Attentional Capacity and Processing Resources

Abstract

Much of the early research that led to the development of contemporary cognitive psychology was concerned with investigating the limits of human abilities. These limits were clearly evident in tasks such as span of apprehension, absolute judgment, reaction time, and in a variety of dual-task situations where two activities had to be performed simultaneously. After the restrictions on maximal performance were well documented, theorists started speculating as to the type of mechanisms that might be responsible for such limitations. Judging from its longevity, one of the most popular of the mechanisms proposed was a limit on the human’s attentional capacity or processing resources. There is considerable confusion about the exact nature of attentional capacity, but all theorists agree that whatever it is, less of it leads to poorer performance on a variety of tasks.