p.43-44. In reviewing the literature on attention we were struck by several observations. One was a reluctance
to define attention... It is difficult to conceptualize a process that is not well defined...As a consequence, the
more we read, the more bewildered we became.
p.44 Selective attention refers to the differential processing of simultaneous sources of information.
p.45 Our main objective in this chapter is to review the evidence with respect to the top-down control of selective processing...
in the course of it we draw 11 tentative empirical generalizations.
p.47 A schema refers to an internal representation of a common spatial... or temporal... configuration of objects and
events... A schema is thought to develop from frequent processing of different instances of a natural category
p.47 1. All levels of stimulus analysis can be primed for particular stimuli.
p.48 2. Selection based on sensory cues is usually superior to selection based on semantic cues.
p.49 3. Irrelevant stimuli sometimes undergo semantic analysis.
p.50 4. Spatial cues are especially effective cues.
p.51 5. Attention is independent of eye fixation and can assume the characteristics of an adjustable-beam spotlight.
p.54 6. Stimuli outside the spatial focus of attention undergo little or no semantic processing.
p.56 7. Stimulus processing outside the attentional spotlight is restricted mainly to simple physical features.
p.59 8. Overlapping objects can be selectively processed.
p.62 9. Nonselected objects within the spatial foci of attention undergo little or no semantic processing.
p.63 10. Selective processing is sometimes performed passively and sometimes actively.
p.65 11. Selective attention can be guided by active schema.
p.68 if a psychological construct is to explain the intelligent and adaptive selection powers of the organism, then it
cannot itself be imbued with those powers.
p.69 [James] Attention creates no idea; an idea must already be there before we can attend to it
p.70 Still, a dull, sinking feeling comes with the acknowledgment that James was much brighter than we and that he eventually
abandoned psychology altogether.
