey (1970 b ) found that noise improved performance on the high priority aspects of a complex task and found a corresponding impairment on the low priority aspects of the task. An alternative explanation was offered by Poulton (1976) who suggested that noise impairs performance by masking auditory feedback from subjects' responses. Four experiments were carried out in order to investigate the phenomenon. No evidence of impaired performance was found in any of the four experiments, with or without auditory feedback. Thus, neither attentional selectivity nor masking of auditory feedback was found to be a significant factor in these experiments. It was concluded that this task is not suitable for investigating the effects of noise on attentional selectivity.