Psychology Experiment- Span of Attention

 

SPAN OF ATTENTION

INTRODUCTION:

The term “span of attention‟ refers to the number of objects which can be grasped in one short presentation. Sir William Hamilton (1859) was the first to carry experimental study in this field. Later on serial studies were carried on revealing significant facts. Allerback (1929) studied the span of attention for dots, words, figures and colors of found them to be 8,8,7,9,3.9 and3.0 respectively.

Attention is defined as the process which compels the individuals to select some particular stimulus according to his interest and attitude out of the multiplicity of stimuli present in the Environment. Thus in short it is the selective activity of consciousness as a process of getting an object of thought clearly before the mind. Span of attention actually tells us that how many things can exist in the focus of consciousness at one time in an individual. It refers to the numbers of object which can be grasped in one short presentation. The span of Visual apprehension is observed through the instruments named Tachistoscope.

Tachistoscope is an apparatus designed to expose objects for a brief space of time. A subject is given a momentary glance from 1/5^th to 1/10^th of a second on regular or irregular groups of dots or letter and is required to tell how many he had observed. This instrument was manufactured by Hamilton and was first used by Whipple.

Tachistoscope are of four type:

1. Tall Tachistoscope
2. Rotatory Tachistoscope
3. Pendulum Tachistoscope
4. Camera Tachistoscope

TYPES OF ATTENTION:

Analytical Attention: When our attention is diverted towards the analysis of problem and to find out the prospective for that occurring presently.

• Habitual Attention: This type of attention is determined by habits.
• Ideational Attention: When the attention is diverted towards some image or status or structure selected to object.
• Involuntary Attention:Here the attention is diverted suddenly toward the stimulus , It hinders the process of goal seeking sometimes but not always. Ex-attention is attracted to a song while studying.
• Voluntary Attention: When the attention is diverted willingly to an object.

DETERMINATION OF ATTENTION

The determinants of attention can be categorized as internal and external.

External determinants of span of attention are:

• Nature of stimulus
• Intensity of stimulus
• Location of stimulus
• Contrast of stimulus
• Change of stimulus
• Isolation of stimulus
• Duration of stimulus
• Movement of stimulus
• Repetition of stimulus

Internal determinants of span of attention are:

• Interest
• Basic drives
• Mental set
• Aim
• Meaning
• Habit
• Disposition and Temperament
• Past experience
• Emotion
• Social motives

Aim of the experiment:

To study the span of attention of a student.

EXPERIMENT

Experimenter:                                                                                   Subject:

Date & Time:                                                                                        Class:

 

SETTING & APPARATUS:

A falling door tachistoscope was used for the measurement of span of attention. Tachistoscope is an apparatus having a window in its middle portion that is called screen. The window is covered by an aluminum plate, which is connected with the lever. When the lever is pressed, the screen opens for 1/10 Sec or 100ms. In that short period the subject read the number of dots/alphabets and tells the same. Nine cards with black dots/alphabets (ranging from 3 to 11) were used. The dots/alphabets were made with black ink on white background. The size of the cards was 12×8 cm. The subject was provided a chair and the apparatus was placed on a stool in front of the subject so that the subject easily saw the dots in the window.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE SUBJECT:

1. Get prepared when ready signal is given
2. As soon as say “yes” focus your attention on screen on which you will see some words.
3. Whatever you see you report it immediately

PROCEDURE

To determine the span of attention, the subject was asked to sit in an isolated chamber and was shown cards with alphabets (ranging from 3 to 12) through the tachistoscope window. The subject was instructed as, “You will be shown some cards with alphabets on the tachistoscope window for a fraction of second. You have to speak out the number of alphabets seen”.

Before the actual starting of the experiment, to make the subject familiar with the system, two demonstration trials were given to the subject. Each card was exposed to clear foveal vision for 1/10 Sec.

 

ANALYSIS & INTERPRETATION:

Observation Table

S. No.	WORDS SHOWN	WORDS REPEATED	RESULT (/X)	PERCENTAGE (%)

 

Example: If 20 words are shown out of which 15 were repeated correctly, then the calculation will be:

Span of attention (%) =   Words correctly repeated X 100

Words shown

RESULT AND DISCUSSION

The subject was able to read exactly to all four alphabet of non-meaningful words when the card containing three or four alphabet were shown of non-meaningful syllabus, the response were correct the result was three or four respectively. But when the card containing five non-meaningful syllables five were shown all the responses were wrong and so the result for five non-meaningful syllables was zero. When the card of meaningful words was shown the subject responded to all the words was shown. The subject responded to all the cards excepting the last two alphabets. But the subject responded when the tenth card was shown for second time subject failed to respond for all the three consecutive time and researchers stop the experiment with meaningful word. The result go obtained shows that span of attention for meaningful word is more as compare to that of non-meaningful word. Thus the span of attention for
non-meaningful word is three. On the basis of other experiments it is confirmed that the span of attention for meaningful word is more as compare to non-meaningful word. So the hypothesis i.e. Span of attention for meaningful word is more than that of
non-meaningful word is verified on the basis of obtained result percentage of meaningful word is equal to 75 and the percentage of meaningless word is 66.

Subject was in tensed situation before test he was bit released when he read the first word. He kept all the attention of the window of tachistoscope when first test of meaningful word completed he was eager to know how much word he had read correctly. He remains in tension completing the test of meaningless word subject found the test interesting.

CONCLUSION

1. Knowing about the span of attention suggestion should be given to increase it by different method.
2. The students can be divided in groups knowing about the span of attention of the students for teaching learning situation.
3. Teaching materials can be prepared more better which can increase the span of attention they should interesting an attractive so that it may attract the attention.