Abstract

MENEZES, Carolina; STEFFEN HOLDERBAUM, Candice; FUMAGALLI DE SALLES, Jerusa  and  BIZARRO, Lisiane. Attentional blink and the limitations of visual information processing related to temporal frequency. Ciênc. cogn. [online]. 2011, vol.16, n.1, pp. 165-179. ISSN 1806-5821.

Abstract The cognitive system has limited capacity of information processing, which requires the attention to prioritize some and dismiss others. The influence of time between the presentation of two stimuli seems to be important for this selection because depending on the interval, attention to the first will impair the perception of the second one. This phenomenon has been coined attentional blink - AB. The objective of this review is to present the AB, describe the paradigm used for its investigation, the research that initially identified it, the main theoretical models that try to explain it, as well as its relation with semantic priming effects and emotional stimuli processing. The studies show that attentional resources are also limited in the temporal domain and that the failure to detect the second stimulus seems to be related to a limitation on the control of attentional distribution, instead of a lack of resources. In addition, this limitation seems to depend on the type of stimuli investigated. Taken together, the findings demonstrate the usefulness of this experimental task, which can contribute to the study of mental processes and their interaction. © Cien. Cogn. 2011; Vol. 16 (1): 165-179.

Keywords : attention; attentional blink; semantic priming; emotional processing; cognitive psychology.

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