Deck 18: Attention and Higher Cognition

Question 1

Attention in which the focus coincides with the individual's sensory orientation is called

A) primary attention.
B) overt attention.
C) covert attention.
D) arousal.

Answer 1

B

Question 2

One's enhanced perception of a particular conversation in a crowded room is referred to as

A) covert attention.
B) overt attention.
C) selective tuning.
D) the cocktail party effect.

Answer 2

D

Question 3

A viewer who is asked to count how many times players that are wearing white pass a ball will not notice a cartoon character on the court due to a phenomenon called

A) change blindness.
B) inattentional blindness.
C) filter failure.
D) differential blindness.

Answer 3

B

Question 4

In early selection models of attention, perceptual analysis and semantic meaning occur

A) before the attentional bottleneck.
B) before sensory registration.
C) after the attentional bottleneck.
D) after awareness.

Question 5

The experience of having your attention suddenly captured by hearing your name from across the room illustrates which attentional selection model?

A) The Stroop effect
B) Attentional blink
C) Early-selection
D) Late-selection

Question 6

Currently, the model of attentional selection that is generally considered to have the most robust experimental support is

A) the early-selection model.
B) the late-selection model.
C) the early-selection model for humans and the late-selection model for nonhuman species.
D) None of the above; debate continues as to the relative strengths of each model.

Question 7

According to the theory of perceptual load, a large perceptual load

A) decreases perceptual resources for unattended items.
B) increases perceptual resources for unattended items.
C) decreases problem-solving capacities.
D) increases problem-solving capacities.

Question 8

In the _______ task, a single stimulus or stimulus location is held in an attentional spotlight.

A) attentional blink
B) peripheral spatial cuing
C) sustained-attention
D) divided attention

Question 9

In the _______ task, subjects are provided with a cue that predicts target location.

A) symbolic cuing
B) Stroop
C) sustained attention
D) attentional blink

Question 10

Which type of cue will typically elicit the fastest reaction time to the target?

A) Invalid
B) Neutral
C) Valid
D) Wrong

Question 11

Voluntary attention is also called _______ attention.

A) endogenous
B) exogenous
C) bottom-up
D) symbolic

Question 12

Because voluntary attention is under direct, conscious control, researchers refer to it as a _______ process.

A) conceptual shifting
B) symbolic cuing
C) bottom-up
D) top-down

Question 13

In a choice reaction time test, visual information typically is processed at the level of the prefrontal cortex within _______ ms.

A) 35
B) 55
C) 110
D) 145

Question 14

The average reaction time in an uncomplicated choice reaction time test (i.e., the time it takes for the premotor cortex to become activated and for the person to push the choice button) is approximately _______ ms.

A) 35
B) 55
C) 150
D) 325

Question 15

Which sequence of the brain events that determine reaction time on a choice reaction time test is correct?

A) Retina  LGN  V1  V4  primary motor cortex  premotor cortex  prefrontal lobe  inferior temporal lobe  spinal cord  finger muscle
B) Retina  LGN  V1  V4  inferior temporal lobe  premotor cortex  prefrontal cortex  primary motor cortex  spinal cord  finger muscle
C) Retina  LGN  V1  V4  inferior temporal lobe  prefrontal cortex  premotor cortex  primary motor cortex  spinal cord  finger muscle
D) Retina  LGN  V1  V4  primary motor cortex  inferior temporal lobe  prefrontal cortex  premotor cortex  spinal cord  finger muscle

Question 16

Reflexive attention is also called

A) endogenous attention.
B) exogenous attention.
C) stimulus cuing.
D) symbolic cuing.

Question 17

The unconscious shifts in attention that come about in response to important changes in our environment are considered _______ processes.

A) bottom-up
B) top-down
C) conceptual shift
D) stimulus cuing

Question 18

Exogenous attention is

A) difficult to consciously repress.
B) based on conscious processing.
C) oriented to sensory events
D) Both a and c

Question 19

In a peripheral spatial cuing task, a valid unexpected stimulus enhances the detection of targets when the interval between the stimulus and the target is

A) short.
B) long.
C) random.
D) predictable.

Question 20

In a peripheral spatial cuing task, the phenomenon of inhibition of return is observed when the cue-to-target interval is

A) in the range of 0-100 ms.
B) in the range of 100-300 ms.
C) at 200 ms only.
D) in the range of 300-500 ms.

Question 21

"Inhibition of return" refers to

A) the conscious inhibition of the feature search in a previously attended spatial location.
B) impaired detection of stimuli at the former location of the task-irrelevant cue.
C) the search for a sought-after item.
D) the "popping out" of a task-irrelevant item.

Question 22

Refer to the figure.
Which statement explains the significance of the results shown in the figure?

A) Due to inhibition of return, the longer reaction time after an invalid stimulus is directly proportional to the delay between the invalid stimulus and the target stimulus.
B) When the delay between a valid cue and the target stimulus is long, subjects focus everywhere else, lengthening their reaction time for detecting the target.
C) The phenomenon in which shorter times between a valid stimulus and the appearance of the target stimulus are associated with shorter reaction times for detecting the target stimulus is called inhibition of return.
D) Once a subject has looked toward a stimulus, their ability to detect a target stimulus in the same location is inhibited.

Question 23

House cats are most successful at detecting prey when

A) they have been trained using punishments.
B) they have competition from other cats.
C) they are presented with one cue.
D) their attention is guided by a combination of cues.

Question 24

The phenomenon of "pop out" refers to the

A) increased allocation of attention to three-dimensional, as opposed to two-dimensional, stimuli, as in pop-up books or 3D cinema.
B) distinguishing feature of a sought-after item that makes it sufficiently different from all distracters.
C) unexpected perception of a sought-after item that suddenly "pops out" in the visual attention field.
D) perception of unusually vivid images in the course of daydreaming.

Question 25

Which type of attention can be sustained over the longest period of time?

A) Endogenous
B) Exogenous
C) Conscious
D) Both a and c

Question 26

The idea that conjunction searches involve sequential shifts of attention that help coordinate multiple cognitive feature maps is referred to as

A) the binding problem.
B) conjunction search theory.
C) feature integration theory.
D) conscious perception and selection theory.

Question 27

Which question illustrates the binding problem?

A) How do we combine perceptions of color, shape, sound, and motion to identify a bird?
B) What brain processes allow us to identify a straight line in space?
C) What makes a tool useful?
D) How does pitch determine a familiar voice?

Question 28

Refer to the figure.
Which choice accurately pairs correctly labeled conditions in the figure with the subject's reaction time?

A) I: Valid, 235 ms; II: Invalid, 300 ms; III: Neutral, 265 ms
B) I: Valid, 235 μs; II: Invalid, 300 μs; III: Neutral, 265 μs
C) I: Invalid, 300 ms; II: Valid, 235 ms; III: Neutral, 265 ms
D) I: Neutral, 300 ms; II: Invalid, 300 ms; III: Valid, 235 ms

Question 29

ERP stands for _______ potential.

A) evoked response
B) event-related
C) evoked-related
D) event response

Question 30

Refer to the figure.
Which choice correctly labels the EEG in the figure?

A) I - P1; II - N1; III - P2; IV - N2; V - P3
B) I - N1; II -N2; III -P1; IV -P2; V - P3
C) I - P1; II - P2; III - N1; IV -N2 ; V - P3
D) I - P1; II - N1; III - P2; IV - N2; V - N2pc

Question 31

Which of the following is a component of an averaged ERP waveform?

A) P1
B) N2
C) P3
D) All of the above

Question 32

Hillyard's classic study of auditory attention found that ERPs for attended stimuli are

A) smaller in amplitude than those for nonattended stimuli.
B) localized to the same side of the brain as the attended ear.
C) particularly evident in the N1 component.
D) localized to the contralateral occipital cortex.

Question 33

Hillyard and colleagues found that in a dichotic tone procedure, selective attention to an auditory stimulus from one ear produced an early positive ERP deflection that was enhanced for the selectively attended input. This phenomenon is called the _______ effect.

A) N1
B) P1
C) P3
D) N2pc

Question 34

The P3 effect of auditory processing is associated with _______ processing.

A) visual stimulus
B) early-selection
C) late-selection
D) early sensory

Question 35

Selectively seeking and attending to a visual stimulus increases activity of contralateral visual areas, evidenced by the

A) N2pc wave.
B) N1 effect.
C) P3 effect.
D) P1 wave.

Question 36

There is some evidence to support the claim that video games can

A) improve social and emotional processing.
B) improve visual attention capacity.
C) decrease the amplitude of the P3 component related to sustained attention.
D) improve sustained attention.

Question 37

Which structure has been shown to be involved in sustained attention?

A) Superior colliculus
B) Lateral geniculate nucleus and superior colliculus
C) Basal ganglia and lateral geniculate nucleus
D) Frontal cortex and basal ganglia

Question 38

Which area of the brain is responsible for the processing of faces?

A) Fusiform face area
B) Parahippocampal place area
C) V2
D) Anterior parietal cortex

Question 39

During a selective attention task in which a shift in attention occurs within the neurons' receptive fields, recordings from individual cortical neurons would likely show _______ in their rate of firing.

A) an increase
B) a decrease
C) no change
D) an increase and then a decrease.

Question 40

Refer to the figure.
There are three possible ways attention might affect single-cell recordings. Which way is demonstrated by the experiment whose results are illustrated in the figure?

A) Attention has globally enhanced the cell's receptive field.
B) Attention has sharpened the tuning of this cell's receptive field.
C) Attention has not affected this neuron because both stimuli are in its receptive field.
D) Attention has shifted the tuning of this cell's receptive field.

Question 41

Which structure guides attentional eye movements?

A) Intraparietal sulcus
B) Superior colliculus
C) Pulvinar
D) Lateral geniculate nucleus

Question 42

Which structure is linked to the orienting and shifting of attention?

A) Intraparietal sulcus
B) Superior colliculus
C) Pulvinar
D) Lateral geniculate nucleus

Question 43

LIP stands for

A) lateral inferior pulvinar.
B) lateral inferior peduncle.
C) lateral intraparietal area.
D) lateral intrasylvian perimeter.

Question 44

The human homolog to the LIP is the

A) frontal eye field.
B) intraparietal sulcus.
C) temporoparietal junction.
D) ventral frontal cortex.

Question 45

In monkeys, the direction of attention to particular locations, regardless of stimulus modality, is correlated with neural activity in the

A) LIP.
B) frontal eye field.
C) temporoparietal junction.
D) pulvinar.

Question 46

Damage to the _______ in humans produces difficulties in suppressing unwanted reorientation of the eyes toward peripheral distracters.

A) frontal eye field
B) LIP
C) temporoparietal junction
D) pulvinar

Question 47

The frontal eye field and IPS make up the cortical network called the

A) temporoparietal system.
B) cortical attention network (CAN).
C) dorsal frontoparietal system.
D) dorsoparietal junction.

Question 48

Which attention network is responsible for top-down control of voluntary attention?

A) The dorsal frontoparietal system
B) The temporoparietal system
C) The ventral frontal cortical system
D) All of the above

Question 49

Directed attention toward novel or unexpected stimuli is controlled by the _______ system.

A) dorsal frontoparietal system.
B) temporoparietal system.
C) ventral frontal cortical system.
D) None of the above

Question 50

What accounts for our ability to shift rapidly between interesting objects that "pop up" in our environment and intended objects of attention?

A) Two distinct cortical networks
B) The highly integrated temporoparietal junction
C) Strong connections between the intraparietal sulcus and temporoparietal junction
D) Specialized mirror neurons in the frontal eye fields

Question 51

Hemispatial neglect can occur with damage to the _______ cortex.

A) right inferior parietal
B) ventral medial
C) left inferior parietal
D) right motor

Question 52

Refer to the figure.
The drawing in the figure suggests the artist

A) suffers from anosognosia.
B) is very young.
C) has optic ataxia.
D) suffers from hemispatial neglect.

Question 53

A person who has trouble moving her eyes to an object, is unable to reach for objects she can see, and can only pay attention to one feature at a time may have

A) hemispatial neglect.
B) Bálint's syndrome.
C) ADHD.
D) anosognosia.

Question 54

Bálint's syndrome is characterized by three symptoms, including

A) attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
B) hemispatial neglect (inability to perceive or attend to the left half of anything).
C) anosognosia (denial of illness).
D) oculomotor apraxia (difficulty voluntarily directing one's gaze).

Question 55

Which structures have been identified as having role in conscious awareness?

A) The temporoparietal junction (TPJ) and the frontal eye fields (FEF)
B) The claustrum, the lateral frontal cortex, and the posterior cingulate
C) The intraparietal sulcus (IPS) and superior parietal lobule (SPL)
D) The frontal eye field, the ventral frontal cortex, and the claustrum

Question 56

Refer to the figure.
What do the similarities between the scans in the figure indicate?

A) These scans show the areas of the cortex that are active while subjects who are in a coma (top) and subjects who are alert (bottom) are answering "yes" and "no" to a researcher's questions.
B) These scans demonstrate that neural activity in particular regions is greater in an alert subject (bottom) than in a coma patient (top).
C) The scans show locations of increased activity in alert subjects (bottom) compared to sleeping subjects (top).
D) The scans illustrate the similar pattern of reduced activity in the brains of individuals in a coma (top) and those who are sleeping (bottom).

Question 57

The "hard problem of consciousness" refers to the difficulty of understanding

A) the effects of qualia on the pineal gland.
B) the brain processes that result in a person's unique subjective experience.
C) how particular patterns of activity create specific conscious experiences.
D) the neural correlates of free will and agency.

Question 58

One reason that researchers have been unable to "read" visual experiences using fMRI is that

A) fMRI gives too much data on neural activity.
B) fMRI gives us continuous information from visual perception.
C) fMRI is too slow and gives only static pictures of visual experience.
D) the signals measured by fMRI are collected from a limited number of neurons.

Question 59

Gallant and colleagues were able to reconstruct visual experiences by

A) directly matching motion in videos clips to motor cortex activity.
B) matching patterns of brain activity from training clips of YouTube videos with clips predicted to give the same patterns.
C) creating YouTube videos that correlate to measured brain activity patterns.
D) All of the above

Question 60

The physician's report on the effects of Phineas Gage's brain injury provided early information about the functional role of

A) the parietal cortex.
B) the premotor areas.
C) the frontal lobes.
D) Wernicke's area.

Question 61

Diminished judgment and planning characterize humans who have sustained injury to the _______ cortex.

A) motor
B) dorsolateral frontal
C) orbitofrontal
D) mediofrontal

Question 62

Computer reconstructions indicate that the primary site of brain damage suffered by Phineas Gage was

A) dorsolateral frontal cortex in both hemispheres.
B) orbitofrontal cortex of the left hemisphere.
C) dorsolateral frontal cortex of the right hemisphere.
D) orbitofrontal cortex of both hemispheres

Question 63

Two of the main subdivisions of the prefrontal cortex are the _______ and _______ areas.

A) sensory; motor
B) motor; premotor
C) dorsolateral; orbitofrontal
D) dorsolateral; mediolateral

Question 64

Which regional prefrontal syndrome is correctly associated with the damage that causes it and its symptoms?

A) Dysexecutive syndrome: orbitofrontal damage; poor social insight, emotional lability, urinary incontinence
B) Disinhibited syndrome: orbitofrontal damage; increased response latency, difficulty maintaining focus, little to no talking
C) Apathetic syndrome: mediofrontal damage; less talking, weakness in the legs, decrease in spontaneity, slow reaction time
D) Dorsolateral syndrome: dorsolateral damage; poor judgement, poor self-care, loss of strength and sensations in legs

Question 65

In economic decision-making, the valuation system is mediated by the

A) dorsolateral prefrontal cortex.
B) ventromedial prefrontal cortex.
C) intraparietal sulcus.
D) orbitofrontal cortex.

Question 66

Despite high levels of background noise, you are able to selectively tune in to what your friend is saying in a crowded bar. This selective enhancement is referred to as the ______ effect.

Question 67

When we focus on simple tasks or objects, the relatively light _______ allows for the processing of additional stimuli (i.e., multi-tasking).

Question 68

The frontal eye fields are critically important for establishing gaze in accordance with _______ processes and cognitive goals.

Question 69

When you detect a friend in a crowd because of his yellow coat among people wearing black coats, you have performed a feature search. If no such distinctive feature had "popped out," you would have had to perform a _______ search, looking for multiple features such as height, gender, and hair color.

Question 70

Auditory attention produces an enhancement of the N1 ERP component, whereas visual attention produces enhancement of the _______ component.

Question 71

The _______ guides attentional eye movements.

Question 72

The pulvinar occupies the posterior quarter of the _______ in humans and is involved in the orienting and shifting of attention.

Question 73

The _______ plays a significant role in shifting attention to a novel location, especially if the stimulus is unexpected.

Question 74

Damage to the right inferior parietal cortex often produces _______, in which the patient disregards the left side of the world.

Question 75

Difficulty with sustained attention is seen in children with _______, who are often treated with stimulant drugs (or Ritalin; or methylphenidate) to improve their focus.

Question 76

Purely subjective experiences of perceptions are referred to as _______.

Question 77

As a result of an industrial accident, Phineas Gage suffered bilateral damage to the _______ cortex.

Question 78

Patients with frontal lobe lesions struggle with task shifting and tend to continue beyond a reasonable degree in any activity, a behavior referred to as _______.

Question 79

The study of brain mechanisms at work during economic decision-making is called _______.

Question 80

Scientists have been able to program a computer to reconstruct an image of what a person was looking at based on a library of video clips by analyzing the specific _______ patterns previously created while the person viewed the videos.