The science of attention

[James Burleigh]

This morning a UC Berkeley neuroscientist, Michael Silver, gave a speech entitled "How attention affects what you see." Here's the description:



We are continuously bombarded with an enormous amount of information entering our eyes. How do our brains extract the most relevant parts of this fire hose of information? Attention is one way the brain selects certain aspects of the environment for enhanced processing. I will discuss the effects of attention on visual perception and summarize what we know about the underlying brain mechanisms. A better understanding of the effects of attention on perception would be relevant for a wide variety of activities, including setting policy for cell phone use while driving, improving performance of airport luggage screeners, and optimizing teaching methods in the classroom.
As part of the presentation, the following video was shown. You will be surprised at what you missed after watching the video. What lessons does it hold for motorcyclists?



As one who works on the administrative staff at UC Berkeley and has published a couple of articles on motorcycle safety, I'm going to try to get an interview with Dr. Silver to explore and publish an article about how his work can help motorcyclists become more informed about how to focus their attention when riding.

As soon as the lecture is put up on line I will attach the link.

JB

 

[ShinyPartsUp]

Excellent subject JB. It is a fascinating area of study. Attention and perception skills have amazing quirks that can be trained. I will be most interested to see what develops in your search specifically related to motorcycles.

A small hijack I hope you will tolerate: I use this video in my practice with PTSD veterans on how hypervigilence for specific stimuli can affect their perception of the world around them, and to posit that they may be missing relevant data in choosing responses. I think this also would relate to motorcyclists as well.

The task is to count the number of times the basketball is passed (best viewed in full screen mode):

Basketball passing video

 

[madmike2]

Actually, the topic applies to ALL vehicle operators. Part of the phenomenon he discussed is why automobile drivers don't "see" motorcycles. It is purely an involuntary subconscious lack of perception on their part. That's why they appear to be looking right at us yet don't perceive us as we approach.

I recall reading an article published in Motorcycle Consumer News a few years ago that discussed and illuminated this very concept. The same issue had an article by the contributing writer of the "Mental Motorcycling" page.

Obviously, added the distraction of cell phone usage, eating, reading or using one's computer while driving multiplies that basic factor.

That's why I (and others, including yourself, JB) use the minutes of suiting up to ride as a time of introspection and mental preparation for our impending trip. "Ride your own ride" must include having our mental faculties attuned.

It seems to me that having our attention tightly focused could be our enemy when we should work at keeping our field of perception and recognition wider and be more open to multiple solutions to every situation, i.e., more than one avenue of escape in case of an emergency invasion of our safety zone or braking/slowing sooner because we more quickly perceived a hazard.

Butt, eye'm knot edumicated, eye mirrorly tries tuh live bye my witts.

 

[James Burleigh]

No hijack at all, SPU. In fact, the basketball video was also shown. And Mad, I had not thought about the angle of car drivers not seeing motorcyclists. I finally understood what that meant when I learned it was not about our smallness as visual input, but our smallness as non-threatening to the driver. Consider how motorcyclists see bicyclists. Same idea.

 

[CHRIS_D]

Great video.

In my MSF classes I always bring up the fact that you should never trust a driver even though he or she may be looking directly at you. Not only are you non-threatening as stated above (good point!), that driver (that's about to pull out in front of you) may be expecting to see an automobile and not even mentally register your presence at all.

 

[Checkswrecks]

Great find JB. The levitating cork was interesting, too.

Emphasizing again the importance of doing what the mind will grab, such as

Headlights and fairing features that resemble a face. A Yamaha designer is quoted somewhere mentioning that they found that faces help sell bikes and a side benefit is improved recognition. The Ducati 1098 sure fits in.

Modulators.

Large fields of brightness like traffic-orange jackets, yellow helmets, and comparing the FJR twin headlights against my old KLR.

Etc.

But you were probably actually looking for his list of sexiest sports when you found this, right?

 

[fjrchooser]

I've found the expectation of what you commonly expect to see colors your perception of what you actually see and how you react .

For instance, where I live now is a rural area with many lakes, farms ,forests, a large non-motorized Amish community and tourists that come to see it all .

Very different from the industrial city area I grew up, lived and worked in for so many years and people were creatures of habit often driving on auto-pilot in their familiar surroundings.

No longer can I count on intersections being the primary danger points, nor vehicles using only roads to access other roads as the Amish will turn to or from anywhere and tractors often enter from or exit to tree lined fields .

Much like the video I'm often surprised sometimes by what I missed on the first look.

Very eye opening video & discussion JB.

 

[James Burleigh]

And Mad, I had not thought about the angle of car drivers not seeing motorcyclists. I finally understood what that meant when I learned it was not about our smallness as visual input, but our smallness as non-threatening to the driver.

Another way to think about this is the opposite, namely, of something clearly threatening. Consider when you're in your car and you're sitting at a stop sign at a intersection waiting to cross a rural highway where traffic is going 65 MPH and does not stop at your intersection. You want to go straight across. You look left and see a huge semi-truck barrelling toward you. You could make it, but it might be close. So you wait because the truck can turn your car and you into a smashed coke can on the road.

Now if that were a motorcycle coming toward you (say you weren't a rider and hense not hyper-sensitive), you have two variables at work as you ponder the decision to pull out: the M.C. is not as threatening, and you cannot judge as well how fast it is going.

Presumptions: you are rational, of average risk aversion, and make intelligent driving decisions. And oh yeah. MadMike2 is driving the truck!

 

[wfooshee]

When I saw the first post, I thought of the vid I'd seen similar to the one in the second post. When I actually clicked that link this morning I found it was a different one, so I went out and found the one I'd seen. It's similar to the one in post 2, but it's more players. A British PSA to "watch for cyclists."



I've not played either of the basketball vids to anyone who found the bear, gorilla, whatever it was in the vid, the first time they saw it. My daughter actually noticed one of the color changes in the card trick video, the woman's shirt. Of course, my daughter is the chief of the fashion police, so she see women's clothes.

 

[madmike2]

Presumptions: you are rational, of average risk averseness, and make intelligent driving decisions. And oh yeah. MadMike2 is driving the truck!

You should hope so because he will have perceived your situation, understood your thought processes, has anticipated the likelihood of a bad decision on your part and is mentally prepared to apply one of many avoidance maneuvers to save your life.

It's what I do everyday at work and try to carry over to my riding habits.

To underscore the article I referenced in my other post, the writer MCN article rode 4 different motorcycles for 2 weeks at a time (The first 3 were "cruiser, "naked" and "touring") wearing dark clothing for one week then, for the second week, driving lights, bright clothing and a white helmet.

During the test he noted/logged each incident of invasive behavior and failure to see him by automobile drivers in commute traffic and while driving in a metropolitan area (intersections, etc.).

The 4th motorcycle was an ex-police BMW and he word a police-style helmet and a tan jacket.

Based on the logged data of incidents, the first 3 types of motorcycles, regardless of lighting and bright clothing, there was little difference in recognition by motorists. The police-style motorcycle was seen and recognized by automobile drivers and there were almost no incidents. His conclusion: the police bike was perceived and recognized as a threat on a subconscious level.

Perhaps now, you who have ridden with me, understand why I mounted my driving lights as I have, even if I rarely use them. My FJR's profile/appearance closely resembles a police BMW and I believe that gives me an advantage on my daily commute. Cars actually allow me a wide space when lane sharing and I'm convinced it's because of the visual impact in their mirrors and mind.

Maybe not.

 

[wfooshee]

Maybe a busy paint job, like this one GunMD posted a couple of years ago.

 

[FJRBluesman]

Very good topic, great comments too. I'm interested to hear more from you after the lecture.

The mind works in amazing ways in how it processes things from our senses, especially from our sight.

Magicians are very smart in the area of visual sight and how our brain processes things we see. They rely on knowing what we saw and how our brain will register what we saw. Hence they get the trick down and slight of hands etc, fools our brains, or really slips passed what really happened. Our brains many times see something and then it'll fill the gaps for us. Movies are a great examples of small snip-its our brain puts together as one continuous flow. Water coming out of a hose is the same. One fun science class we had, there was a tube of water pouring into a bucket, we all can imagine what that looks like. Sync a strobe light on it and it's not a steady flow of water, it's many small drops of water that our brain puts together as one continuous flow.

Cool stuff.

One of the key things is when we ride we must be in tune to so many things, if we get fixated on one thing or target we can be in trouble as the rest of the world is ignored. In all of these "visual" tests we were told or lured away from all that was going on, we were told to focus on one thing in particular, we did and we missed many things. As MM2 stated you must go in on your game and be able to process all going on and not focus for just one or two things.

 

[madmike2]

Maybe a busy paint job, like this one GunMD posted a couple of years ago.

The problem is recognition and perception of risk. Regardless of colors, on a subconscious level, motorcycles are not "seen".

As motorcyclists, our mindset and recognition of a motorcycle and any modifications is vastly different than the typical automobile driver. Even in my car or work truck I SEE motorcycles because, since I own one, they are of interest to me and thus are part of my subconscious response function.

Most automobile drivers do not have the same interests and do not perceive (on a subconscious, response triggering level) motorcycles, bicycles, pedestrians, etc., because when they are attempting to turn into or cross traffic they are focused on other cars or trucks. Other objects are not recognized.

Great topic, JB!

 

[James Burleigh]

I've not played either of the basketball vids to anyone who found the bear, gorilla, whatever it was in the vid, the first time they saw it. My daughter actually noticed one of the color changes in the card trick video, the woman's shirt. Of course, my daughter is the chief of the fashion police, so she see women's clothes.

I saw the gorilla and wonder why doesn't everyone see it. But even as a person who oil paints and cares about color (but not fashion) I did not see any of the other color changes in the card-trick vid.

I wondered if seeing the gorilla in the basketball vid was partly because of an ability to widen my vision (for movement not color) as I do when I commute on the freeway and go up between cars.

 

[James Burleigh]

To underscore the article I referenced in my other post, the writer MCN article rode 4 different motorcycles for 2 weeks at a time (The first 3 were "cruiser, "naked" and "touring") wearing dark clothing for one week then, for the second week, driving lights, bright clothing and a white helmet.
During the test he noted/logged each incident of invasive behavior and failure to see him by automobile drivers in commute traffic and while driving in a metropolitan area (intersections, etc.).<snip>

This experiment is curious to me. Apart from a car in the no. 2 freeway lane merging at 65 MPH over into me as it changed lanes into the no.1 lane the other day (I just giddy-uped and shook my head), I cannot recall really any incidents in my commuting or weekend riding where a car viloated my right-of-way. I think a large part of the explanation for that is my riding strategies and style (e.g., I don't sit in one place in my lane and let traffic respond to me like, in my mind, the stereo-typical HD rider, including my brother-in-law).

I'm not questioning the study or the results, which I think are telling, and right (I like to think I look like a cop to some drivers too--just look at my current FaceBook avatar--pasted below). But I do wonder how the experimenter determined when a violation occurred or did not.

 

[dcarver]

Now if that were a motorcycle coming toward you (say you weren't a rider and hense not hyper-sensitive), you have two variables at work as you ponder the decision to pull out: the M.C. is not as threatening, and you cannot judge as well how fast it is going.

I can distill this to an easily understandable bumper sticker.
The Lug Nut Rule

He with the most lug nuts rules.

You are welcome, carry on!

 

[ShinyPartsUp]

I've not played either of the basketball vids to anyone who found the bear, gorilla, whatever it was in the vid, the first time they saw it. My daughter actually noticed one of the color changes in the card trick video, the woman's shirt. Of course, my daughter is the chief of the fashion police, so she see women's clothes.

I saw the gorilla and wonder why doesn't everyone see it. But even as a person who oil paints and cares about color (but not fashion) I did not see any of the other color changes in the card-trick vid.

I wondered if seeing the gorilla in the basketball vid was partly because of an ability to widen my vision (for movement not color) as I do when I commute on the freeway and go up between cars.

A psychiatrist I work with asked me to watch the gorilla video about a year ago, when he was checking out using it in his practice. He was shocked I saw the gorilla. I too, saw the movement and checked it out -- Just as JB did. But I also lost track of the count of basketball passes. On a motorcycle, that could present difficulties as you try to process a new or unusual piece of information, and lose track of other "targets".

I didn't see any of the color changes in the card trick video. Maybe if the woman had bigger ****s I would have seen the sweater change -- which points to the theme of watching for those stimuli we are trained to see.

 

[James Burleigh]

Now if that were a motorcycle coming toward you (say you weren't a rider and hense not hyper-sensitive), you have two variables at work as you ponder the decision to pull out: the M.C. is not as threatening, and you cannot judge as well how fast it is going.

I can distill this to an easily understandable bumper sticker.
The Lug Nut Rule

He with the most lug nuts rules.

You are welcome, carry on!

That just about sums it up.

 

[worldbound4now]

Interesting video clips. I saw the background color change, but otherwise missed the other color changes. I did see the gorilla and was able to count the passes accurately. Unfortunately I wasted another 30 minutes staring at optical illusion videos on youtube... silver kitty phenomenon.