Individual Differences in Attention: Behavioural and Electrophysiological Investigations

在我们的日常生活中，有很多事情需要我们去关注，而我们的注意力却受限于我们在任何给定时间所能关注的信息量。因此，尽管我们可能会试图同时执行两项任务(例如，一边开车一边打电话)，但这往往会导致其中一项或两项任务的表现较差。此外，我们的注意力可能会被与手头任务无关的刺激所吸引(例如，开车时的醒目广告牌)。因此，适当的控制和注意力分配对于成功和安全的任务执行至关重要。最近，研究人员，包括我自己，已经开始调查同时执行多项任务的能力的个体差异，以防止我们的注意力被与任务无关的刺激捕获。例如，我的实验室的工作表明，在计算机化的任务中，双重任务注意力成本的大小存在可靠的个体差异，这些注意力成本可以通过各种性格、认知和脑电测量来预测。这项资助的目的是为了更好地了解注意力表现的个体差异。我将研究在不同的注意力捕获任务中，注意力捕获的程度和性质是否存在可靠的个体差异，如果是这样的话，这些个体差异是否与各种注意力捕获任务相关，从而通常可以说一些人更容易被捕获注意力。此外，我将研究注意捕获的个体差异是否与双重任务注意的个体差异有关，以及这些差异是否可以通过日常多任务行为、工作记忆、注意力投资和/或认知控制的个体差异来预测。一系列实验还会问：认知投资中可靠的个体差异是在什么加工阶段开始的？我还将考察个人在多大程度上意识到自己同时处理多项任务或避免注意力分散的能力，以及他们是否根据自己的能力调整自己的日常行为。最终，这项研究将揭示个体在成功驾驭日常生活的注意力需求方面的能力差异的方式和原因。

In our day-to-day lives multiple events require our attention, yet our attention is limited in terms of how much information we can attend to at any given time. Consequently, although we may try to perform two tasks at once (e.g., talking on a cellular phone while driving), this often leads to poorer performance on one or both tasks. Also, our attention may be captured by stimuli that are irrelevant to the task at hand (e.g., an eye-catching billboard while driving). Therefore, appropriate control and allocation of attention are critical to successful and safe task performance. Recently, researchers, including myself, have begun to investigate individual differences in the ability to perform multiple tasks simultaneously and to prevent our attention from being captured by task-irrelevant stimuli. For example, work from my lab has shown that there are reliable individual differences in the magnitude of dual-task attention costs in a computerized task, and that these attention costs can be predicted by various dispositional, cognitive, and EEG measures. The goal of this grant is to better understand individual differences in attentional performance. I will examine whether there are reliable individual differences in the degree and nature of attention capture across a variety of attention capture tasks, and if so, whether these individual differences are related across various attention capture tasks such that some people can be said to be more susceptible, generally, to having their attention captured. In addition I will examine whether individual differences in attention capture are related to individual differences in dual-task attention and whether these can be predicted by individual differences in everyday multi-tasking behaviour, working memory, attentional investment and/or cognitive control. A series of experiments will also ask 'At what stage of processing do reliable individual differences in cognitive investment begin?' I will also examine the degree to which individuals are aware of their ability to multi-task or to avoid attentional distraction and whether they modulate their everyday behaviour according to their abilities. Ultimately, this research will inform how and why individuals differ in their abilities to successfully navigate the attentional demands of everyday life.