Hearing Something Then Hearing It Again in 24 Hours

Information technology feels uncanny, simply is in fact all about how our attention works, says Anina Rich, Professor in the Section of Cognitive Scientific discipline.

We've all been there. An obscure word we've never seen before captures our attention. Then, all of a sudden, we starting time to see that discussion pop upwardly all over the place. Or y'all're thinking nearly buying a particular machine, and you brainstorm noticing the same brand and model seemingly everywhere.

Second take: Seeing the same car everywhere is 1 case of the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon at work.

Information technology is known as the Frequency Illusion or Bias and, more informally, the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon. The latter coining was apparently by a paper reader in Minnesota, US, who, in a letter to the newspaper in 1994 described information technology every bit a phenomenon in which, after the offset time you learn a new word, phrase or idea, you see that discussion, phrase or idea again within 24 hours.

Information technology was named after an incident in which the reader, Terry Mullen, was talking to a friend nearly the once notorious West German Baader-Meinhof gang, and the next day, the friend referred Mullen to an article in that twenty-four hours'south newspaper in which the left-wing terrorist system was mentioned, decades subsequently it had whatever reason to be in the news.

Nosotros need to be responsive to what happens in the environment in social club to stay condom. At the same time, if we can't ignore our surroundings, we wouldn't be able to complete any tasks.

More than x years after, the term Frequency Illusion was coined by Stanford linguist Arnold Zwicky. Essentially, the Frequency Illusion is a perception that something you've been thinking about, or recently learned, all of a sudden seems much more than frequent in your environment than it was before.

In that location are two parts to it. One part is the perception of increased frequency; the second office is a confirmation bias where you believe that information technology didn't happen earlier at the same frequency. Only in reality, the frequency hasn't changed, you just weren't noticing it because your attention wasn't existence drawn to information technology.

In that location aren't many scientific papers about Frequency Illusion, but the result closely resembles 'working memory-driven attentional capture', which I've studied to explore how attention is guided. This is a way of describing what happens when something you are property in heed influences where your attention goes.

Cat versus pianoforte

Imagine yous are looking at a computer screen with different items on information technology, a 'visual search' display. If I enquire yous to commencement remember a detail item, say a piano, and and then I show you a visual search display and enquire you to await for a cat, the presence of a pianoforte as a distractor in the display makes you slower to discover the cat than if the piano is not there.

Listen games: Seeing a word for the start fourth dimension, then again soon later on, is a common experience of the miracle.

Then, fifty-fifty though the retention item – the piano – is irrelevant to your visual search task, if it is present, it captures your attending, slowing your search for your target item (the cat). We can use visual search times to look at how attention is guided under different conditions.

Working retentivity-driven attentional capture is very similar to what is happening in the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon: something you are holding in your mind so draws your attention to that thing in the environment in a way you don't commonly notice. It is a nice illustration of the unconscious influences on where our attending goes.

Competing for your attention

Where attending is deployed at any given moment is a dynamic interaction between what is happening in the world effectually you and what your electric current goal is. Voluntary attention allows usa to select information that is relevant to what we are doing right now. Involuntary capture of attention happens when something else external draws our attention from that chore.

In an evolutionary sense, nosotros demand to be responsive to what happens in the environment in social club to stay safe. But at the same time, if nosotros can't effectively ignore our environment, we wouldn't exist able to complete whatsoever tasks. And attending is crucial for learning and for memory – if you are not paying attention to something you are not going to remember it.

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Ane of my research topics is the interaction between where y'all want your attention to go – that is, the task y'all are currently focusing on – and what is happening in the environment – that is, what captures your attention without your will.

The Frequency Illusion shows the interaction of factors that straight your attention; what y'all are thinking almost unconsciously guides y'all to relevant data in the environment. It shows how important information technology is to empathize how attending works – it is fundamental to everything we practise, and has a major influence on what we perceive effectually us.

Our ability to function in our complex world relies crucially on the chapters to select what's relevant and ignore what'southward irrelevant at any given moment. That's why I study attention!

Anina Rich is a Professor in the Department of Cerebral Science.

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Source: https://lighthouse.mq.edu.au/article/july-2020/What-is-the-Baader-Meinhof-Phenomenon