Individual differences in selective attention: The relation of priming and interference to cognitive failure

Abstract

This study investigates individual differences in the ability to respond to a target, whilst ignoring a distractor, using color as a selection cue. The Cognitive Failures Questionnaire (CFQ) of Broadbent, Cooper, FitzGerald and Parkes (1982) was used as an index of everyday absent-mindedness and failures of attention. In the first experiment subjects were required to respond to a target word in the presence of distractors which were either random letter sequences or words. It was found that subjects with high and low CFQ scores responded with the same latency to the control displays, but in the presence of distractor words those with high CFQ scores took much longer than those with low CFQ scores. These data support the hypothesis that CFQ score may predict efficiency of selective attention. Tipper and Cranston (1985) proposed that active inhibition of distractors may be one mechanism of selective attention, particularly if selection was to be successful. In a second experiment, the priming effect of ignored information was examined for subjects scoring high and low on the CFQ. It was found that ‘negative priming’ was seen only with those subjects scoring low on the CFQ (who were the more efficient selectors in experiment 1). These experiments therefore support previous findings of individual differences in the efficiency of selective attention, and suggest that active inhibition of distractors may be a mechanism associated with efficient selection.