Acta Psychoiogka 35 At&&on and Performance ZZZ(A. F. Sanders, ed!

) 1970,118-13 1
0 North-Holland Publishing Company, Amsterdam

REMARKS ON ATTENTION CONTROL

DANIEL KAHNEMAN 1
Applied Psychological Research Unit, Cambri&e, B&nd a

ABSTRACT

SOme rect& trends in studies on optimality in the alknxtlon sf attention and on

determinants of attentional performance are discussed, and brief reports of some
new experimes~tsare given. The discussion of allocation includes resistance to distrac-
tion and perkrmance in nr~tliple tasks. It is suggested that optimal allocation of
attentjon is often achieved in both types of task.
As to the .determinants of attentional performance, the role of spatial orientation
is dkussed and comments are given on the results of experiments on shadowing.

Mstn~psycbologists discovered in the Ia& 1950sthat the mind reseg bles

a hi&-speed computer. The discovery was mad.e when high-speed
computers were first introduced in major universities. It is perhaps
appropriate that we should again follow the advances of computer
science and begin to think of the mind as a time-sharing system. Each
of us is, of course, a time-sharing system, at least in the limited sense
of being able to deal with several programs at once - although single-
channel bottlenecks certainly exist. As in any time-sharing system,
there must be a control unit in our computer, which keeps track of
the storage and capacity requirements of various simultaneous programs,
and allocates resources according to a sensible order of priorities. Two
questioris are raised in this paper: how effectively does the control
unit work? and under what condition does it work best?

2. OPHMAJJTY IN THE ALLOCATION OF ATTENTION

2.1. R&stance to distraction

The limSng case of time-sharing is that of a person who works at
a task and is exposed to irrelevant and attention-demanding stimuli.

1 The comments of D. E. Broadbent, I. D. Brown and J. Morton on an earlier

version cd this paper are ackowledged with thanks.
z Permanent address: Depa%ment of Psychology, Hebrew University, Jerusalem,
Israe,
118
 ATTENTION C3NTRQE 119

ilocatim of atterrtion is then optimal if he gives his nN to the ta& a&

ignores the irrelevant stimulation. Unimpaired performance of the task
is the simple test for optimality. There is much evidence that we are
capable of virtually perfect performance by that test, at least over relatively
s of time. A rich vein of research done in the 1920s and
reviewed by WOODWORTH (1938 ; WOODWORTH and SCHLOS-
supports this conclusion. hus, MOVEY (1928) showed that
igence test scores under nditions of intense distraction
(firecrackers, bells, insults, etc.) was virtually the same as under control
conditions. This is generally true: the mean level of performance under
distractions stress is quite stable, although the variance increases, both
within and between individuals (LAZARUSet al., 1952).
The ability to withstand short-term distraction is not restricted to
studb:nts or to adults, or to highly intelligent Ss. In a recent study, we
presented a highly heterogeneous sample of 140 boys, 14 years old,
with lists of 5 or 6 digits that they were to retain for an interval of 15
set, under instructions to refrain from rehearsing aloud. On half the
trials, we played Beatle songs into their ears at four times normal speed,
during the entire retenti(lJn interval. The wild az~d exciting sound had
only a *mildeffect in de,ipressing memory scores: the mean percent of
digits remembered, rega,rdless of or er, decreased only from 89.4%
to 83.8%. Since performance on such a test is known to collapse when
the S engages in almos7t any kind of interpolated activity, it follows
that our Ss could maintain a fairly steady rate of rehearsal in spite
of intense stimulation. Neither IQ nor socio-economic background
were found to predict susceptibility to distraction in individual boys.
The: relative stability of performance under distraction indicates that
information-processing capacity is properly allocated to the main
task, but this stability is achieved at a distinct cost. Autonomic and
skeletal manifestations of heightened tension abound (FORD, 1929;
FREEMAN,3939).
There are indications (HOCKEY,1969) that prolonged exposure to
loud izoise induces a significant increase in the level of arousal, with
a secondary effect on the level of performance; in accordance with
the familiar Yerkes-Dodson law, performance may improve on aft easy
task (MCGRATH, 1963) or deteriorate when the task is complex (e.g.
BROADBENT, 1951).
There is suggestive evidence that a distractor is more lik
processing capacity when the primary task is easy. G.
120 D. KAWNEWLN

and 1 recently asked a sample of students to perform paced computation

tasks. They heard an instruction in the right ear, for example Add!,
then three digits, at a rate of l/set. They were to respond with the result
on the next beat. For example : Subtract! 23, 7, 8 - the answer is 8.
Each exercise takes 5 sec. The total work period of 8 min was divided
into successive intervals of 15 set, alternating silence with random
snatches from popular songs, played at a normal rate into the left
ear. Performance was slightly poorer and skin conductance was higher
during the music intervals. The decrement of performance was due
mainly to the easier addition task, which dropped from 89% to 82%
correct; performance on subtraction was less affected (77:/, to 74%
correct; t = 2.98 for the interaction, Jf= 83).
There is a choice of interpretations for these results. It could be argued
that our Ss were Icss challenged by the easy addition task and deliberately
abandoned it on some occasions to concentrate on the music. The
r&ective performance decrement would then represent a failure to obey
instructions rather than a failure of attertional control. If the selective
decrement was not intentional, on the other hand. the control unit
:must be faulted for underestimating the demand ol he easier task.

2.2. Multiple tmk per-&-~zanee

The issue of optimality is far more interesting and more complex
in the multiple-task case, where the very difinition of optimality presents
major difficulties. There are two main variants of multiple tasks. The
various tasks involve the same organ in the simpler case, and this neces-
sarily implies a sequential organization of perfformance. John Sen.ders
describes the delightful example of a man who reads a newspaper by
the swimming pool while watching a toddler engaged in a random
crawl in the area. At any one time he can look at the baby or read the
paper, but not both. In the more complex case, the competing tasks
require different sensory channels and different effecters. Driving a
car while holding a conversation is an example.
The allocation of successive observing responses is a problem of
tig: the baby-watcher must adjust his looks away from the news-
paper to a frequency which is sufficient to maintain the risk of the baby
falling into the pool within acceptable bounds. SENDERSet al. (1966)
have studied the allocation of observing responses in a multiple-dial
moti[oring situation. A normative model can be developed for observing
behavior that is optimally responsive to the frequency of critical signals.
 ATTENTION
CONTROL 121

The behavior of the Ss conforms closely to the normative model. Thus,

thecontrol unit appears to function optimally in the observing-response
situation. It seems capable of keeping track of the time elapsed since
the last look at a target and of triggering the next look at the appropriate
time. This is a very sophisticated calculation, which seems to be carried
out without conscious control.
Optimality is harder to assess in examples such as the drivers con-
versation, because the nature of time-sharing is opaque in these cases.
It is usually impossible to distinguish genuine arallel control of the
two activities from rapid alternation between them. Most research in
this design has been devoted to the demonstration of interference between
concurrent activities, and the conclusion is that interference is always
found with tasks of any difficulty (see BROWN, 1964; WELFORD, 1968,
ch. 4; for useful reviews). Indeed, even the most highiy practiced auto-
matic acts seem to impose a load on central capacity (POSNERand
KEELE,1968). While walking with a friend, you may ask him casually
to multipFy in his head 17 by 46, reaching the correct answer as fast
as he can. The probability is that he will immediately stop ir. his tracks.
Even walking interferes. Thus, all activities apparently draw upon a
common pool and performance of multiple tasks therefore requires
proper allocation of limited resources.
Optimal performance of multiple tasks must mean that the S maximizes
the total payoff associated with the various tasks. However, the Ss
performance can only be assessed if the payo% are explicit and if the
tradeoff function between the tasks is known. The state of the art is
still very rudimentary in this area of research (BROWN, 1964).
A simple limiting case which permits some assessment of the effect-
iveness of control is that in which the S is instructed to consider one
of the tasks as primary and to devote only spare capacity to the other
task (e.g., POULTON,1958; SCHOUTENet al., 1962; TUNE, 1964). When
the I:asks are hierarchically defined in this manner, control is optimal
if performance on the primary task remains unaffected by the introduction
of the secondary. Several studies have reported that the primary task
is duly protected in this manner (e.g., BRowN,1962; POULTON,1458).
Other studies report impairment of primary performance (e.g., BROAD-
BENTand HERON, 1962; MURDOCK,1965; TUNE, 1964), but it is dif-
ficult to evaluate these results because of the ambiguity of the instructions
used: the S must perform the secondary task, thcugh he is instructed
to protect the primary. What is his optimal course of action if he
122 D. KARINEMAN

cannot in fact perform the two tasks together without disrupting primary
performance?
11~ah the experiments cited, performance was gl.obally assessed over
substantial periods of work. StudEes of second-by-second interference
provide more detailed evidence for the impressive; effectiveness of attent-
ional allocation. One experiment of this kind (KANNEMAN et al., 1967)
was designed to validate changes of pupil diametr:,r as an index of mental
1oa.d.The primary task was a digit-transformation procedure: S heard
four tape-recorded digits (e.g. 8362) at a rate of l/set, paused for one
second, then answered with four digits (9473), adding 1 to each of the
original digdts, in time with l/set beats. Letters were flashed on a promi-
nent display at a rate of S/set during the entire course of the digit-
transformation task.. The secondary task was to report, after the trial,
whether the letter K. had been shown. The subject was paid 2# for every
correct digit-transformation. He was also paid I$ for every hit or correct
rejection with respect to the K, but only for those trials on which the
transformation had been correctly performed. False alarms on the K-
detection task were always heavily pemlizedl (S& but misses were not.
The pupil response in this task is highly repeatable (KAMNEMAN et al.,
1969). It consists of a steady dilation during the input phase and the
pause, which reaches a peak on the first or second digit spoken by the
subject, then subsides rapidly. Performance on the detection task follow-
ed a very similar function: detection of the K was best when the K
was shown early or late in the task, and worst when it was shown during
the pause or the early phase of tht: report. The study emphasised the
similarity of the two functions and barely mentioned another result,
which now seems at least equally important: performance of the trans-
formation task was entirely independent of the time at which the target
letter was shown. One could expect that encoding the occurrence of
3, K would interfere with performance, particularly at the critical time
of &ma1 efR)rt in the primary tes,t. The results indicate that Ss simply
did not see K att that time, and thus protected the more important task.
Fig. 1 represents partial results from two subsequent experiments
carri out at arvard with Ruth Wolman. .Ss performed the digit
transformation task while !ooking at a computer-controlled scope face.
Digits were Bashed WI the scope at a S/WC rate, starting one second
before the auditory presentation of the digits to be transformed. At an
unpredictable *time during the task, the following sequence was flashed
on t!: 3 scope : 50 msec of visual noise; a single letter presented for 80
 EN-I-ION CONTROL 123

msec of visual noise. The S was requested to recall the letter

at the end of the trial. The experi ents from which figs. la and 1 b
rawn were conducted with different scopes, and only the overall
slopes of the curves can be compared.

c
(al
8+l LISTEN
I! I REPORT LISTEN REPOflT
80 80
70 70
60 66
56 66
40 40
36
20
10
I I

TIME (SEC) TIME (SEC,

Fig. 1. (a) Percentage failures of digit transformation 2nd percentage failures of

letter identifications for trials on which digit transformation war correct. Results
for 15 Ss, 60 trials per S. (b) As above, with odified payoffs (see text). W = 12.

Fig. la shows results for the following payoff matrix: success in both
tasks 4$ bonus; in digit transformations alone 2$ bonus; failure of
digit transformations 4$ penalty. This payoff structure produces a
conservative strategy of task protection; the primdry task of digit trans-
formation is fully protected, and performance on that task is inde-
pendent of the timing of the potentrally interfering letter.
The payoff structure was modified in another experiment (fig. lb).
Success in both tasks gave 4$ bonus; in digit transformation alone,
no pay; while failure of digit transformation gave 4$ penalty. The ne!N
payoffs induced a gambling strategy in which Ss tried to perform both
tasks on each trial. An inverted U function now appeared for both
digit transformation and the identification of the target letter. The
trend was slight but highly consistent for 12 Ss. On quite a few trials,
both tasks were missed. The S temporarily got hold of the letter, scram-
bled to catch up with the transformation task, missed it, only to discover
that the letter was now forgotten.
There are strong indications that the performance illustrated in fig.
la was in fact optimal. The primary task was fully protected, and excess
124 D. KAHNEMAN

capacity was available on a second-by-second basis for the execution

of the secondary task. One could hardly ask any control unit to do
any better.
It is much more difficult to evaluate performance in fig. lb, in the
absence of detailed infor:mation on the tradeoff relation between the
two taysks.All one can say is that a shift in the direction of a gambling
strategy appears justified. This difficulty illustrates an unsolved metho-
dological problem, which urgently requires attention. Complex parametric
experiments are required, If the type that RABBITTand VYAS(this
volume:, p. 56) has done for ::peed-accuracy tradeoff in RT, before Ss
performance in time sharing can be evaluated.
The type of attentional control that these experiments illustrate is
very commonly applied in everyday life. Thus, the experienced driver
will normally interrupt h.is conversation while making a turn into the
traffic, but may continue it while making a less dangerous turn. The
transition is smooth, effortless, and very rarely involves a conscious
decision. As far as 3 know, even spec:ulative efforts have not been directed
to the question of how the allocation system works. One could imagine
active systems, in which the demands) of the various tasks are continuously
monitored, or passive systems. like a queue at a shop, where the first
customers take all they need, and subsequent customers take what is
left.
In evaluating the attentional strategies of our Ss, it is important to
note that thefailures ofi:knt$cation in fig. I were often errors of perception
and szot of memqq. The retention interval is longest when S is asked
to recall a letter shown early in the trial, but performance is most deficient
when the letter is shown in the middle of the digit transformation.
The distinction between failures of memory and failures of perception
was usually obvious on individual trials. There were instance!; in which
Ss knew at the end of the Gal that t:hey had seen a letter, now forgotten.
Their guesses about the identity of the letter were then likely to be acoustic
confusions. However, these cases were not typical. Most often, .Ss
:;ould unwillingly hazard a guess that was subjectively random.

3. &BEIXTERMINANTS
OF ATTENTIONAL
PERFORMANCE
3.1. Attentional egectiveness and spatial orientation
Selective attention is normally spatial, and appears to be most effective
when it has that character. This rulle zems to apply to audition as well
as to vision, and it may provide an important clue to thi: operation
 ATTENTION
CXINTROL 125

of the control unit. ANNE TREISMAN (1969) has reviewed studies of

selective listening which show that we can select auditory messages
that differ in such physical characteristics as pitch or sex cf speaker
and in less obvious characteristics such as content or language. gut
there seems to be no doubt that best performance in selective attention
is achieved when spatial orientation is possible, most spectacularly
when following a message in one ear while ignoring a different message
in the other ear. Although BROADBENT (1954) was among the first to
stress the importance of spatial localization in selective attention, the
more abstract and general statement of his filter theory, according to
which any physical attribute may be used in selection of inputs, may
lead us to forget that spatial location has a special status.
Attention to a location in space permits a selective orientaticn. This
orientation seems to be often associated with eye movements, but it
is not always accompanied by what the Russians call an orienting response
(OR). Ne have observed this dissociation between orientation and the
OR in a selective monitoring test. The test, which was constructed in
collaboration with Daniel Gofer, requires S to repeat every digit in a
mixed message consisting of digits and words. Different messages are
presented o the two ears, at ::, rate of 2 items/set in each ear. The ear
that S is to follow is periodically indicated by a tone. The test shows
promising correlations with the perfor ante of aircraft pilots.
Selective hlonitoting of one ear involves an orientation, which fre-
quently has overt components. The eyes look in that direction, the head is
often tiited, and there are other signs of heightened tonus on the selected
side. The shift of orientation which a tone occasions is also very noticeable.
However, a recent study of 15 Ss showed that these tones elicit no con-
sistent GSR. There is a GSR to the Ready signal, and the increased
level of conductance is often maintained during a good part of the
message, but no detectable GSR follows either the first or second tone.
The general response also tends to habituate rather quickly. This finding
of orientation without an OR suggests that we should carefully maintain
a distinction between the orienting response as defmed by autonomic
indicators and by alpha-blocking (LYNN,1966) and the type of orientation
which selective attention often demands.
Ss seem to believe that selective orientation helps maintain selective
attention. Recently a naval rating at APU exclaimed, after a few trials
of selective monitoring: If I look to the right, I can listen to the right
ear!. Should we take his word, or should we assume that fixation to
126 D. KAHNEMAN

the right while attending to the right earphone is an outcome or life-long

conditioning.7 IBirect evidence is lacking, but the consideration of
orientation may help resolve some puzzles in this area. Thus, BROADBENT
(1956) observed that alternations between the two ears became difficult
to follow beyond a rate of 3fsec. The idea that this parameter re
the time needed for a shift of the filter is probably no longer held today,
but there remains a remarkable correspondence between the rat& of
comfortable #alternation and the standard rate of saccadic movements.
Similarly, TRIZISMAN (this volume, p. 132) describes the difficulties that
ss encounter in following a message that is rapidly switched from ear
to ear. This result is not counter-intuitive if we imagine her Ss trying
t> follow the message with their eyes, as spectators at a tabletennis
match. The concept of orientation may be invoked in two ways to
accou::; for these results: (a) orientation is funcitonal in dichotic listen-
ing, arrd performanr z dpteriorates when the rate of alternation exceeds
the possibiz rate of orientation; (b) orientation is not functional but the
eticitation of con&ctEng and abortive orientations at fast rates is disruptive.
Sclecuve orientation and eye-movements are obviously crucial in
vision because of the superiority of central over peripheral vision, but
orientation is significant even when that lactor i:s removed. Thus,
BRYDEN (1961) and CROVITZand DAVES (1962) have shown that accuracy
of reports of a tachistoscopic display is related to the direction of eye-
movements after the exposure. In the same vein, we may consider
the findings of I-Mars and HABER(1963) th;:t Ss who encode all dimensions
of an object as a single unit do better than Ss who attempt to encode
one dimension at a time for several objects. There are several plausible
explanations for this superiority of Objects coderc over Dimension coders.
One is that object coding best corresponds to the structure of the English
language. ANNETREISMAN (1969) has recently proposed another theory,
suggestjng that all dimensions of a single object may be efficiently
analyzed 61 parallel because the various dimensions are sorted out by
independent analyzers. I see no flaw in these explanations, but we should
also note that a single visual object requires a single act of orientation,
and1 that any operation which requires; several successive orientations
is necessarily perfumed sequentially.
There is an intriguing suggestion that spatial location may be used
for negative selection of stimuli to be ignored, as well as for positive
s&&n of messages to be attended. Tire deleterious effects of noise
of%long-term performance are reduced. when the noise comes over
 kb
TTENTIQNCDNTRQL 327

earphones, in comparison to the case where noise of the same intensitlr

is rceived as room noise ( RQADBENT, personal communication).
nally, a topic of some interest is the state of orientation of ,a 3
.~vhofollows his own trend of thought, as in rehearsal or mental arithme-A
his problem was the object of much analytic introspection.
observers agree that inner voices are definitely localized and that the
localization becomes sharper a more distinct when one is struggling
to resist distracting stimu,lation PERLING, 1967). In addition, informal
observations suggez c al thing we do when thinking about
an object which is available in the field of vision is to look at it, even
when the look cannot be expected to provide any useful information.
We may also do well to look when the object is absent. NORMAN
(1968) reviews literature on mnemonics and notes that one of the most
powerful techniques is t at of imagining that the items to be recalled
are placed in different locations. Recall is accomplished by visualizing
enting to) each location and, thereby discovering the object.
n summary, the suggestion is advanced that the control unit for
attention prefereutiahy uses a spatial code to label attended sources of
stimulation, and also, attended objects of thought, and that it appears
to rely on movements and on postural adjustments, notably of the
eyes, to achieve and maintain the state f selective attention.

3.2. Atterltional eflectiveness in diflerent tasks

The most impressive demonstrations of selective attention have come
to us from studies of shadowing. It was CHERRY (1953) who originally
showed how little information one retains from one message while
simultaneously shadowing another, and ANNE TREISMAN, (e.g., 1960,
1964) has extendeLI and qualified these findings in a series of fine ex-
periments. A S who is not specific&y instructed to detect some feature
of the rejected message apparently knows virtually nothing about that
message, not even the language in which it was spoken. Even when the
S is instructed to detect specific events on the rejected channel, he does
very poorly, as Treisman has recently demonstrated. (TREISMAN and
GEFFE~, 1967; TREISMAN and RILEY, 1969). The r,ationale for using
shadowing is that this task forces the S to attend continuously to one
channel, and provides objective evidence that he follows that instruction.
It appears, however, that the extremely high selectivity that is observed
in shadowing is in part a characteristic of the task. Selectivity is certainly
poorer in other tasks.
 Ii28 D. IGUiINRMAN

MOUY and OBRIEN(1967) have reported a study in which they

required their Ss to monitor for letters in a stream of digits, at 100
items per minute. Their instructions for one of the experimental conditions
were as follows: Listen only to your right ear. Try to shut out the left
ear which is an attempt to distract you. Whenever ycu hear a letter from
tl$;eleft ear, despite your efforts to avoid it, tap the left key. Try to shut
them out, but if you hear one, tap the left key. Your main job is to
ibp the right hand key for the right ear letters.
These instructions are straightforward in theic emphasis on the
importance of monitoring the right ear message. They suggest that it
Is optimal to maintain the same performance as one woald without
the left ear message, and to block out the left ear completc:ly. Ss were
apparently unable to comply fully with this insttuction. Moray and
OBrien report their results in d; the mean d for the right e;nr decreases
f;rom 5.02 in the absence of a left-ear message to 3.71 when it is present,
and the mean d for the rejected left-ear is a respectable il.43. Moray
and dBrien note the discrepancy between their observations on monitor-
ing, and normal shadowing results, and they comment on the extremely
yol.verful locking-on of the S ?o one message in shadowing.
It could be argued against Moray and OBrien that the instruction
to tap to left-ear items lent some importance to the left-ear message,
which was then deliberately attended siJrne of the time. Mowever, an
expeeriment from my laboratory, which avoids this criticism, produced
similar results.
The experiment iis run as follows: S hears a stream of words, dif-
ferent words in each ear, for a period of 15 sec. The words are recorded
at ~/XC, so that S is presented with a total of 62 words on each. trial.
Immediately after the message, 5 turns to a checklist on which 3~ finds
24 words: 8 from the right-ear list, 8 from the left-ear, and 8 distracters
selected from the same pool of bisyllabic Hebrew words.
Very recently, we ran 20 students on this task, alternating two con-
9 ditions: on half the trials, they h.eard words on both ears but were
instructed to ignore the left ear. After each trial, Ss scored themselves:
2 points for each right-ear word correctly checked, a penalty of 1 point
for each left-ear word or w;rtside distractor. Thus, Ss are penalized
for listening to the left ear, but they are unable to refrain completely
from doirfg so: they check 55.3 % of the right-ear words, 29.7 % of the
left-ear words and 20.2% of outside distracters (t = 4.73 for the dif-
fi:rence between the left-ear and outside wor&). Thus, the effect of
 ATTENTICiN CONTROL 129

left-ear words (crudely measured by the percentage difference between

these words and outside distracters) is 20% of the effects of right-ear
words. As in the oray and 0 rien study, selectivity is far from
perfect.
We have now come back to the question of optimality with which
this paper began. There seem to be two broad classes of tasks: (1)
shadowing, the distraction studies, and the double-task situations that
were discussed earlier - in all these the allocation of attention appears
nearly optimal; (2) monitoring and the recognition task just. described,
in which selectivity fails very significantly. What can the contrast teach
us about the conditions for effective attention?
A tentative generalization may be that selective control of attention
is effective when the primary task involves an activity that is continuous
and coherent, regardless of whether the activity is overt or covert.
The meaning of continuity is obvious; its antonym is intermittence.
The example of shadowing may illustrate when is meant by coherence.
Normal shadowing is phrase shadowing (NCFZMAN,968). There is group-
ing at the output end, and the lag that Ss sponta eously adopt permits
them to have an idea of what the next response will be even as they
emit the current group. Although intonation is often flattened in high-
speed shadowing, enough remains to i icate that responses are si;c-
cessively predictive of one another, and that is the essence of response
coherence.
It is apparent that monitoring for digits in a stream of words is neither
continuous nor coherent. It is probably significant that this task
exhibits a refractoriness effect. In the monitoring task that I described
earlier, Gofer and I observed that, when tw-o digits are separated by
a single intervening word, the probability of the seconti being missed
when the first is reported is 9.20//,. That probability decreases to 1.6%
when the digits are separated by 7 words. In monitoring, in contrast
to shadowing, the second response is not anticipated when the first
is prepared.
The fai!,ure of selectivity in the recognition task cannot be due to
the mere absence of overt activity: we have seen that selectivity remains
excellent during silent rehearsal. However, the 5 in the recognition
experiment is prevented from organizing a coherent, and continuous
response, of the type which occurs in rehearsal, and this may be the
source of his difficulty.
130 D. KANNEMAN

4. CONCLUSIONS

I lhave been able in this paper merely to scatter comments on the

gene.rd area of a control mechanism for attention. A. brief review of
major points may help put them in perspective.
(1) Resistance to distraction is usud!y excellent; it is not restricted
to aIdults or intelligent Ss.
(2) Direct failures of attentional control, in which capacity is captured
by the distractor, must be distinguished from indirect effects which
are mediated by changes of arousal.
(3) Two requirements for the assessment of the effectiveness of control
have not been met in studies of multiple-task performance : (a) specifi-
cation of payoffs; (b) parametric investigation of tradeoff functions.
(4) Studies of second-by-second performance of multiple tasks suggest
that the allocation of effort may often approach optimality.
(5) In sketching miodelsof attentional allocation, both active distribution
systems and passivle queuing models should be cotrsidered.
(6) Spatial orientation appears tc be a common mode gf attentional
control, in both input and processing modes.
(7) Selective orien!tation is not always accompanied by an OR.
(89 The elicitation of conflicting orienting tendencies could account
for performance decremer,ts in the channel-switching situation, regardless
of whether the orientations are in fact functional.
(9) Any processing that has a major orientation component is necessarily
serial.
(10) Selective attention is far from optimal in selective monitoring
and in selective listening without response, I::ncontrast to shadowing.
(11) The suggestion is advanced that the opportunity for continuous,
coherent, serially organized behavior is an important determinant of
effective attentional control.

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