The effect of divided attention on inhibiting the gravity error

Hood, Bruce M.; Wilson, Alice; Dyson, Sally

doi:10.1111/j.1467-7687.2006.00493.x

Cited by 26 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…For example, when they see a ball dropped through the left chimney of the apparatus shown in Figure 1, they will incorrectly search for the ball in the left cup, even though they can see the opaque tube that connects the left chimney to the right cup. In a series of seminal studies, Hood and his colleagues have shown that this error represents a “gravity bias:” The error persists even after multiple trials (Hood, 1995), it can re-emerge in older children under conditions of divided attention (Hood, Wilson & Dyson, 2006), and it is not caused by mere adjacency considerations because the analogous error is not obtained if the ball travels in the upward direction (Hood, 1998). …”

Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Believing what you’re told: Young children’s trust in unexpected testimony about the physical world

Jaswal

2010

Cognitive Psychology

127

145

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How do children resolve conflicts between a self-generated belief and what they are told? Four studies investigated the circumstances under which toddlers would trust testimony that conflicted with their expectations about the physical world. Thirty-month-olds believed testimony that conflicted with a naive bias (Study 1), and they also repeatedly trusted testimony that conflicted with an event they had just seen (Study 2)-even when they had an incentive to ignore the testimony (Study 3). Children responded more skeptically if they could see that the testimony was wrong as it was being delivered (Study 3), or if they had the opportunity to accumulate evidence confirming their initial belief before hearing someone contradict it (Study 4). Together, these studies demonstrate that toddlers have a robust bias to trust even surprising testimony, but this trust can be influenced by how much confidence they have in their initial belief.

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Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Believing what you’re told: Young children’s trust in unexpected testimony about the physical world

Jaswal

2010

Cognitive Psychology

127

145

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“…Prolonged looking in young infants, a phenomenon termed by some as 'obligatory attention', is postulated to result from the emergence of neural processes that inhibit peripheral eye movements. Hood et al [50,51] have suggested that prolonged looking may be related to infant inability to disengage from a salient fovea stimulus. The inability to disengage fixation in such infants may be an immature pattern reminiscent of the obligatory attention noted in very young infants.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Prenatal Cocaine Exposure and Prolonged Focus Attention

Chiriboga

Starr²,

Kuhn³

et al. 2009

Dev Neurosci

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In experimental models, prenatal cocaine exposure has been found to perturb monoaminergic development of systems implicated in modulating attention. To determine whether prenatal cocaine exposure affects infant attention, we assessed visual recognition memory and focused attention during free play. We enrolled at birth 380 infants, 113 cocaine exposed, using multiple biomarkers to assess drug exposure. Behavior was videotaped and coded off-line for sustained looking time (i.e. focused attention), banging and intrusion. Prenatal cocaine exposure was not associated with visual recognition memory, but was significantly associated with longer sustained looking times (average focused attention) at ages 6 months (p = 0.02) and 12 months (p = 0.04) in analyses that adjusted for variables, including maternal intelligence, education, depressive scores and other exposures (alcohol, tobacco and marijuana). Cocaine-exposed infants at age 12 months also spent significantly less time in banging activity (p = 0.02) after adjusting for confounding variables. This finding was not explained through cocaine effects on motor development, neurological findings or time spent in focused attention. Prenatal cocaine exposure was significantly associated with longer periods of sustained looking or focused attention in infancy, a finding that could interpreted as a measure of poor processing efficiency, or alternatively as precocious maturation of attentional systems. Either interpretation has implications for later cognitive development. Lower banging activity among cocaine exposed was not explained through cocaine effects on motor development or neurological findings, suggesting that activity level itself is diminished in these infants. Whether focused attention findings impact long term development awaits further study.

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“…Therefore, they repeatedly commit the ''gravity error'' in spite of negative feedback on many trials (Hood, 1995(Hood, , 1998Hood, Santos, & Fieselman, 2000;Hood, Wilson, & Dyson, 2006). Further evidence for the robustness of this error comes from comparative studies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…By implication, dividing children's attention interfered with their ability to inhibit the prepotent response, which in turn led them to revert to the systematic gravity error (Hood et al, 2006). In a different study, 4-, 5-, and 7-year-olds who could accurately solve the tubes task were asked to approach an empty cup.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%