Attention, Memory and Cognitive Control

人脑支持着一系列惊人的认知技能。考虑到我们轻松完成的日常任务需要我们感知周围世界的物体，为这些物体赋予意义，将物体放入有用的类别，记住过去经历过的物体，等等。当我们专注于与手头任务相关的更广泛的目标时，这些认知技能中的每一项，以及所有这些技能的更令人印象深刻的协调，通常都是在我们很少或根本不需要努力的情况下完成的。然而，对大脑和行为的研究表明，这些技能背后的机制是复杂的。本提案中描述的研究计划侧重于支持三种特定认知技能的机制，以及它们之间的协调。其中一项技能是感知周围事物并对其采取行动的能力，而另一项技能是记住特定先前经历的能力。众所周知，这两种认知技能都依赖于第三种认知技能，即有选择地将注意力集中在争夺我们思想和行动控制权的事件的子集上的能力。虽然注意和知觉之间的联系，以及注意和记忆之间的联系，都是公认的，但知觉和记忆对注意的共同依赖提出了一个问题。显然，注意力（至少）有两个主人。注意力既用于知觉，也用于记忆。如果没有某种形式的注意力在这两个目的上的协调，我们应该预料到一个技能领域（感知）对另一个技能领域（记忆）的大量干扰，反之亦然。事实上，实验心理学家已经发现了许多方法来证明注意力的供应是有限的，并且将注意力分配给一个目标会干扰正在进行的针对另一个目标的行为。然而，考虑到这种潜在的干扰，令人惊讶的是，我们在日常活动中经常将感知和记忆穿插在一起，好像协调这两种活动只是一种轻微的挑战。该研究计划的主要目的是研究导致这种看似毫不费力的感知注意力和记忆注意力协调的机制。这个问题的一个一般解决方案是假设日常活动是由对过去类似经历的自动、毫不费力的检索支持的。回忆这些经历需要很少的注意力，而且确实允许我们在思考另一件事的同时从事一项活动。在空旷的高速公路上开车就是一个例子，这种活动通常是在大脑漫游到与驾驶无关的想法时进行的。与此同时，如果发生了一些新奇和意想不到的事情，人们的注意力就会被吸引到意想不到的事件上。这种注意力的捕捉似乎上调了我们对经验细节的处理，否则这些细节就会被忽视。此外，当被问及到达目的地后的高速公路之旅时，我们不太可能记住一段平淡无奇的高速公路行驶，相反，我们更有可能记住那些吸引我们注意力的不寻常的事情。这项提议的研究旨在解释这种与周围环境毫不费力地互动的非凡能力，同时也能迅速适应需要额外关注的情况。

The human brain supports an astonishing array of cognitive skills. Consider that routine tasks we perform with ease require us to perceive objects in the world around us, to assign meaning to those objects, to place objects into useful categories, to remember objects experienced in the past, and much more. Each of these cognitive skills, and more impressive the co-ordination of all of these skills, is often done with little or no effort on our part, as we focus on broader goals associated with the task at hand. Yet research on brain and behaviour has revealed that the mechanisms underlying these skills are complex. The research program described in this proposal focuses on mechanisms that support three particular cognitive skills, and the co-ordination among them. One of these skills is the ability to perceive and direct actions toward objects in the world around us, while a second skill is the ability to remember particular prior experiences. Both of these cognitive skills are widely known to depend on a third cognitive skill, the ability to pay attention selectively to just a subset of the events that compete for the control of our thought and action. Although the links between attention and perception on the one hand, and between attention and remembering on the other hand, are both well-established, the joint dependence of perception and remembering on attention raises a problem. Apparently, attention has (at least) two masters. Attention is recruited both in the service of perception and in the service of remembering. Without some form of co-ordination of attention for these two purposes, we ought to expect massive amounts of interference from one skill domain (perception) on the other (remembering), and vice versa. Indeed, experimental psychologists have discovered many methods for demonstrating that attention is limited in supply, and that the allocation of attention toward one goal can interfere with ongoing behaviour directed towards another goal. And yet, given this potential for interference, it is surprising that we routinely interleave perceiving and remembering in our everyday activities, as if co-ordinating these two activities is only mildly challenging. The primary aim of the proposed research program is to study the mechanisms that lead to this seemingly effortless co-ordination of attention for perception and attention for remembering. One general solution to this problem assumes that routine activities are supported by an automatic, effortless retrieval of similar experiences from the past. Retrieval of these experiences requires little attention, and indeed allows us to engage in one activity while thinking about another. Driving a car on an empty highway is an example of an activity that is often carried out while the mind wanders to thoughts unrelated to driving. At the same time, if something novel and unexpected occurs, attention is drawn to the unexpected event. This capture of attention seems to up-regulate the processing of details of our experience that would otherwise go unnoticed. Moreover, when asked about the highway trip upon arrival at our destination, we are unlikely to remember stretches of uneventful highway driving, and instead more likely to remember events during which our attention was captured by something out of the ordinary. The proposed research aims to explain this remarkable ability to interact effortlessly with the environment around us, while also adapting rapidly to situations that require additional attention.