15.3.1: Attention

Learning Objectives

1. Describe the different types of attention.
2. Explain how temperament, task complexity, and sensory modality affect selective attention.
3. Summarize key research findings related to young children's attentional control.

Changes in attention have been described by many as the key to changes in human memory (Nelson & Fivush, 2004; Posner & Rothbart, 2007). However, attention is not a unified function; it is comprised of sub-processes. The ability to switch our focus between tasks or external stimuli is referred to as divided attention or multitasking. This is separate from our ability to focus on a single task or stimulus while ignoring distracting information, called selective attention. Different from these is sustained attention, or the ability to remain focused on a task for extended periods of time. Moreover, we also have attention processes that influence our behavior and enable us to inhibit a habitual or dominant response, as well as others that allow us to distract ourselves when upset or frustrated.

Divided Attention

Young children (age 3-4) have considerable difficulties in dividing their attention between two tasks, and often perform at levels equivalent to our closest relative, the chimpanzee, but by age five they have surpassed the chimp (Hermann, Misch, Hernandez-Lloreda & Tomasello, 2015; Hermann & Tomasello, 2015). Despite these improvements, 5-year-olds continue to perform below the level of school-age children, adolescents, and adults.

Selective Attention

Children’s ability to focus on selective attention tasks improves as they age. However, this ability is also greatly influenced by the child’s temperament (Rothbart & Rueda, 2005), the complexity of the stimulus or task (Porporino, Shore, Iarocci & Burack, 2004), and along with whether the stimuli are visual or auditory (Guy, Rogers & Cornish, 2013). Guy et al. (2013) found that children’s ability to attend to visual information selectively outpaced that of auditory stimuli. This may explain why young children struggle to hear the teacher's voice over the cacophony of sounds in a typical preschool classroom (Jones, Moore, & Amitay, 2015). Jones and his colleagues found that 4- to 7-year-olds could not filter out background noise, especially when its frequencies were similar to those of the target sound. In comparison, 8- to 11-year-old children often performed similarly to adults.

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): A group of children making crafts. Image by Joint Base Charleston is in the public domain.

Sustained Attention

Most measures of sustained attention typically ask children to spend several minutes focusing on one task while waiting for an infrequent event, despite the presence of multiple distractors for several minutes. Berwid, Curko-Kera, Marks & Halperin (2005) asked children between the ages of 3 and 7 to push a button whenever a “target” image was displayed. Still, they had to refrain from pushing the button when a non-target image was shown. The younger the child, the more difficulty they had maintaining their attention.

Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): A child playing a game that measures her sustained attention. Image by Fabrice Florin is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

References, Contributors and Attributions

Berwid, O. G., Curko Kera, E. A., Marks, D. J., Santra, A., Bender, H. A., & Halperin, J. M. (2005). Sustained attention and response inhibition in young children at risk for Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 46(11), 1219–1229. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2005.00416.x

Guy, J., Rogers, M., & Cornish, K. M. (2013). Age-related changes in visual and auditory sustained attention in preschool-aged children. Child Neuropsychology, 19(6), 601–614. https://doi.org/10.1080/09297049.2012.734293

Herrmann, E., Misch, A., Hernández-Lloreda, M. V., & Tomasello, M. (2015). Uniquely human self-control begins at school age. Developmental Science, 18(6), 979–993. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12274

Herrmann, E., & Tomasello, M. (2015). Focusing and shifting attention in human children and chimpanzees. Journal of Comparative Psychology, 129(3), 268–274. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0039384

Jones, P. R., Moore, D. R., & Amitay, S. (2015). Development of auditory selective attention: Why children struggle to hear in noisy environments. Developmental Psychology, 51(3), 353–369. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0038570

Nelson, K., & Fivush, R. (2004). The emergence of autobiographical memory: A social cultural developmental theory. Psychological Review, 111(2), 486–511. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.111.2.486

Porporino, M., Shore, D. I., Iarocci, G., & Burack, J. A. (2004). A developmental change in selective attention and global form perception. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 88(3), 205–219. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2004.03.007

Posner, M. I., & Rothbart, M. K. (2007). Educating the human brain. American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/11519-000

Rothbart, M. K., & Rueda, M. R. (2005). The development of effortful control. In U. Mayr, E. Awh, & S. W. Keele (Eds.), Developing individuality in the human brain: A tribute to Michael I. Posner (pp. 167–188). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/11108-009